Description of Historic Place

Épicerie Le Roi du Bœuf is a wooden two-storey commercial/residential building in the Edwardian style, located on Principale Street in the Village de Baker Brook on the south side of Route 120. The store is on its original site on the banks of a portion of the Saint John River that marks the Canada-U.S. border.

Heritage Value

Épicerie Le Roi du Bœuf Grocery Store is designated a Local Historic Place for its continuous use as a business over the past 100 years, having marked its 100th anniversary in 2008. In 1908, Mrs. Laura Collin had this building constructed and moved into it the hat business she and her friend Mrs. Morais Landry had owned since 1897. The fact that two women owned a store at that time is remarkable in itself. The hat store soon became a general store. Mrs. Collin and Mrs. Landry sold linens and fabric in the left section of the store, while Mrs. Collin’s husband, Denis Nadeau, looked after the hardware and groceries section. The store was run by the same family from 1908 to 2000. Denis Nadeau and his wife Laura Collin were co-owners from 1908 to 1950. Uldéric Nadeau took over the store’s management in 1950 for several years and then passed it on to his son Luc, who ran it until 2000.

The location of this store is very strategic, as it is situated near two major waterways in the region's history, the Saint John River and Baker Brook. In fact, the store sold cordwood as early as the turn of the century, using the rivers as a means of transportation.

The building’s Edwardian structure and architecture have been well preserved. Today, arches adorn the large ground-floor veranda, whose second storey has been replaced by a central balcony with a pediment roof. These later details conform to the Edwardian style.

Source: Madawaska Planning Commission, Register of Historic Places, File: 2.1 Épicerie le Roi du Bœuf

Character-Defining Elements

The character-defining elements of this site include:
- building use unchanged since construction in 1908;
- two-storey rectangular plan built of spruce wood;
- large veranda adorned with segmental arches spanning the full length of the front façade and continuing along the left side of the grocery store;
- central balcony on the second floor with pediment roof, adorned with segmental arches;
- fanlight in the tympanum of the pediment;
- hipped roof;
- rectangular windows and doors with entablatures;
- original material, spruce wood, carefully preserved and restored over the years.