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Montreal's Marvelous Melon

by Ronald T. Harvie

On January 1, 2000, the Montréal Gazette buried a Millennium Time Capsule that contained a selection of things uniquely and essentially connected to the city. Among the items: a puck from hockey's greatest shrine, the Montréal Forum; a passport to the most successful "World's Fair" in history, Expo 67; a baseball signed by Jackie Robinson; and--most intriguing of all--a packet of seeds for the Montréal Melon!

Why melon seeds, of all things? Simply because the Montréal Melon--once a world-renowned delicacy--had, to all intents and purposes become extinct. It had disappeared from seed catalogues altogether in 1954! And this delicious fruit, so highly valued for its subtlety of flavor and delicate color disappeared from the memory of the world's taste buds.

Or so it seemed. Because in 1991, Barry Lazar of the Montréal Gazette newspaper started wondering "whatever happened to the Montréal Melon?" Other people joined the hunt for the mystery's solution. Records of bygone melon-growers were unearthed. Photos found. Seed banks worldwide were scoured for anything resembling a survivor.

Persistence paid off and a few seeds came to light, which would supposedly grow into Montréal Melons. They did, and after several years, a bank of reliable seeds has been established. So, once again, people can grow--and enjoy--this wonderful member of the Reticulatis group of the species Cucumis melo.

Today, the leading lady in the drama of the Montréal Melon is Lee Taylor. She got the seeds into the Millennium Time Capsule. And she's been selling seeds by the thousands as part of a fund-raising campaign to restore the old train station that saw the out-shipment of thousands of tons of melons during their peak popularity period from 1880 to 1940.

King Edward VII's melon of choice

What made the Montréal Melon so popular for so long? First, its flavor, which might be described as the subtle, clean sweetness of the honeydew enlivened by a touch of the exotic heady flavor of the cantaloupe. Its color, too, was unique: a softer, peachier pink than the comparatively garish cantaloupe.

The classic Montréal Melon looked spectacular, too. Averaging 10 to 15 pounds in weight, the choicest specimens of the two types--the round "Décarie" and the oval "Gorman"--were ridged like pumpkins, only more deeply, more sculpturally. The outer skin resembled that of the cantaloupe.  But here too the Montréal Melon had more character: the "netting" of lacy lines that covered its surface was more varied, more intricate and more beautiful than that of its smaller cousin.

All of these features prompted the owner of Montréal's stylish Windsor Hotel, when challenged to find an original gift for the world's foremost gourmet--and gourmand--King Edward VII of England, to send the luscious Montréal Melon to London. They delighted the royal palate. And thereafter, the Décarie family's melons were shipped to the top hotels in Boston, New York and Chicago each bearing a red-and-white sticker stamped "Edward VII."

This was the era-1900-1914- when the Montréal Melon was at its most chic. It was the summer dessert of choice among the rich and famous at New York's Waldorf-Astoria and the Ritz in Boston. During this period of "Montréal Melon mania" over 2,500 dozen melons were grown on Montréal island every year.

And like all luxury items, they were expensive. In 1906, No. 1 melons fetched $8 to $10 per dozen wholesale. In 1907, the price was $15 per dozen. And by 1921, it had reached $25 to $35. By that time, a single slice of Montréal Melon in Boston hotels cost $1 or $1.50--more than the price of most steaks!

How "Melon Mania" began*

Europeans first tasted melon some two thousand years ago. They were among the many exotic, highly prized imports from the Persian Empire. During the colonial period, melon seeds were brought to North America in the hope of finding favorable growing conditions. And find them the colonists did--particularly on the south--facing slopes of Mount Royal, Montréal's own "Central Park."

A certain "person of merit" -- by his own description! -- sent from France to check out the moneymaking possibilities of the colony of New France, reported the area to be agreeable as to climate and soil. Even melons, he stated, grew to abundant perfection-without any help. Which proves that this "person of merit" had never been a farmer himself, since melons, like most crops, require intensive labor.

In any case, the suitability of Montréal Island for melon growing is amply documented. In 1694, for example, a Jesuit historian recorded the fact that an exceptionally rainy season had resulted in a melon crop so poor that there were barely enough to provide seed for the next year.

Melons were carefully cultivated and selected from year to year from the mid-seventeenth century on. Eventually, a particularly large, profuse and flavorful variety evolved. This became the famous Montréal Melon. There were two main types, varying only in shape--the older Décarie and the more recent Gorman, both named after farming families.

It is the Décarie family that is most closely associated with melons. Their large farms on the western edge of Montréal produced the lion's share of fruit exported abroad. This area of the city, long since built over, is still linked closely to the family: the main highway running through it is called the Décarie Expressway.

Family archives abound in melon lore. The season of 1910-11, for example, surprisingly produced a large number of misshapen and imperfect melons, which normally would have meant economic disaster for the Décaries. But the manager of Montréal's best hotel offered to buy the entire crop at the normal price-if the Décaries could deliver it in the form of a jam! And so it happened that Marie Décarie, working non-stop for two weeks, saved the family fortune by creating "Marmalade Décarie." Needless to say, this became as much of a sought-after delicacy as the melons themselves! And Marie was rewarded for her ingenuity and effort with a diamond ring from a grateful husband.

Another Mme Décarie-Louise by name-tells how Montréal Melons were handled and shipped to market. They went by horse cart in wicker baskets lined with fine hay, each basket containing a dozen fruit. But for special customers, the Décaries would pack only five specially selected, large, perfect melons, all cosseted by extra layers of hay.

Montréal Melons were an amazingly profitable crop. An acre of land could earn the farmer up to $2000 at the turn of the twentieth century! And even then, the demand from the U.S. East Coast could not be met. One of the Gorman family recorded a net profit of $912/acre in 1913. In today's terms, that would amount to about $30,000 per acre!

Like everything else in culture and society, food is affected by fashion and convenience. And from the 1920s on, the Montréal Melon declined in popularity--as the melon farms themselves were swallowed up by urban expansion. Tastes changed: among the melon family, the more exotically flavored cantaloupe rose to stardom. Smaller--and nowhere near as spectacular looking as the Montréal Melon-cantaloupes were hardier and easier to transport.

Rising wages and land values increased costs to farmers and profit margins fell. Better, faster means of shipping meant that a wider variety of fresh imported fruits became available to consumers and the good old local melon had a hard time competing with them.

It has even been said that the invention of the car doomed the Montréal Melon! How? Well, for years the "secret ingredient" that made the melon so exquisitely plump, flavorful and large was horse manure, the fertilizer of choice for melon farmers. More cars, fewer horses, fewer choice melons.

But maybe the most credible scientific reason for the melon's gradual demise is the fact that the genotype of the Montréal Melon is not stable and must be carefully selected out every year in order to maintain the character and quality of the fruit.

So fashion, economics and genetics combined to drive the Montréal Melon to the brink of extinction. But not quite over it. And today it is once again possible to grow and enjoy this unique variety of Cucumis melo--even without the aid of horse manure!

Edited by Kerry Cohen

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