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Good Bones: The Fascinating History of 1331 First Street
To some it is known as the Morris-Israel House because of its previous owners. In 2020, Zion Williamson famously purchased the mansion at 1331 First Street for his mother, Sharonda Anderson, giving it a new era in history.
Front elevation in 2024 
From First and Coliseum in 2024 
View with the new roof in 2024 
New roof and addition in 2024 
Front elevation with view of side in 2024 
Proposed renovations to 1331 First via Uptown Messenger https://uptownmessenger.com/zion-williamsons-mom-receives-city-council-approval-for-addition-to-garden-district-mansion/ The home has been undergoing somewhat controversial renovations since. The controversy is primarily because it has been there since 1869. The longevity of some buildings seems to be so mind boggling to some humans that we insist they remain the same forever.
Apparently the Irish architectect, Samuel Jamison, who designed this particular roof ensured that you can’t see it from the street. This is the reason for originally denying approval for the renovations. I do not think one single tour guide or tourist has noticed in any of the 15.5 decades since Jamison built that roof that it disappeared from sight. I have yet to understand why this was such a good feature of the old mansion at First and Coliseum that had to remain indefinitely.
This home was built by a racist man, as best I can tell, and was the seat of the queen of the most exclusive carnival society for several decades after that. It seems that this home might need to be rid of some of its buried bones.
The Times-Picayune November 30, 1869 p. 1. Speaking of bones…
After a mention of actual bones found in the house by some lovely folks on a recent tour, I went down a rabbit hole. The newspaper was surprisingly fruitful with information about the address. There have been four eras of this home before Zion bought it, and one of them did involve found bones. Shall we?
Part 1: The Beginning 1860-1924
It took nine years to build1, which was greatly delayed by the Civil War, for Joseph Chandler Morris2 and his family. They were residents of New Orleans for 53 years, according to his obituary in 1903.
The Times-Democrat
Tue, Aug 04, 1903 · Page 5
The Times-Picayune. August 6, 1903 p. 6. 
The Times-Picayune July 17, 1921 p. 42 
The Times-Picayune January 8, 1922 p. 4. The first newspaper references I could find for the address are want ads for house staff in 1895, all of which specify the race of the staff they prefer. Morris’s biographical section of his obituary begins, “Born in Massachusetts and coming here when a young man, Mr. Morris became thoroughly Southernized in his sympathies.” I recently described my own father as a natural Southerner, but I was referring to his love of the outdoors, hunting and fishing. Since Morris lived in a mansion in the Garden District instead of a raised home in the swamp, like my father, I assume his sympathies were not for wild game.
The home remained in J. C. Morris’s family for two more decades with many more racially specific want ads piled up. It became known as the Chassaignac residence because of Morris’s daughter, Jennie, who married Dr. Charles Chassaignac. In 1921, it was listed for sale. The sale ads continued for a couple of years before the contents of the home were finally put up for auction in 1924. Before the auction happened, the home sold privately. The home’s first era lasted 55 years.
Part 2: The de Monte Leone Era 1924
New Orleans Item March 8, 1924 p. 36. In 1924, for about six months, Dr. Paul de Monte Leone lived in the home. He hosted weekly free lectures about psychology and the occult. He claimed to be a psychologist who trained in Tibet. I have not figured out if he owned the home or just lived there. I haven’t found a real estate transfer with his name. His departure from the home coincides with the auction in 1924.
I did find that Dr. de Monte Leone was arrested for “operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of liquor” in September 1924, during Prohibition. He was also sued by Mrs. Anna Dann for $1,000. She had invested into his Leonic Institute, a proposed school for “mental defectives”. Anna worked without pay with the promise of a share of the profits. She claimed the suit grew out of dissatisfaction with the project, and he refused to return her money. The lawsuit in October 1924 is the last I found Dr. Paul de Monte Leone in New Orleans. I went to the City Archives to try to find the civil case docket, but I only found a handwritten note about how a bunch of missing pages were in the clerk’s desk drawer. Dr. Monte Leone made the same type of impact in St. Louis and Texas3.
The Times-Picayune November 23, 1924 p. 38. 
The New Orleans States November 23, 1924 p. 15. 
The Times-Picayune November 26, 1924 p. 32. 
The Times Picayune January 31, 1926 p. 31. Between 1924 and 1926 the home was let as apartments with the owner living on the first floor, Mrs. Paul/Pearl McCain/McCranie.
