A high place of the jet-setin the 1960s

Cajarc, center of the chic world

At the end of the 1960s, Cajarc, paisible city on the banks of the Lot, became a high spot for the national jet-set. Birthplace of the writer Françoise Sagan, it experienced for about twenty years, a surprising worldly activity by becoming the pole of attraction of a whole Parisian gentry who, at one time or another, made it their home port. Cajarc’s fame exploded when former President of the Republic Georges Pompidou and his wife Claude fell under the spell of the region and acquired a residence there on the causse in 1962. The humorist Coluche, very attached to a part of the Aveyron close to and visitor to Cajarc, was inspired by the fishing tackle merchant Moulinot to write his famous sketch Le Schmilblick in 1975.

Françoise Sagan

It is here, at 45, boulevard du tour de ville, in a 19th century bourgeois building with walls clasped with vines, that Françoise Quoirez was born on June 21, 1935. Better known as Sagan, Françoise spends part of her childhood in this family home.

She was only 19 when she published, in 1954, her first novel Bonjour Tristesse. It was the beginning of a long career as a writer. Literary child prodigy, she interests the media and seduces readers. Nicknamed the “charming little monster” by François Mauriac, she becomes the symbol of a casual and bourgeois generation. Symbol of the free woman, Sagan left a substantial work: novels, short stories, plays and screenplays…

Sagan will remain attached to Cajarc all her life. In the 1960s, she regularly stayed there with her brother Jacques, and her band of friends including her friend François Mitterrand.

Françoise Sagan died in 2004 in Honfleur and rests in the cemetery of Seuzac.

Her only son, Denis Westhoff, works a lot for the memory of his mother. In the novel Sagan and Son, he delivers an anthology of his childhood memories, an autobiography in which he paints a portrait of a loving and attentive mother, far from the sultry clichés of a night owl.

Georges Pompidou

It was Suzanne, Françoise Sagan’s older sister, a friend of the Pompidou family, who brought Claude Pompidou to Cajarc in 1963. Looking for a country house in a discreet and sunny environment, the couple fell under the spell of a sheepfold located on the Causse and purchased it. The Pompidou love art and welcome their friends poets, writers, artists.

From then on, Cajarc finds itself in the media. The village café is regularly besieged by hordes of journalists. Georges Pompidou was on the list for the 1965 municipal elections. Appointed mayor, he declined the position because of his position as Prime Minister of Charles de Gaulle. This anecdote was worth an article in the Canard Enchaîné of the time.

Elected President of the Republic in 1969, Pompidou continues to come regularly to recharge his batteries in Cajarc, appearing in beige jeans shod with espadrilles, loving to speed along the small roads of the Causse at the wheel of his white Porsche, an eternal cigarette screwed between his lips.

The Maison des Arts Georges et Claude Pompidou extends the memory of this couple with a passion for contemporary art.

Calmness and rest are the reasons that brought me among you, on the edge of my native Cantal, but in a sunnier site. I come to Prajoux to relax and rest but I remain at the disposal of the municipality and the inhabitants of Cajarc to examine with them their problems.

Georges Pompidou

Maison natale de Françoise Sagan à Cajarc

Three characters,

two places

LA MAISON SAGAN

It is located at 45, boulevard du Tour de Ville
Francoise Sagan rests in the hamlet of Seuzac, on the commune of Larnagol

LA MAISON DES ARTS GEORGES ET CLAUDE POMPIDOU

Address: 134 Av. Germain Canet, 46160 Cajarc

COLUCHE

In 1975, the humorist Coluche spent a few days of vacation at his second home in Aveyron. The idea of the famous sketch Le Schmilblick with Monsieur Moulinot, fishing tackle merchant, came to him during his visit to Cajarc. The sketch broadcast on July 04, 1976 in the emission of Guy Lux “Midi Ring” has largely contributed to the fame of Cajarc.

And yet a major error crept into the sketch! Cajarc is a city in the Lot and not in Aveyron.

An excerpt from the sketch:

Guy Lux – Well, hello! The Schmilblick is today in Cajarc, a small town in the Aveyron.

Guy Lux: I’ll briefly remind you that the Schmilblick is round, that it contains yellow, that it fits in the hand, that it can be cooked in different ways and that a navigator used to make it stand upright.. In Cajarc, to you Simone! First candidate…

Simone – Hello Guy. Candidates of Cajarc who came in great numbers, good morning! The first candidate, it is Mr. ?

Coluche – Mr. Moulinot! Merchant of fishing tackle on the market place in Cajarc: a quality fishing tackle is bought at Moulinot!