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CFCL Radio

Photo by contributor Anonymous - Posted August, 2006

Photo by contributor Brian Bockus - Posted June, 2017

Plaque Location

The District of Cochrane
The City of Timmins
In Mattagami Historical Park, at the edge of the parking lot
just off the entrance to the park
from Riverside Drive/Algonquin Boulevard West

Coordinates: N 48 28.591 W 81 21.152

Plaque Text

The first French-language radio station in Ontario, CFCL-Timmins, began broadcasting in December 1951. The event was greeted with enthusiasm by Franco-Ontarians who until then had heard limited programming in French over the airwaves. The station reached listeners from Kirkland Lake to Hearst, showcasing local talent and creating a sense of community among the widely dispersed francophone population of northern Ontario. Daily features on French life in the region taught cultural pride, the love of one's maternal language, the importance of sending children to French schools, and of furthering their education. The creation of CFCL by the station's owner and founder, Conrad Lavigne, was a landmark in the cultural development of the northern Franco-Ontarian communities.

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Here are the visitors' comments for this page.

> Posted December 29, 2015
Just wasting time rummaging through the internet on a cold blustery evening in Wasaga Beach ON, I came across this site and I was immediately taken back to the late 50's - early 60's. At 16 years of age, I started working at CKGB radio as an office boy/record librarian and within a short time went on air with a show called "The Top 40" from 4 to 5 pm daily. I eventually moved over to CFCL TV for a short time where I worked audio and some air time. I left in 1961 to exist in the army where I served for 35 years. I am now 77 and retired. I have never been back to Schumacher (where I lived).

> Posted June 18, 2013
Timmins misses C.F.C.L. Television. I mention it in my song "Town with no train".
"The T.V.station is the pits
it's been dismantled bit by bit"

> Posted June 3, 2013
Ironically Mr. Conrad Lavigne left this world owing me 40.00 dollars. I played a gig in the sixties at the Empire Hotel for the French organization of Timmins and during my show he asked me if I could play French songs (good question) as my repertoire at the time was not like it is to-day. Anyway I never got payed for the gig. haha. However he gave us good programming and losing the T.V.station has been a great loss for Timmins. C.F.C.L. (Canadien Francais Conrad Lavigne)
Thanks, Paul Henry Dallaire

> Posted March 14, 2011
I remember that very well, having gone there with a bunch of people in a car..must have been around 10 or 11 in the mid 60s..those were the good old days..I also used to listen to it on a small transistor radio..Timmins was a great place to grow up in..I have long left the town of my birth and haven't been back since 1975..I recently looked it up on the internet and barely recognized it..the family home is still there but it long belongs to someone else,and they have taken the trees out that my dad had planted in the front yard and replaced them with some little rock garden..how sad it looked... anyway will never forget the hilltop rendezvous, it was a much anticipated show for me as I was coming into my teens...thanks for jogging my memory..

> Posted November 24, 2009
Many years ago when I was in grade school, we could get this radio station on our little transistor radio from our home in Holtyre, east of Matheson. The radio station's site was also well known for the weekend show "Hilltop Rendez-vouz", where one would get in line in their vehicle, and once your turn came you could make a request live on the air for your favourite song. I vaguely remember it, but we once saw the lineup stretch from the station's location at the top of Pine Street North, all the way to Algonquin Boulevard.
Denis Gionet, Hearst, Ontario.

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