History of Suresnes

Its economic activities have historically developed in line with this environment, from fishing on the river to vine-growing on the hillsides, the automotive and aeronautics industries along the Seine, and, since the creation of the La Défense business center in the neighboring towns of Courbevoie and Puteaux, the headquarters of major corporations.

From the mid-19th century onwards, the face of Suresnes changed radically, with the arrival of the train, tramway, and navigation services on the Seine: the town was now within easy reach of Parisians, who flocked to the guinguettes lining its quays, often after attending the races at the nearby Longchamp racecourse.

Disused, the château was demolished and the site subdivided, but the park was redeveloped and opened to the public in 1988 under the name “Parc du Château.”[84][85][86] In 1647, the monks of Saint-Germain asked the King to clarify their property, to avoid the risks associated with confused inheritances and territorial mutations.

[126] The urban planning of the period set the tone for the future development of Suresnes, as the gardens of the middle-class residences would later become undeveloped land, making it possible to build the Jules-Ferry school and municipal warehouse (to the west), the boulevard Henri-Sellier (to the south) and the town hall and its annexes (to the north) at the end of the 19th century.

This trade, in addition to the land it owns (particularly in Val d'Or), brings Suresnes a modest income, but it does enable it to maintain certain buildings at community expense (such as the presbytery and the school), guard the farmland, employ the carillonneur, and pay for the town's defense in trials in which it is involved.

Among the personalities associated with Suresnes at the time were Antoine François Fremin, a lawyer at Parliament and director of the Saint-Louis glassworks, and Jean-Rodolphe Perronet, a Suresnes-born engineer who designed the Neuilly bridge and founded the École nationale des ponts et chaussées.

[119] On the banks of the SeineThe Peace that victory bringsComes back to our charming roomsHappy inhabitants of SurèneYou can taste the first fruits.In 1713, the Elector of Bavaria Maximilien-Emmanuel spent a few months in Suresnes, giving parties in an estate (destroyed in a bombardment in 1870, but its ruins survived long afterward, at the entrance to rue du Calvaire in Saint-Cloud).

In 1715, he returned to Bavaria, accompanied by his secretary Frantz Vilhem de Jarzt, who, in memory of this episode, had a castle built in the small village of Schwabing (near Munich), which he called “Suresne” (or Werneckschlößl), later incorporated into the Bavarian capital and used as an administrative building.

[note 19][171][172][173] Forgotten, the 1793 monument was destroyed in 1868, the mayor of the time stating that it “had no historical value.”[174][175] On December 10, 1793, the municipality organized a celebration in honor of Marat and Lepeletier, attended by representatives of popular societies from neighboring towns; a brazier was built, where symbols of feudalism were burned, and a tree of liberty was planted in Place de l'Église.

With the bell no longer ringing in the mornings, leading to the inhabitants being awakened, a carillon was put back in place, but renamed “le réveil des sans-culottes.” The municipality defended certain citizens from the death penalty but remained merciless towards those who did not wear the tricolor cockade, demanding their incarceration.

[191] On April 26, 1802, he sent a letter to First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte, asking him to set up a seminary on Mont Valérien, as the commune's resources had diminished (although he downplayed their size) after the removal of the calvary; he had the agreement of the site's owner, Merlin de Thionville, for the sale, but the deal fell through.

[105] The Mount Valérien pilgrimage regained great popularity, attracting thousands of people during the Feasts of the Cross; King Charles X even climbed the mountain barefoot,[13] surrounded by young girls crowned with white flowers, banner-bearers, and Swiss guards.

However, the mayor was required to report the house numbers where the insurrection had found a foothold, with the sub-prefect noting that “this information must not be lost for the future.” For the rest of the revolution, the commune had to pay for the food of the men guarding the fort, as well as the bread of the workers employed in the national workshops.

[239] The urban structure of Suresnes continued to change: in addition to the destruction of the Rothschild estate, in 1854 Pagès gave up his neighboring property, whose park was parcelled out, with the northern part of the commune becoming constructible (a request for the establishment of a candle factory was made as early as December).

The arrival of the Germans and the routed French troops had a very tangible impact on Suresnes: “In carts, disarmed, disheveled and discouraged, the survivors of Sedan made their way to Versailles, where the sad debris of our fine regiments was being collected,” wrote G. Moussoir, author of Six mois au Mont Valérien.

[279] Among the trades typical of Suresnes' bygone days were, in addition to winegrowers, laundry workers (between the end of the 18th century and 1914, they formed an important guild, with a clientele that was essentially Parisian) and feeders (fewer in number, they raised cows in enclosed cowsheds, or vacheries, until urbanization caused them to disappear).

