The idea belonged to Sir Edward Wentworth Beatty, president of the Canadian Pacific Railway, who in 1923 envisioned a grand arena for Montreal's newest professional hockey team, the Maroons. Senator Donat Raymond brought in William Northey to draft plans for a 12,500-seat rink, but financing proved elusive, and the design was scaled back to 9,300 seats. The site chosen at the corner of Atwater and Sainte-Catherine West had previously hosted an outdoor rink where Frank and Lester Patrick, Art Ross, and Russell Bowie had played as youths, and before that a roller skating rink also called the Forum -- a name that stuck. Financed by mining magnate H. L. Timmins and built by the Canadian Arena Company, the Forum opened on November 29, 1924, at a cost of $1.5 million Canadian. It was constructed in just 159 days. Over the following decades, two major renovations -- in 1949 and 1968 -- expanded the building until its final capacity reached 17,959, including roughly 1,600 standing-room spots.

No building in hockey has a record to match the Forum's. Fifteen Stanley Cup championships were clinched or presented on its ice: twelve for the Canadiens, one for the Maroons, and one each for the visiting New York Rangers (1928) and Calgary Flames (1989). The Forum hosted Stanley Cup Finals in thirty-one different years between 1926 and 1993. In 1972, Game One of the legendary Summit Series between Team Canada and the Soviet Union took place here -- the Soviets winning 7-3 in a result that stunned the nation. The building's most solemn moment came on March 11, 1937, when the Forum hosted the only funeral in its history. Howie Morenz, the Canadiens' electrifying forward known as the "Stratford Streak," had died at thirty-four from complications after breaking his leg in a game against the Chicago Blackhawks. Thousands filled the arena to pay respects to a man whose speed and daring had defined early professional hockey.

The Forum's acoustics and atmosphere made it a legendary concert venue. The Beatles performed there on September 8, 1964. Queen recorded their 1981 concert film at the Forum, later released as Queen Rock Montreal -- considered one of the finest live concert recordings in rock history. Rush filmed Exit...Stage Left there the same year. Bob Marley played the Forum on June 10, 1978, during his Kaya Tour. David Bowie brought his Serious Moonlight Tour in July 1983. Whitney Houston performed during her debut headlining tour in August 1986. The Forum also hosted Bob Dylan, the Bee Gees, Journey, Madonna, Hall and Oates, and Metallica. Beyond music, the building served as a venue for five events at the 1976 Summer Olympics, including the gymnastics competition where fourteen-year-old Nadia Comaneci earned a score the scoreboard could not display -- the first perfect 10 in Olympic history.

The closing ceremony on March 11, 1996, drew on the deepest traditions of the franchise. After the final victory over the Dallas Stars, former greats were presented to the crowd. Then Emile Bouchard, the oldest surviving Canadiens captain, carried a flaming torch from the dressing room onto the ice surface -- a symbol drawn from the lines of "In Flanders Fields" displayed in the Forum's home locker room: "To you from failing hands we throw the torch; be yours to hold it high." Bouchard passed the torch to Jean Beliveau, who passed it to Yvan Cournoyer, then Henri Richard, Serge Savard, Bob Gainey, Guy Carbonneau, and finally to then-captain Pierre Turgeon. The next day, a parade carried the torch through Montreal's streets to the new Molson Centre, since renamed the Bell Centre. The Forum's signature high-pitched siren -- which had signaled the end of periods since the building shared that quirk with only the Boston Garden -- was reinstalled at the new arena, where it sounds to this day.

The building still stands at Atwater and Sainte-Catherine, designated a National Historic Site of Canada in 1997. After the Canadiens departed, Brian De Palma used the empty arena to film sequences for Snake Eyes before it was gutted and converted into the Pepsi Forum entertainment complex -- now a Cineplex cinema with shops and restaurants. For years, a recreation of center ice occupied the heart of the complex, complete with a section of original grandstand seating and a statue of Maurice Richard. But economic pressures took their toll. Renovations stripped away most of the hockey tributes to give the space a generic retail feel, and Dawson College leased upper floors for campus expansion. Some Forum memorabilia persists on the upper levels, easy to miss unless you know to look. Outside, the Atwater Street entrance still features a bronze Canadiens logo surrounded by twenty-four Stanley Cup banners embedded in the sidewalk, inscribed in French: "Fiers pour toujours" -- forever proud.