The iconic “Jules Patry” sign that could be seen on the City Centre building since 1965 no longer looks out over Centretown. It has been taken down from its familiar spot on the facade of the commercial site between Somerset and Albert streets and moved into storage, but it took a Twitter campaign sparked by local artist Andrew King, to avoid having the slightly rusted, yellow sign from being sent to the dump.
King says he loves many of the vintage signs that have been part of the community for so long, and has even created T-shirts with sign designs on them, including one of the Jules Patry sign.
When construction crews began taking down the sign in late August, people were concerned about losing this local landmark and turned to Twitter and King to save the sign.
“Somebody on Twitter said, ‘Holy cow, they’re taking it down,’ and had a picture of it being dismantled,” says King. “After seeing the old Dairy Queen sign on St. Laurent being thrown into the trash, I knew I had to act fast to save it.”
King has been keeping a close eye on many of Centretown’s iconic old signs since the demolition of the DQ sign, and is worried more will be taken down.
King was about to leave the city for Toronto, so he took to Twitter, and as well, started the ‘#savethejules’ campaign to help spread the word.
Marc Patry, owner of Jules Patry Ltd, a company that distributes fireworks and products for convenience and dollar stores, told the Ottawa Citizen in August that the company had downsized and moved to a different part of the building. With nowhere to store the sign, he said he accepted District Realty’s offer to remove and dispose of the sign at no cost.
King also got his girlfriend Alison Fowler, a fellow artist, to check up on the sign and leave a message with District Realty to let the firm know that the sign was a valuable part of the community and that they should not throw it out.
King even offered to purchase it.
When Fowler drove to check on the sign for the second time that night, she saw the ‘Patry’ half was gone. She phoned King to let him know and they decided that she should take the rest of the sign to save it.
“I jammed it in the back of my trunk somehow by myself,” says Fowler. It was not an easy job to get the massive, rusty, metal ‘J’ and the other half, ‘ules’ all connected, into her blue MDX. “It didn’t fit in my car. I had to drive with the hatch open!”
The next day, after talking to District Realty, the artist couple found out that the ‘Patry’ half had been safely stored, but the ‘Jules’ had been left because it didn’t fit into a District Realty vehicle. The ‘Jules’ half was then brought to District Realty to be re-united with the ‘Patry’ half of the sign.
District Realty told King they plan to auction off the sign for charity.
Sally Coutts, heritage planner for the City of Ottawa, says there is nothing restricting the sign from gaining a heritage designation if it meets the criteria laid out in the Ontario Heritage Act. There are no age requirements or limits on what can gain heritage status; everything from landscaping, signs or a building can become designated.
“We never received any requests about the sign though,” says Coutts. The sign was dismantled before the community knew what was coming, and no one had time to make a request for heritage protection.
To add to the struggle of the Jules sign, no one at District Realty’s office, or King seem to know the sign’s current whereabouts. “Who knows if we will ever see it again, but at least it didn’t go into the trash,” says King, who plans to make another offer to purchase the sign.
King says he hopes the sign will one day be hung back up, either in a park or as part of a heritage product.