Baseball in Montreal: City Hall exhibit explores game's local history from Champ de Mars to Gary Carter

The debate began in the mid-1990s when attendance at Expos games started to plummet, and the team eventually packed up and headed to Washington.

Is Montreal a baseball city?

There are more than a few ways to delve into that question, but when it comes to the history of the sport in this city, an exhibit now set up in the Hall of Honour at Montreal City Hall makes a pretty good case for the affirmative.

"People really don't know the history of baseball [in Montreal] goes way back to the middle of the 19th century," explained Mario Robert, head archivist at the Archives de Montréal and a big baseball fan who helped put the exhibit together.

The project was a long time coming, Robert said, but it was the city's baseball-loving mayor who gave the OK to get it off the ground.

The exhibit is bilingual to make sure everyone, including English-speaking tourists, will be able to take it in.

"It's for everyone, not just people who like the sport," Robert said.

Champ de Mars once a baseball field

Montréal à coup sûr, or Montreal is a hit, looks at the history of baseball in the city, starting in 1860.

And the location of the free, bilingual exhibit is fitting — the first recorded game of baseball played in Montreal took place in 1860 at Champ de Mars, the green space just behind city hall. 

That game wouldn't have looked the same as the baseball played today, because they were playing a precursor modelled after the Massachusetts game, Robert explained.

Modern baseball is an offshoot of the New York-style game.

The city's first team, the Montreal Baseball Club, was created in 1869. 

The first iteration of the Montreal Royals, the franchise that would eventually make history as Jackie Robinson's final stepping stone toward breaking the MLB's colour barrier, was created in 1879.

• Jackie Robinson talks about playing baseball in Montreal

Big summer for Montreal baseball

There are about 120 objects in the exhibit, which includes sections dedicated to Robinson and women's baseball, the original Youppi! outfit, the helmet worn by Gary Carter in his last at-bat, and jerseys worn by Randy Johnson and Pedro Martinez.

The items come from, among other places, the Archives de Montréal, the Quebec sports hall of fame, the Panthéon des Sports du Québec, and the private collection of Montrealer Perry Giannias.

Giannias isn't just any collector — he claims to have the biggest Expos memorabilia collection "in the universe."

Usually, the hundreds of items in his collection are displayed in his Laval home. This is the first time they will be displayed at an event that he didn't organize himself.

Some of his items are also on display at the Grévin Museum.

He said he's been asked before to lend his memorabilia to different events and declined. He agreed this year because of a confluence of events: it's a big year for the city, its 375th anniversary, and two Expos have been singled out for honours, with the election of Tim Raines to the Baseball Hall of Fame and induction of Vladimir Guerrero to the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame.

"I just feel like this summer was really important for Montreal baseball," Giannias said.

Giannias has been to the exhibit and says it's a must-see.

Ever-optimistic about the eventual return of the Expos, he's hoping to be able to display the items in his collection on a more permanent basis — maybe even at a museum inside the revived team's stadium one day.

• Why the Montreal Expos could make a comeback

Montréal à coup sûr — or Montreal is a hit — is free. It's open Monday to Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 12 to 4 p.m. at Montreal City Hall, 275 Notre-Dame St E.  The exhibit runs until Aug. 19.