Part 3: The Hopkins Era 1926-1966
The New Orleans Item September 8, 1926 p. 11. It became a single family home again in 1926 when the Hopkins family became residents. Dr. Ralph Hopkins4 was a physician who trained at Tulane and served as director of the Louisiana Leper Home in Carville, Louisiana, from 1902-1920. He was also a Confederate and a member of the Boston Club. His daughters were queens of the most prominent Carnival krewes.
New Orleans States January 15, 1935 p. 17. Many queens reigned over the property, as this mansion became known as the location for the queens’ dinners after the Comus balls for many years. They hosted many debutante teas within the walls of 1331 First during the 41 years the Hopkinses owned the home. Dr. Hopkins died in 1945, and Mrs. Hopkins continued hosting for several years. She didn’t die until 1982, but the house passed out of the family in 1967.
Part 4: The Israel-Aron Era 1967-2015
The Times Picayune April 9, 1967 p. 114. 
The Times Picayune October 18,1967 p. 11. Mrs. Marian Hopkins sold the house to Merryl Silverstein Israel Aron5 and her first husband, Sam Israel, Jr., in 1967. Merryl was a golf champion and a New Orleans native6. The couple immediately began renovating, as many people who take up residence in the Garden District do. The renovations became news when human bones were bizarrely found in the floor of the second story. “The bones and the top portion of a skull, with a crop of reddish brown hair still clinging to it, were found beneath second-story floor boards that were pulled up in a unoccupied three-story brick and wood residence at 1331 First,” The Times-Picayune March 9, 1968 p. 22.
The Times Picayune March 9, 1968 p. 22. The homicide detective on the case estimated that the “remains may be as much as 60 years old,” which would put the remains in the home with the Hopkins family the entire time but safely outside the bounds of suspects. George Hopkins explained that the home was used as a “boarding house” before his parents bought it for the news article. It seems to me that of the eras of this home’s history, the era of many tenants sharing space is the least likely to have hosted a secret like bones in the ceiling.
The next article with the address is April 11, 1969, when Sam Israel, Jr., a member of the Tulane Board, held a reception there. They opened it to the public a few weeks later as a stop on a walking tour of historic mansions to benefit the Louisiana Landmarks Society. The Times Picayune wrote up the renovation on September 14, 1969, with no mention of the bones.
The later articles about the home occasionally mention the bones with the story becoming more embellished. Eventually, the bones are found in a secret room, not the floor of the second story, and blamed on a Voodoo ritual performed by the servants, according to legend. Sometimes an entire skeleton is found7. Sometimes the home is referred to as the “house of the Voodoo ritual”. I submitted a public records request to see how the homicide investigation ended. The response was quick.
Record request #24-11633 has been closed. The closure reason supplied was:
You may wish to inquire with the City Archives which are housed at the Main Branch of the New Orleans Public Library. Here is a link to the archives website: http://archives.nolalibrary.org/~nopl/spec/speclist.htm.
On behalf of the custodial department(s), our office has responded to your request and considers this request closed.
Law Department
City of New Orleans
1300 Perdido St., Ste. 5E03
New Orleans, LA 70112
504-658-9800So I submitted a request at the Archives.
Thank you for reaching out to the City Archives. I will work on researching this request in the next few days. Because there is no name/ case number/ or date connected to the original incident, it may take some time to uncover information.
In the meantime, you can take a look at our website regarding the police records in our collection here: https://nolacityarchives.org/new-orleans-police-department/
The information at that link is the reason I submitted a public records request in the first place. It doesn’t appear that an investigation from 1968 is archived yet, which is exactly what the City Archives said when they told me to ask NOPD:
I haven’t been able to find any more information about the Homicide Investigation that you requested. As you mentioned, the homicide report is outside of the scope of our collection. You can try contacting NOPD directly, but I am unsure of their record holdings from that time period.
The public records request I made is asking NOPD. So NOPD told me to ask the City Archives and the City Archives told me to ask NOPD…
At age 84 in 1997, Merryl chose to donate her home to Tulane University with the condition that she lived there until she died. She died in 2015 at age 102, effectively ending the 48 year era for her family. Tulane sold the house back to her family in 2016, but it sat empty until 20208.
Part 5: The New Era
In 2020, Zion and his mother gained ownership of the mansion, a fitting next chapter in the life of this old house. His aim seems to be to remove everything but the bones of the house thereby ensuring that no skeletons remain in these closets or walls or even ceilings. Of course, the Garden District geezers tried to stop his renovations…because they would be able to see the roof. He received approval to move forward with his modified plan in 2021, so Zion will make his mark on this house with his mom as the reigning queen of 1331 First9. I hope you’ll join me in rebranding it the Williamson-Anderson House.
