Maison Saint-Gabriel

Montreal, Pointe-Saint-Charles. Away from the Old Montreal crowds, this farm shows daily life in New France rather than its power. Marguerite Bourgeoys bought the property in 1668 to support her congregation, and the house also served as a school and sheltered some of the Filles du Roi, the young women recruited in France as potential wives for colonists. The present house was rebuilt by 1698 on the foundations and creamery that survived a fire, and the sisters of the Congregation have run the farm for more than 300 years. Restored since the 1960s to recreate seventeenth-century living conditions, it is the entry on this list for anyone who wants to know how ordinary settlers lived, rather than how governors and bishops ruled.