Tourny Fountain (Quebec City, Quebec)

 monument, fountain, interesting place

The Tourny fountain was donated to Quebec City by businessman Peter Simons for its 400th anniversary.

This impressive work was created in Barbezat foundry of Val-D’Osne, France, in 1854. Six copies of the fountain were made. In 1857 the fountain was placed in the Allées de Tourny - Tourny Alleys in the heart of Bordeaux (the five other fountains are located in the cities of Angers, Geneva, Porto, Saint-Quentin and Soulac).

In 1960 the city of Bordeaux decided to remove the fountain from the city center because of the high maintenance cost. Indeed, the fountain was in a poor condition as it hadn’t been maintained since the World War I. It was dismantled and stocked in the Château Larivière (Lariviere castle) near Bordeaux. At the beginning of the 21st century it was bought by Parisian antique dealer Marc Maison.

In the spring of 2003, Mr. Peter Simons, president of the famous Québec Maison Simons clothing store was visiting Paris. He’s looking for old woodworks for his store in Old Quebec and discovered the fountain at Marc Maison’s at Saint-Ouen flea market. Afterwards the work was transported to a barn on the Ile d’Orleans island and restored.
On July 3rd, 2007, the Tourny fountain was officially inaugurated on the occasion of the 399th anniversary of Quebec.