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In 1976, as Montreal basked in the glory of hosting the Summer Olympics, two future United States presidential candidates walked the streets of a city that would shape their paths in different ways.

For now we know about the “Kamala connection” to Montreal—That teenager who dances to disco music and navigates the winters of Montreal while longing for his home in the United States.

However, Donald Trump’s connection to the city is often overlooked. But connecting some dots reveals that ‘Donald’ was here that same year.

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In October 1976, Trump surprised model Ivana Zelníčková by appearing at one of his fashion shows in Montreal.

Their visit came after the two hit it off in New York City earlier that summer.

“I was walking down the catwalk in a fur coat when I noticed a tall, blonde man in the audience,” Ivana recounted in her autobiography. Raising Trump. “Our eyes met and he smiled at me. ‘Was Donald on the show?’”

“Somehow he found out and came to Montreal to surprise me. It made me feel a little uncomfortable that he had information about me that I hadn’t given him (a hangover from a communist childhood, perhaps), but I was flattered.”

After the show, Ivana said Trump left Montreal, but the spark of their romance would soon become a defining connection in her life.

Ivana became Ivana Trump as Trump’s first wife and the mother of his three children: Donald Jr., Eric and Ivanka.

Together they formed one of the most iconic power couples of the 1980s and built a sprawling business empire that would forever shape the man who would one day become president.

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