It was in 1803 that the very first town council decided to build a building on an empty plot of land in the rue Cornevin in the district known as La Voie, just above the communal covered market, to serve as a college (i.e. school), town hall and justice of the peace room. The rubble came from the local Bocherez quarry and the ashlar from the Dammartin-sur-Meuse quarry, but as the new building had only one room, it quickly became inconvenient. So, in 1851, following an extraordinary sale of spare wood, the new municipality had this first public building rebuilt for the same purpose, enlarging it considerably on the sound advice of the architect Descaves in Chaumont, who had a remarkable classical façade designed by the contractor Edme Hérard from Langres, which can be seen below the town hall (now the entrance to the municipal library). |In September 1897, consideration was given to equipping the building with a clock, to be supplied by Odobey-Cabet of Morez (Jura). However, as the public building had no space for a clock, in June of the following year, an elegant bell tower was built on the ridge and in line with the façade, to house a classroom bell and a clock. Although the frame of the bell tower was completely rebuilt in 1942, the same façade can still be seen today.
Hôtel de Ville de Montigny-le-Roi
