The City of Montreal, the only planned mining company town in Wisconsin, was designed in 1921 by the Oglebay-Norton Mining Company to house the 700 miners needed for the new Montreal Mine #5 shaft and their families in a setting intended to accommodate their nationality and temperament. First called Hamilton, the community featured neat white frame houses, gently curving streets, and gracious landscaping, and the company managed nearly every aspect of daily life on the belief that content workers were productive employees. Miners could rent one of 140 company-owned homes for as little as $1.50 per room, per year, choosing from six models ranging from a one-family bungalow to a two-family D-2 duplex, with each house painted white and maintained at company expense. Playgrounds and gardens were placed throughout the town, and after work families could enjoy movies, billiards, and the soda fountain at the company-run Hamilton Club social center, making livelihood and leisure part of the same community.