Sources:
- Property Listing 1331 First Street, New Orleans, LA. The McEnery Co. https://www.mceneryco.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/1331-First-Street_OM.pdf ↩︎
- Find A Grave “Joseph Chandler Morris” https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/71466485/joseph-chandler-morris ↩︎
- Richardson, Bill. “Grief, Memory, Three O’Clock in the Morning,” Oh, MG: My Mavis Gallant Centennial Diaries sub stack, April 24, 2024. https://billrichardson.substack.com/p/grief-memory-three-oclock-in-the-73b ↩︎
- Find A Grave “Dr. Ralph Hopkins, Sr.” https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8584388/ralph-hopkins ↩︎
- Find A Grave “Merryl Silverstein Israel Aron” https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/155880023/merryl-israel_aron ↩︎
- “Merryl Israel Aron: New Orleans, Louisiana” New Orleans Auction Galleries Catalog for May 21-22, 2016. ↩︎
- “Morris Israel House” by Exploring Nola Tours, March 1, 2021. https://exploringnolatours.com/blog/f/morris-israel-house ↩︎
- “A Gift to Tulane Provides a Home for a Lifetime” Fall 2016 Seasons: A Lifetime of Giving Newsletter https://giving.tulane.edu/s/1586/Giving/16/interior.aspx?sid=1586&gid=2&pgid=4636 ↩︎
- Hart, Katherine. “Zion Williamson’s mom receives City Council approval for addition to Garden District mansion” Uptown Messenger September 24, 2021. https://uptownmessenger.com/zion-williamsons-mom-receives-city-council-approval-for-addition-to-garden-district-mansion/ ↩︎
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On Authenticity
New Orleans is deeply authentic. New Orleanians cherish authenticity to the point that individualism is elevated to art. Outsiders often immediately feel this authenticity. I believe this feeling is a large reason why so many people instantly identify with New Orleans and feel it is home.
Nothing annoys me more than a poser. Someone who is trying to be something that they aren’t reeks of insecurity. Keeping up the façade is impossible, so it never feels real.
Always an important port city, New Orleanians have come from around the world for more than three hundred years. My family roots in New Orleans are about 175 years deep, but each of the men who married into the New Orleans line of my family came from elsewhere. My original Louisiana ancestors joined the Creoles from Ireland. My great grandfather came from Finland and never left. My grandfather came from Pennsylvania, a merchant marine, who never left. And my father came from New York and never left. I still have family in all of those places.
But my ancestors came to this city. They were not forced to settle here, but became some of the many transplants who decided that New Orleans was their home.
New Orleans doesn’t hide the bad, and bad shit has always been a prominent part of life here since the Europeans arrived. From storms to plagues to murders and duels, lots of death and and destruction has always surrounded those who choose their home in the swamp. The swamp is decay, the beautiful decay described inadequately by so many writers, including this one.
In 2016, I went to Jean Lafitte National Park each season to capture the swamp transforming dead stuff into flowers. As you walk around the prominent tourist sites, you’ll find prominent plaques about the wonderful things that happened and the amazing people who lived here right alongside plaques noting horrific events in history. New Orleans doesn’t hide the bad. This authenticity is one reason why so many people have such a visceral connection to the Crescent City. The country flushes its pollution down the Mississippi, and so many people rejoin the trash to leave their cares behind.
This year I’ve been ruminating on a theory that New Orleans is the most American city. Still the most European, African, Caribbean, unique, interesting city but also the most American city. My theory stems from the fact that so much American culture comes from the mouth of the Mississippi River. Of course, I had to leave Louisiana to realize this.
While traveling the world almost 20 years ago, a common refrain of Europeans from “older” countries was that America had no culture. This baffled me. Europeans seem to equate culture with age. Their culture is apparently contained in the stones of buildings that have lasted several hundreds of years. Louisiana, New Orleans in particular, seethes with culture from the people. Creativity and flavor ooze and leak from those who mix here, the leftovers sopped up and regurgitated by the rest of the world. I started forming my theory that the culture of my home is the culture of my country, not some other foreign culture like I’ve so often repeated.
But why does the othering of New Orleans matter? Things like the devastation of Katrina are why it matters, where you see newscasters sharing with the world, “How could this happen in America?” Or an open fire hydrant flooding the street with no one paying attention to it. Two hundred year old buildings that fall down in the middle of the most preserved district. Or trees that critically injure tourists in Jackson Square. Or another year as the murder capital of the world. Losing power three times a week without rain or regularly having to boil your water before you can use it. Things you simply wouldn’t see in other great American cities but we accept regularly, are why it matters.
