80 years later, AM radio institution CJAD is the enduring 'voice of Montreal'

Montreal's heritage radio station has survived ice storms, reported defining moments in Quebec, and weathered challenges to the radio industry.

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The Main

8 décembre 2025- Read time: 2 min
80 years later, AM radio institution CJAD is the enduring 'voice of Montreal'The CJAD studios in 1948. | Photograph: Conrad Poirier / Wikipedia

Eighty years ago today, on December 8, 1945, a radio station signed on in Montreal with call letters borrowed from its founder's name: J. Arthur Dupont stamped his initials onto the city's airwaves and launched CJAD from studios on Mountain Street, in a building that's now home to O'Sullivan College.

What started as a middle-of-the-road music station in the post-war era evolved into Montreal's go-to for news, talk, and local coverage. CJAD has been there for Quebec's defining moments: the Oka Crisis, the 1989 Polytechnique massacre, both referendums, the 2013 Lac-Mégantic rail disaster. For decades, it was also the English voice of the Montreal Canadiens, a role it held until 2010.

Photograph: Archives de la Ville de Montréal
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