VINCENT, Joseph Arthur (1867-1949) was best known at a civil engineer and surveyor who was active in Montreal but, during his career, he also practised architecture, although there are few significant commissions that can be credited to him. Born in Longueuil in 16 March 1867 he graduated 'with great distinction' from courses in Civil Engineering at Laval University in Montreal in 1888, and served an apprenticeship under Joseph Rielle, Land Surveyor. He joined the Province of Quebec Association of Architects in August 1891 and in 1894 he entered a partnership with two civil engineers named Hormidas A. Gauthier and Laurent A. Dufresne, as Gauthier, Vincent & Dufresne, Architects & Engineers (Gazette [Montreal], 12 March 1894, 6). Their partnership was dissolved in January 1895, and Vincent & Dufresne formed a new partnership (Montreal Daily Star, 7 Jan. 1895, 4).
In 1898 they prepared a design for the Police & Fire Station, St. Charles Street West, LONGUEUIL, QUE. (C.R., ix, 27 July 1898, 3; burned 1907, and rebuilt after the fire by J.A. Vincent). From 1905 to 1914 Vincent served as director of the Surveying Department for the City of Montreal, and after 1918 his son Roch Arthur Vincent (1897-1976) assisted him with many of the engineering and architectural commissions that were undertaken in his office. These include the Town Hall & Fire Station, MARIEVILLE, QUE. (c. 1925; inf. P.Q.A.A. Application Form for Roch A. Vincent, 3 April 1936), the Westchester Apartments, Sherbrooke Street West at Wilson Avenue, MONTREAL, QUE., 1927-28 (Daily Commercial News [Toronto], 17 Sept. 1927, 5), and the Mount Klare Apartments, Sherbrooke Street West at Montclair Avenue, MONTREAL, QUE., 1927 (Montreal, Les Appartements, 1991, 417-18, illus). J.A. Vincent died in Montreal on 19 September 1949 and his son continued the practise under his own name in Montreal (obituary in La Presse [Montreal], 20 Sept. 1949, 18; biography and portrait in Biographies Canadiennes Francaises, 1920, 215).