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(Left) Regulations of the Provincial Board of Health for the Direction of Local Boards of the Health of the Province of Québec, 1889 (Right) Dr. E. P. Lachapelle, 1880

Photomontage of two images. On the left, the cover page of the Regulations of the Provincial Hygiene Council for the direction of Local Councils or Hygiene Offices of the Province of Quebec. The document is damaged and at the bottom of the document the year 1889 is visible. On the right, a black and white portrait of a man. Seated on a chair, he wears a military uniform and holds a saber between his legs.

(Left) Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec, 1889 (Right) McCord Museum Archives, 1880

(Left) Following a health crisis caused by a smallpox epidemic in 1885, the government of Québec enacted its first public health law, which led to the creation of the Conseil d’hygiène de la province de Québec (Provincial Board of Health of the province of Québec) in 1888. The document reads: “Regulations of the Provincial Board of Health for the direction of local boards of the health of the province of Québec.” 

(Right) Emmanuel-Persillier Lachapelle (1845–1918) was a prolific Québec doctor who, in 1879, participated in the founding the Faculty of Medicine of Montréal’s Université Laval, which would later become the Université de Montréal and who, one year later, helped found the Notre-Dame Hospital. In 1888, with other health officers, he founded the Provincial Board of Health of the province of Québec, which he would preside until his death.