Pontlevoy Abbey

[1] Gelduin endowed the abbey with enough revenue for Benedictine monks to build a huge church, dedicated to the White Virgin.

In 1776, Louis XVI turned the school into one of the 12 royal military academies of France; a huge cedar of Lebanon in the courtyard was planted in honour of his accession to the throne.

The mid- nineteenth century director, Abbé Louis Alexis Bourgeois, conducted subsequently controverted research into prehistoric remains of the area.

They built large, elegant houses with steep, slate roofs, walled gardens and spiked wrought-iron fences that still grace the town.

[1] The previous owner of the abbey and the college was the Marquis de Vibraye, a descendant of Gelduin, allowed Pontlevoy to open a municipal museum on the third floor.

Each year his company issued a new series of brightly colored cards commemorating notable men (including Benjamin Franklin) with flowers and illustrations of fairy tales.

Mr. Maffre's pride: a 1935 electric delivery van from the Poulain factory; a De Dion Bouton, from 1918, the oldest truck in the collection, and an American G.M.C.

[3] It was bought in 2001 to house "The European American Center for International Education", whose aim is to promote and develop cultural exchange between Europe and the United States.