In the garden of the historicist-style château he had built by architect Denis Darcy on the site of the former Clos-des-Seigneurs in the 1860s,[300] he had stored a large number of columns, sculptures, and statues salvaged from the ruins of the Tuileries Palace (burnt down during the Commune), which he had frequented as a result of working for Empress Eugénie.

The mayor declared at the ceremony: “This bell has rung enough error to now proclaim the truth.”[37] The event was disrupted by a few anti-Dreyfus supporters; one demonstrator was even arrested and, in the afternoon that followed, Camelots du roi tried to topple the bust set up in Place Trarieux.

[...] I wouldn't want to pass, at midnight, in front of the bronze blessed by this scoundrel.”[345] On its pedestal is engraved a phrase by Émile Zola, written during the Dreyfus Affair: “One day, France will be grateful to me for having saved its honor.”[86] The decision was nevertheless taken to build a new church, the Cœur-Immaculé-de-Marie, whose foundation stone was laid by Cardinal Richard on December 15, 1907.

Among the stained-glass windows created between 1907 and 1911, several by Calor and inspired by drawings by Henri Brémont, pay tribute to the life and history of Suresno, particularly in terms of religion (ascent of the Calvary, winegrowers' processions on Saint-Vincent, Saint Geneviève, Marguerite Naseau, etc.).

Anyone who has not lived through those hours, who has not seen, as we did, the boulevards on the evening of November 11th, is unaware of the explosion of joy of an entire people freed from a bloody nightmare of four years, and intoxicated by the legitimate pride of victory.” 523 Suresnois died in the war, their names inscribed on a monument in the Voltaire cemetery.

[370][371] A map of the Seine made by Father Jean Delagrive, the king's geographer, in 1731 mentions the existence of two bassiers, “river bottoms raised by sand and stones”: the Marinet (from the Saint-Cloud bridge to the Avre aqueduct) and the Muret (at the southernmost tip of the Ile de Puteaux).

[402] The choice of street names for the garden city was based on the following perspective, as expressed by the mayor at the city council meeting of March 22, 1932: “The municipality wished to pay tribute to the thinkers and statesmen of all religions and nationalities who, over the centuries up to the present tragic era, have held out to humanity the torch that should guide it towards definitive peace and the fraternity of peoples.” Sully, Grotius, William Penn, Father de Saint-Pierre, Romain Rolland, Jean Jaurès, Léon Bourgeois, d'Estournelle de Constant, Woodrow Wilson, Frank Billings Kellogg, Louis Loucheur (many Suresnois benefited from his law to build pavilions)[403] and Gustav Stresemann.

As far back as 1920, the General Council had already prepared projects in line with Henri Sellier's thinking: “It is obvious that a development plan for a suburban commune can only have rational formulas in conjunction with those of neighboring communes.” For Suresnes, this concerns its relations with Saint-Cloud, Rueil, Nanterre and Puteaux.

A development plan was adopted by the city council on October 30, 1927, confirming old ideas: no longer tolerate unhealthy or inconvenient businesses in the collective housing zone, and regulate the height of buildings to ensure that each side of the streets gets plenty of sunlight.

In July, a parade of thirteen floats decorated by local associations is held, with the Historical Society presenting, for example, one, the “Vieille Maison suresnoise,” featuring a hearth and a wine press, with old winegrowers in traditional costume, and another, the “Guinguette,” where bohemians and grisettes dance and sing under an arbor.

For the occasion, the Comité des fêtes and the Société historique help evoke the history of Suresnes by erecting the towers of the old “Porte de Dessus-l'Eau” at the beginning of Rue du Pont; a well of love is also reinstalled, along with old houses and poternes in the Saint-Leufroy district.

[453] Evoking the western suburbs of Paris, marked by the geography of the Seine, writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline wrote, following the boats passing on the river from his belvedere in Meudon: “From my attic, I can see her name, her number, her laundry to dry, her man at the helm...

[498] Inaugurated in 1973, the Salvador Allende stadium was the mayor's way of paying tribute to his Chilean friend, the victim of a coup d'état that same year; in 1983, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Jean Moulin's death, the sports facility was renamed after the resistance fighter.

In his mind, the aim was “to breathe new life into Suresnes, to maintain and reinforce its modern, urban, Parisian, village and provincial character.” To this end, an action plan has been launched to attract new businesses and encourage the creation of small and medium-sized craft industries.