From the Revolt of 1768, cementing the historical place of New Orleans at the forefront of what it means to be American (before we even were American), New Orleans has been defining our culture and transporting our goods. Without trying to be anything else. Authentically. Allowing everyone else to follow our parade. I hope that my role as a tour guide helps more people repeat a new refrain about New Orleans. We’re not just a haunted party town, but a great American city to be proud of and to preserve.
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Lalaurie’s Bricked Up Window
Lalaurie Mansion 1831 The Lalaurie mansion went back on the market for over $10 million this week. As soon as the images for the real estate listing posted, I started trying to figure out the floor plan to solve the mystery of the bricked up window.1 2
In the legend of Madame Lalaurie, they (not sure who) bricked up the window because of the tragic death of an enslaved girl named Leah. Leah snagged Delphine’s hair while brushing it, enraging the enslaver. The girl jumped from the window to avoid punishment, dying in the process.
Rebuilt home before 1895 The truth is that the story is impossible. This home was not built until 1837-38, after Delphine left New Orleans, by Pierre Trastour. The home she lived in burned, both in the legend and in reality, and it was only two stories. The rebuilt home was also originally two stories. Fortunato Greco owned the building from 1893-1916 and added the third story and rear addition where the bricked up window is, according to the Historic New Orleans Collection.3 Watch my video for the true story of Delphine and the haunted house and why it’s far worse than the ghost stories that are retold. Fortunato Greco features prominently in the history of the ghosts.
From the 2024 listing with my labeling In some photos of the home, you can find two bricked up windows. But currently one bricked window on the Gov. Nicholls elevation on the third floor second from the left tantalizes tourists and tour guides. I have spent entirely too long looking at the real estate photos and video to try to determine what the heck that bricked up window is. This home has a speakeasy hidden in a bathroom and an observatory on the roof, but neither of those seem to contain the secret of the bricked up window.
As far as I can tell, the real estate images do not reveal the secret of Lalaurie’s window. Who knows if that’s intentional. But there is a hint. There is a vent in the small guest room on the same wall as the door to the mystery…I wonder if the air return or some other mundane modern amenity hides behind the bricked up window? They would have retrofitted for air conditioning at some point, so this feels like the most likely explanation to me. What do you think?
From the 2024 listing with my labeling Here’s another story of an old haunted house in New Orleans.
[Historic New Orleans Collection?] 2-050-060 
Negative gift of Mrs. Emilio Levy, May 20, 1968. 2-050-059 
Negative no. 34712/16336, lent by Library of Congress 2-050-058 Negative lent by Louisiana State Museum. 2-050-056 - Brandt, Libertina. “For $10.25 Million: A New Orleans Mansion With a Wine Cellar, ‘Psychedelic Room’ and Some Ghosts,” Wall Street Journal, July 4, 2024. https://www.wsj.com/real-estate/luxury-homes/lalaurie-mansion-new-orleans-for-sale-35a20826 ↩︎
- “1140 Royal Street, New Orleans, LA 70116” Latter & Blum Real Estate Listing. https://www.latter-blum.com/p/1140-Royal-Street-New-Orleans-LA-70116/dmgid_170502975 ↩︎
- “1140 Royal Street” Collins C. Diboll Vieux Carre Digital Survey, a project of the Historic New Orleans Collection. https://www.hnoc.org/vcs/property_info.php?lot=22782-30 ↩︎
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Voodoo in New Orleans
I recently completed a continuing education course on the History of New Orleans Voodoo at Loyola University. I wanted to spend dedicated time learning more about the African American religion that New Orleans has exported around the world in a scholarly setting.
One thing is clear from the depictions of Voodoo or Voudou or Vodou or Vauxdaux in the newspapers: there are no unbiased accounts. The reports were written by white men with all of the lenses of distortion afforded to the privileged class. One of the most remembered depictions of Voodoo comes from Lafcadio Hearn, who was not from New Orleans but spent about a decade (1877-1888) writing in the city. He is sometimes credited with “inventing” New Orleans because his stories are the ones still often retold.
