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In the age of convergence, where fearsome local editors have taken a back seat to faceless corporate managers from out of town, the romantic good old days at the [Montreal Gazette[ are slipping fast into nostalgia, alongside the three-martini lunch, felt fedoras thrown on the ice at the Forum, and the let-them-deny-it approach to sensational copy. The paper became part of a megadeal that saw the Asper family's CanWest Global Communications Corp. of Winnipeg gain control of the Southam newspapers from media mogul Conrad Black. The Gazette was a building block of the fabled Montreal Anglo establishment which controlled much of Canada's economy, to say nothing of national politics, through most of the last two centuries. Journalists complain about the Aspers' bottom-line-driven style of management. The Gazette has been a special place since its inception. One of its backers was an American, Benjamin Franklin, and its first publisher was a Voltairean freethinker from France.

Since its 1947 inception, the Hockey News has been essential reading for hard-core fans. Ken McKenzie, its co-founder and long-time publisher, died in an Ontario hospital. His son, John, a New York-based correspondent with ABC News, wrote this tribute to his father and his achievements. Ken McKenzie--along with Will Cote--started the Hockey News in 1947, and the paper that came to be known as the bible of hockey. After the Second World War, Ken, who grew up in Winnipeg, moved to Montreal, where he got a job as a sportswriter for the Gazette. Within months, he approached the president of the National Hockey League, Clarence Campbell, and suggested that the league needed a full-time publicity director. Campbell gave him the job, and more. For Ken, whose father had died in his early 50s, Campbell became a surrogate parent. Campbell supported my father's dream of starting a newspaper devoted exclusively to hockey. There is a picture of my father taken at his induction in the Hockey Hall of Fame, which shows him at the podium, arms outstretched, fists clenched, wearing this big, beautiful smile.

Focuses on the 22nd annual Montreal World Film Festival, and reviews Robert LePage's movie `No.' Sense of occasion provided by selection of LePage's film to open the festival; Features of the festival; LePage's career in film; Review of the movie.

The article focuses on the environmental hazards of plastic bags. The author reports that according to environmentalists, because plastic bags are made from oil, they choke both landfills and wildlife. Jacques Lalonde, a Montreal translator who started an online petition and collected 50,000 signatures, urged the government to consider a tax on each of the plastic bags used by Canadians every year. Liberal Environment Minister Line Beauchamp is weighing the idea.

The article reviews the exhibition "Ephemera," at the Musée d'art contemporain in Montreal until April 22, 2007.

The article discusses the campaign leading up to the 2008 federal elections in Canada. Topics include Opposition leader Stéphane Dion's efforts to woo votes by means of video posted on the Internet and Dion's campaign plans 12 days before the elections. Also discussed is Dion's address to the Board of Trade in Montreal, Quebec.

The article offers reviews of various Canadian college and university dining halls. Particular attention is given to the food served at the North Shore Campus cafeteria at Capilano College, the new residence hall cafeteria at McGill University, the Student Centre Food Court at York University, Hub cafeteria at Ryerson University, and the Cafeteria Chez Valere at the University of Montreal. Article topics include information on the various foods served at these dining establishments.

A plane crash is the worst of many calamities to hit Montreal's Griffintown in Quebec, Canada. The storied neighbourhood -- home to Irish immigrants who fled the potato famines in the 1800s and to several generations of their descendants -- has endured floods, fires, riots and strikes. It's a colourful past that has won Griffintown a small, if unhappy, place in the literary imagination. In the acclaimed historical novel 'Away,' Ontario writer Jane Urquhart's heroine heads to Griffintown in search of her lover, only to encounter "ragged families huddled on thatched or tin rooftops," trying to escape a flood. Author Brian Moore chose Griffintown as the home for the hapless protoganist of his 1960 award-winner, 'The Luck of Ginger Coffey.' Even renowned humorist Stephen Leacock found only gloom there. In his 1942 book about his adopted home, 'Montreal: Seaport and City,' Leacock touches on Griffintown, and dismisses it as "a wretched area, whose tumbled, shabby houses mock at the wealth of Montreal," and "the first of our industrial 'slums.' " In 1654, Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve, the founder of Montreal, granted the land that would eventually become Griffintown to Jeanne Mance, a pious woman who, with the nuns of the H&ocric;tel-Dieu, ran the city's first hospital.

