[3] Félix Leclerc was born in La Tuque, Quebec, Canada in 1914, the sixth in a family of eleven children.

In 1939, he began working as a writer at Radio-Canada in Montreal, developing scripts for radio dramas, including Je me souviens.

A house which he occupied from 1946 to 1967 (and where his son Martin stayed with his mother for another year) is also a museum in his honour in Vaudreuil-Dorion, west of Montréal.

Leclerc played a major role in revitalising the Québec folk song ("chanson") tradition.

His semi-autobiographical novel Pieds nus dans l'aube was adapted by his son, filmmaker Francis Leclerc, as the 2017 film Barefoot at Dawn.