“Voudou Nonsense”The Times-Picayune Fri, Jun 26, 1874, Page 1 
“St. John’s Eve after the Voudous”The Times-Picayune Fri, Jun 25, 1875, Page 2 
“St. John’s Eve”The Times-Picayune Mon, Jun 25, 1877, Page 1 
The Times-Picayune Wed, Jun 25, 1879, Page 4 
The Times-Democrat Fri, Jun 17, 1887, Page 3 
“Dance of the Voodoos” The Semi-Weekly Times-Democrat Fri, Jun 26, 1896, Page 5 Newspaper articles describing St. John’s Eve ceremonies in the 19th century. But Lafcadio got a lot wrong in his interpretation of Voodoo. For instance, he explains, “…the devil is god, and it is to him they pray.” The association of Voodoo with evil is so ingrained to this day that travelers to New Orleans are stunned to learn that Voodoo is a real religion. In fact, there is no devil in the Voodoo tradition, according to all of the speakers in my class and all sources I’ve referenced. In his article “The Secret and Irreligious Doctrines of Voodooism” from the Journal of Church and State, Dr. Kodi Roberts explains, “Hearn frequently focused readers on the supposed foreignness and backwardness of Voodoo while simultaneously using it to characterize and exoticize New Orleans. Hearn classified traditional religions as primitive and attributed the imagined flaws in the culture of New Orleans’ Black population to their African heritage.”
In celebration of St. John’s Eve (June 23), the most sacred holiday in the Voodoo tradition, I’m reflecting on what I’ve learned, what I’ve read, and what I think about myself now. This is an effort to sort through what I’ve learned for my own reference later. It will also change as I learn more. I also published a video with more information about St. John’s Eve and why I think New Orleans is known for Voodoo as of now.
A Comparative Analysis of Voodoo
Because Voodoo has been an oral tradition for a long time and because there are many sects, there are contradictions in the information from researchers and worshipers. The speakers in our classes did not always agree on the facts. The three main sources I’m relying on for this comparison are Priest Robi Gilmore who spoke to our class, The Magic of Marie Laveau: Embracing the Spiritual Legacy of the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans by Denise Alvarado, and The Voodoo Encyclopedia by Jeffrey E. Anderson.
In general, Voodoo is a monotheistic religion that originated in Africa more than 5,000 years ago. It has spread across the world, largely due to the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Enslaved Africans brought their religious traditions to the Caribbean and North America, where they evolved. Religious ceremonies and rituals are largely secret (speakers in my class would not share some information because of this), but some public ceremonies have been performed historically and still occur. In New Orleans, the Voodoo tradition overlaps with Roman Catholicism due to colonialism and restrictions on religious freedom. The religion of Voodoo was never outlawed, but many of its components — gathering, drums, dancing, fortune telling, herbal medicine — were outlawed at various points.
Lwa/Orisha are lesser beings in Voodoo similar to the saints in Catholicism. The name used depends on where you are in the world and what sect you observe. They are more than human but less than God, but closest to God. According to the speakers in my class, the order of prayer is to the living, the ancestors, the Lwa/Orisha, then to God.
Voodoo v. Hoodoo
Priest Robi, shared that there are still no accurate portrayals of his religion in media or books. He also said that the closest depiction is The Skeleton Key, a 2005 movie starring Kate Hudson that is largely about hoodoo. I rewatched it, and there is a scene where one of the characters explains the difference between Voodoo and hoodoo, as I understood Priest Robi, plainly and accurately — Voodoo is a religion and hoodoo is folk magic. The Voodoo Encyclopedia also has this explanation as the most accepted and repeated by scholars.
But that explanation conflicts with Denise Alvarado’s explanation in her book The Magic of Marie Laveau: Embracing the Spiritual Legacy of the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans. Alvarado, who is from New Orleans and was raised in the Marie Laveau tradition, explains that up to a certain point, the terms Voodoo and hoodoo referred to the same practices.
“There are a few theories, mostly by white authors who posit African Americans mistakenly began calling Hoodoo Voudou or vice versa. Others say it was white folks who began calling Voudou Hoodoo or vice versa. I truly believe this is not an issue to Marie Laveau or her followers, as she clearly engaged in Voudou rituals, magick, and gris gris and did not develop illusory categories to define what she was doing. New Orleans practitioners follow suit, rarely arguing this point amongst themselves as we understand how the various aspects of the tradition originated in different regions of Africa and came together in a beautiful, hybridized blend,” Alvarado wrote (p. 49).
She goes on to explain that hoodoo is not embraced by all who observe the Voodoo tradition. In The Voodoo Encyclopedia, Jeffrey E. Anderson explains, “Historically, however, practitioners of what modern historians consider to be Voodoo referred to the faith as hoodoo, using the term Voodoo to designate its practitioners.” Priest Robi shared that the noun for practitioners is voudouizant, but they do not practice; they worship. The uninitiated can be said to “practice” voodoo.
Bayou St. John
In the video “Was Marie Laveau a Voodoo Queen? (Legend v. Reality),” Priest Robi explains that Bayou St. John is where salt and fresh water meet. The two deities of these waters (Yemaja and Oshun) also meet in New Orleans, so Bayou St. John is also integral to the history of New Orleans as a cradle for the religion of Voodoo. Worshipers come from around the world to the sacred location of Bayou St. John. In her book, Alvarado agrees that Bayou St. John is sacred.
