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Lac-Mégantic is a town in the Eastern Townships region of Quebec, Canada. It is located on Lac Mégantic, a freshwater lake after which the town was named. Situated in the former Frontenac County in the historic Eastern Townships, Lac-Mégantic is the seat of Le Granit Regional County Municipality and of the judicial district of Mégantic.〔(''Territorial Division Act'' ). ''Revised Statutes of Quebec'' D-11.〕 Lac-Mégantic is a tourist destination and a producer of forestry products, furniture, Masonite doors, particleboard and architectural granite. In 2013, the Lac-Mégantic rail disaster led to a massive fire and deadly explosion of petroleum tank cars that devastated the downtown with considerable loss of life. ==History== Prior to contact with Europeans, the region was inhabited by the Abenaki. Archaeological digs found that the Amerindians had been in the region for over 12,000 years, making this the oldest known site of human occupation in Quebec. The name of Mégantic comes from the Abenaki word "namesokanjik" which translates to "place where the fish are held."〔 The first known European to discover the region was a Catholic missionary, Father Druillettes of the Society of Jesus, who arrived in 1646. He came to convert the Abenaki.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://montreal.ctvnews.ca/portrait-of-a-decimated-town-a-brief-history-of-lac-megantic-1.1357254 )〕 The first colonists to settle in the region came two centuries later, around 1850, and were of French Canadian or Scottish origin.〔 Originally called Megantic, the town was founded in 1884 after the Canadian Pacific Railway began construction of the final segment in its transcontinental railway linking Montreal with the Atlantic Ocean port of Saint John, New Brunswick. This line opened in 1889, and was operated by International Railway of Maine, a subsidiary of CPR. Mégantic was the meeting place of two railroads at that time: the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Quebec Central Railway. The CPR line was more important because of its adaptation to large freight and passenger trains. Nearby Agnès, founded in 1895, was named after Susan Agnes Bernard, the widow of Prime Minister of Canada Sir John A. Macdonald. It merged with Mégantic in 1907.〔 Macdonald and his wife had visited the area in 1879.〔 Mégantic was renamed Lac-Mégantic in 1958, after the adjacent Lake Mégantic, located on the municipality's southern boundary. Lac-Mégantic consisted of two Roman Catholic parishes, Sainte-Agnès and Notre-Dame-de-Fatima. An important figure of Lac-Mégantic was Joseph Édouard Eugène Choquette, a priest, who, in his spare time, was an amateur scientist. He was the catalyst for the creation of an electric lighting system which, on the eve of Christmas in 1898, illuminated the entire city; and a power company. Father Choquette was also an amateur photographer.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.choquet-te.org/english/priest.html )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Lac-Mégantic, Quebec」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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