Comments on the Montreal Canadiens hockey team. Sale of the team by Molson Inc.; Likeliness that the team will be bought by an investor from the United States; Decline of the franchise as a viable business in Montreal.

Investigates the Museum of Humor, Montreal, a $13.5 million attempt to explain humor. Promoted by Gilbert Rozon, architecture by Luc Laporte, the museum is housed in an old brewery building, a rabbit maze of interconnected rooms that are designed to take 2 1/2 hours to traverse. Admission of $17.50 makes it the most expensive museum in North America; Best jokes in Montreal come for free in the street; The silent films are the funniest of all.

The article focuses on online gambling. Attention is given to Canadian Alwyn Morris, a former Olympian. He is focusing his attention on building a gaming enterprise on the Kahnawake reservation, which is located outside of Montreal. Kahnawake is home to Mohawk Internet Technologies, which hosts more than half of the world's Internet gambling traffic. Morris has created the Morris Mohawk Gaming Group, which promises to solidify Kahnawake's status as the online gaming capital of North America.

The article reports that Montreal, Canada, has a lax policy on pedophiles. Robin Sharpe, a notorious child pornographer and leader of a movement to normalize pedophilia, has moved to the city and says he enjoys the freedom. Pedophiles Steve Goldberg and Ian Hodgson have reported feeling similarly. Epifora, a company that provides support to pedophilia-related websites, is based in Montreal.

This article comments on the opinions of Haitian people living in Montreal to the crisis going on in their native country. Haitians are genial, buoyant, extravagant, voluble -- and extremely politicized people. I know this after meeting last week with three Haitian-born Canadians and a visitor stranded in Montreal by the trouble back home. Two hours later, the four -- a political science professor, a scientist turned novelist, an actor, and a teacher from Port-au-Prince -- were no closer to a manageable answer to a simple question: what's the problem in Haiti? One thing seemed to unite the four, though: disappointment. They were all one-time supporters of Aristide -- the populist Catholic missionary who became megalomaniacal, not unlike his predecessor, dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier. Haitian exiles are said to pump US$1 billion a year into the national economy, compared to the US$273-million annual revenue of the government. But Montreal's Haitians exert little influence over the affairs of their homeland. But for kids of Haitian background born and raised in Quebec, the peculiar idiosyncrasies of Haiti's political class seem increasingly odd.

Focuses on Montreal, Quebec. Portrayal of the city in the motion picture 'The Score'; Efforts of Quebec to promote its culture and the French language; Discussion of Montreal society.

Reports on the drop in the number of Israeli citizens of Russian origin who are granted refugee status in Montreal, Quebec. Serge Vallee chief of the Montreal office of the federal Immigration and Refugee Board on the drop in the number; Pressures being exerted on the board; Why the Russian descendants are leaving Israel; The federal-provincial September 1996 disagreement which erupted over the Montreal refugee decisions.

Discusses the prospect that the Montreal Canadiens will be sold to an investor from the United States. Fears that the team will be moved to another city; Impact of municipal taxes on the sale; How fans of the team blame the current owner, Molson Inc., for its problems.

Reports on the ruling of a Quebec Superior Court judge that a Loblaw supermarket set to open in Montreal must be demolished for violating municipal zoning regulations. The competitive nature of Quebec's grocery industry; Details of a 1996 lawsuit filed against Loblaw Cos. Ltd. by the Metro Inc. grocery chain.

Profiles Montreal's McGill University, whose 170-year history and reputation for academic excellence are currently functioning under a partly clouded horizon. Contending with Quebec's volatile political climate; The 1986 capital campaign and endowment; McGill's accumulated debt; Comments from McGill principal David Johnston; Thinly stretched resources.

Focuses on the killing of four professors at Montreal's Concordia University by Valery Fabrikant, who was angry over the what he believed were attempts by the university to deny him a promotion and a sabbatical. Specifics of the crime; Bizarre five-month trial; Mandatory life sentence that Fabrikant received.