“Bayou St. John was one of the spots where Marie Laveau held her annual St. John’s Eve ceremony; but, that’s not the only thing it is known for. One belief tied to the Laveau legend holds that if a person has been crossed, they can remove the conjure by submerging themselves in the spot where Marie Laveau II reportedly drowned. Another bit of lore is the Wishing Spot located on the lakeside of Bayou St. John at the intersection of DeSaix Blvd. There was a hollow tree trunk that functioned like a wishing well where people tossed coins and dollar bills and burned candles in the hopes their wishes would be answered. In another hallowed-out tree in Congo Square referred to as the Wishing Tree, Marie was known for leaving plates of jambalaya and money for the needy after her public dances held there.” Alvarado writes (p. 52).
In The Voodoo Encyclopedia, it’s spelled Bayou St. Jean. Jonathan Foster explains:
“Bayou St. Jean played a significant role in the practice of Voodoo in 19th-century New Orleans. The bayou assumed great importance in the ceremonies of famed priestess Marie Laveau and her supposed daughter Marie the Second. The elder Marie often bought herbs and other supplies needed for rituals from the Native Americans who resided around the bayou. The bayou also served as a favored location for Voodoo ceremonies following the prohibition of such activities at Congo Square. The banks of Bayou St. Jean thus became home to various gatherings aimed at health, good luck, and celebration. These gatherings varied greatly in size and activity, and often included large bonfires, spirited dance, loud music, and feasts. The largest annual ceremony took place on St. John’s Eve (June 23) near the Lake Ponchartrain mouth of the bayou. By the last decades of the century, the St. John’s Eve ceremony sometimes attracted thousands of interested onlookers.”
Catholic Voodoo
In class, we also learned about the hierarchy of spirits and ancestors in the pantheon of Vodou, all providing intercessions on behalf of olodumare, the one creator. Olodumare loosely translates to the owner of the heavens. The ancestors and spirit world are necessary to ask god for help. Alvarado goes into some detail about rituals for the spirits and ancestors in her book, particularly for Marie Laveau.
In The Voodoo Encyclopedia, Dr. Kodi Roberts explains Catholicism and Vodou/Voodoo on pages 46-48, but the word olodumare is not used. Instead, he uses bondye or “the good lord”. Carolyn Morrow Long agrees with this term in A New Orleans Voudou Priestess.
“The saints of New Orleans Voodoo are frequently thought to derive their power and purpose from things that happened to them before their corporeal deaths. It is upon dying that they take on the miraculous powers that make them a help to the living who call on them for assistance with their problems.” p. 47The similarities between the mystic practices I learned in Catholicism and the demonized rituals of Voodoo are striking — praying novenas and rosaries for intercessions, lighting candles and incense, ceremonies with emotional music, ritualized sacrifice for penance like fasting. It’s easy to understand why enslaved people used the symbolism of Catholicism in their own spiritual practices when they were forced to worship a foreign god and hide their own spirituality.
Voodoo Dolls
One of the myths Priest Robi corrected is the story of Voodoo dolls. He explained that performing magic with dolls is actually a European magical tradition called poppets. In the Voodoo tradition, similar dolls are created to represent people. The purpose of these dolls was more akin to record keeping for medicine doctors, however, as so many people of African descent were prevented from learning to read or write. They used the dolls to note injuries or maladies and treatments. Perhaps the Europeans saw this tradition, recognized its similarity to their own folk magic tradition, and made an assumption.
This explanation does not appear in Alvarado’s book. In The Voodoo Encyclopedia, Anderson confirms Priest Robi’s association of the dolls with European traditions, but he does not mention the medical record-keeping.
“First, the use of dolls is by no means unique to religions of Africa and the African diaspora. Similar items appear in European accounts of witchcraft as well. Some authors have even argued that Voodoo dolls were never part of the belief systems of Haiti and the Mississippi Valley. At any rate, dolls are by no means a central feature in the beliefs of Vodou or Voodoo. The mythology of the Voodoo dolls is bound to the uninformed belief that the faiths they are supposed represent are little more than sorcery designed to hard enemies rather than full-fledged religions with their own pantheon of deities and religious ceremonies.”
Marie Laveau
Marie Laveau is the patron saint of New Orleans Voodoo, according to many. She has been elevated by some to a Lwa. There are many mysteries about her life. Some of the literature and what I learned in class are contradictory. For instance, it’s pretty well established that she was born in New Orleans, according to the academics. This is based on a baptismal record that was discovered in 2001.
