A Surprising Heritage

Jean-François Lachance tells with emotion how he received, by chance, a legacy from his grandfather.

Jean-François Lachance, grandson of François-Xavier Lachance, is in the rowboat shop of the Parc maritime de Saint-Laurent. He speaks to an interviewer on the right side of the camera.

[Jean-François Lachance] A man came to me and said, “I have a boat from your grandfather to sell and I would like to sell it to you.”

So I said, “Yeah, but …” [laughing]. That made me a little bit dazed.

I said, “I have neither the time nor the money to buy a wooden boat, but tell me.”

He says, “Listen, I let it go, the boat … we have to do something with it because otherwise it’s the end of that boat, then …”

He said, “I bought it to restore it and now I don’t want it anymore … I don’t have time anymore, I don’t have enough money to do it.”

So he said, “I’m ready to let it go to you for almost nothing.”

I said, “Well listen, let me think, first I need to find a place to put it, and then I’ll answer you pretty quickly.”

I went home and told my wife, who said: “Well, with all the time you’ve been working on the project on François-Xavier Lachance, you cannot say no to that. We will find a place and we will find the time to restore it.”

So I said yes and I ended up with a 32-foot sloop,

Low-angle color photograph showing the front of a gray painted wooden boat on which Jean-François Lachance is standing, leaning on the mast lying on the boat. The boat is on a trailer.

[J.-F. L.] which was built the year of my birth in 1970

Back on Jean-François Lachance in the rowboat shop.

[J.-F. L.] et qui a été baptisé l’Héritage.

[J.-F. L.] and which was baptized “l’Héritage” (Heritage).

So I said, “It couldn’t be invented, a story like this” [laughs]. The boat is a bit of my heritage and I thought it was like … After all the research I’ve done in recent years about Grandpa, it was like

Color photograph of Jean-François Lachance, smiling, in front of his boat.

[J.-F. L.] a gift that fell from the sky.