From The Birth of a Voodoo Queen: A Long Held Mystery Revealed It’s also accepted that she has no living descendants based on the archival evidence. But those who know they are her descendants shared with my teacher, Benita “Mama Nita” Scott, that she was born in Haiti and immigrated to New Orleans when she was 6-8 years old. An old legend about Marie is that she knew Voodoo because she was Haitian, but the discovered baptismal record seemingly disproved that.
It’s also widely accepted that she was illiterate. This is because we have found no records of her writing (such as letters or diaries or prayers or cures), she claimed before notaries that she was illiterate, and she signed with an X when necessary. But Mama Nita said this is also untrue. Her descendants said she was taught by Père Antoine at St. Louis Cathedral in secret. Père Antoine died in 1829, when Marie was 28 years old.
We have a record of her first marriage to Jacques Paris in 1819 by Père Antoine, but we have no record of her second marriage to Christophe Glapion. We know she died on June 15, 1881, as her death was reported across the country. She is interred in St. Louis No. 1 as Dame Christophe Glapion, confirmed by the archival evidence. However, some still insist she was actually buried in St. Louis No. 2 to keep the location of her tomb secret from the public.
Conclusion
It’s always struck me as odd that Europeans would qualify the Voodoo religion as both superstition and evil. If it was just rudimentary folk practices with no meaning, why were they so scared of it? One of the points of The Skeleton Key is that you have to believe for the hoodoo to work. It seems to me that the Europeans also believed in the power of Voodoo and hoodoo, the power of those they tried to subjugate, and labeled it demonic.
Three Hundred Years of New Orleans Voodoo
Timeline (Red is a law, italics is a first hand account)
1719 First enslaved people are brought to New Orleans
1723 Capuchin friars arrive
1724 Code Noir implemented, requiring Sundays off for enslaved people
1718-1734 The earliest reference to Congo Square occurs in Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz’s Histoire de la Louisiane, a memoir of the nearly two decades he spent in Louisiana between 1718 and 1734
1727 Ursuline nuns arrive in the colony. New Orleans was unique in that the first missionaries were women here to educate women.
1736 Marguerite Semard, Marie Laveau’s great-grandmother, is born in an unknown location. She was enslaved.
1754 Catherine Henry, Marie’s grandmother, is born enslaved
1772 Marguerite Henry, Marie’s mother, is born enslaved
1762ish Louisiana becomes Spanish
1786 Miró outlaws gatherings of enslaved Africans in the Bando de Buen Gobierno (Edict for Good Government) https://www.nps.gov/ethnography/aah/aaheritage/frenchama.htm
1788 An amendment to the Code Noir requires tignon for women of African descent (Sisters of the Holy Family and the Veil of Race p. 200)
1790 Marguerite Henry, Marie’s mother, is granted freedom at age 18.
1795 Catherine Henry, Marie Laveau’s grandmother purchases her freedom at age 42.
1801 Marie Laveau is born free.
1803 The Republic of Haiti is established after the successful Haitian Revolution.
1803 The Louisiana Purchase makes New Orleans American.
1804 Louisiana becomes the first place requiring a license for pharmacy.
1804 Congo square becomes open land (not just swamps and woods).
1808 People of African descent are required to add homme or femme de couleur libre (fmc or fwc) on all business or legal documents.
1808 The United States bans the importation of enslaved Africans.
1811 German Coast uprising.
1812 Congo Square becomes a public square Place Publique.
1817 Ordinance forbidding enslaved people to gather except on Sundays in Congo Square then called Place Publique.
1819 First hand account of Sunday at Congo Square from Benjamin Latrobe in his journal https://smarthistory.org/congo-square-new-orleans/
1835 Sunday afternoon music and dancing outlawed in Congo Square, effectively banning to Voodoo traditions.
1845 People of African descent allowed back in Congo Square with musical instruments.
1848 Description in Times Picayune of Congo Square.
1850 Oldest reference to voudou in newspaper.
1856 People of African descent couldn’t play horns or drums in the city — rituals moved to the lake.
1862 New Orleans falls to the Union in the Civil War.
1863 Oldest reference to voodoo in newspaper.
1869 July 5 first newspaper account of St. John’s Eve celebration (Long, p. 122)
1869 Possession reported in the newspaper
1872 Last report of Marie Laveau at a St. John’s Eve ceremony in the newspaper (Long p. 126)
1877-1888 Lafcadio Hearn “invents” New Orleans
1880 George Washington Cable publishes “The Grandissimes” (character is thought to be based on Marie and he claimed to visit her shortly before her death).
1881 Marie Laveau dies
1885 Last of the Voudous by Lafcadio Hearn published in Harper’s Weekly
1887 Congo dance at West End advertised
1887 State law forbidding medicine without a license (Long, p. 128)
1890 Jazz begins forming
1897 New Orleans ordinance against fortune telling (Long, p. 128)
1897-1917 Storyville
1945 Lyle Saxon publishes “Gumbo Ya-Ya”.
1956 Robert Tallant publishes “The Voodoo Queen”.
1973 Cynthia Himel was writing a thesis at LSUNO; St. John’s Eve event at Edna and Harry Freiberg’s home on Bayou St. John. The Freibergs hosted an annual St. John’s Eve event from at least 1966-1975.
1977 Sallie Ann Glassman begins practicing Voodoo in New Orleans (self-reported).
1990 First ad for Voodoo ceremony by Sallie Ann Glassman.
2005 Skeleton Key movie
YouTube videos of the Rituals in New Orleans:
2007 https://youtu.be/PJPx9xhplYw?si=irQu4u82jYe6R0-u
2008 https://youtu.be/bZUYhbgGhCU?si=ynsD0qhQgNkNsVHS
2011 https://youtu.be/RhwWvGYGAXo?si=pYBdiDFoBUx7jUd8
2013 https://youtu.be/iMJ86oYGlX0?si=oVOZns2a4UVMtzkZ
2014 https://youtu.be/zWYqVsZlHRY?si=QpRL9qnSpK_V0FKE
2014 https://youtu.be/2zRvxpxVMI8?si=loltuoOJjfWff2XM
2015? https://youtu.be/ZePgj6rLV5k?si=qiCcnfMCCE1zn9GX
2017 https://youtube.com/shorts/oGU_g_KJUmE?si=LgnY4OGEXh5B9_6i
2018 https://youtu.be/sFZQhD79rYs?si=KJDDH-yaaAZyrR_z
2021 https://youtu.be/Zf1-wgssagQ?si=YvywswtlO3pvGapy
The Times-Picayune Fri, Dec 22, 1848 ·Page 1 Sources
- Alvarado, Denise. The Magic of Marie Laveau: Embracing the Spiritual Legacy of the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans Weiser Books, February 1, 2020.
- Long, Carolyn Morrow. A New Orleans Voudou Queen: The Legend and Reality of Marie Laveau University Press of Florida, October 7, 2007.
- Roberts, Kodi, ”The Secret and Irreligious Doctrines of Voodooism: Institutionalization versus Cultural Stigma in New Orleans Civil Court.” Journal of Church and State, Volume 60, Issue 4, Autumn 2018, Pages 661–680, https://doi.org/10.1093/jcs/csy004
- Scott, Benita “Mama Nita.” “Voodoo Practices with Priest Robi and Dr. Crow.” Guest speakers Robi Gilmore and Andrew Wiseman (Dr. Crow). The History of New Orleans Vooodoo. Loyola University of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA, March 21, 2024.
- Wiseman, Andrew (Dr. Crow). “Voodoo Tour by Dr. Crow.” New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum, New Orleans, LA, Sunday, April 7, 2024.
- “New Orleans Vooodoo from the Inside” directed by David M. Jones, DMJ Productions, November 1, 1996. M U. September 30, 2022. https://youtu.be/oQV8CgvYssU?si=fo9dfTmBUz8KVEuw
- “Was Marie Laveau a Voodoo Queen? (Legend v. Reality)” Free Tours by Foot New Orleans. June 11, 2021. https://youtu.be/6_a_6SsrK_o?si=ErpGgCttZG8JMwva
- Asher, Kat. “Voodoo Priestess Marie Laveau Created New Orleans Midsummer Festival” June 23, 2017. American South: A Smithsonian Magazine Special Report. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/voodoo-priestess-marie-laveau-created-new-orleans-midsummer-festival-180963750
- Calogne, Kristine. “Expert Uncovers Birth Record of Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau.” LSU Press Release, March 28, 2002. https://www.newswise.com/articles/expert-uncovers-birth-record-of-voodoo-queen-marie-laveau
- Anderson, Jeffrey E. “Dolls.”The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIO, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 78-79.
- Anderson, Jeffrey E. “Saint John’s Eve.”The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIO, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 253-254.
- Anderson, Jeffrey E. “Voodoo in the Mississippi Valley.”The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIO, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 306-310.
- Foster, Jonathan. “Bayou St. Jean.” The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIO, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 20-21.
- Long, Carolyn Morrow. “Jean Montanée.” The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIP, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 190-191.
- Roberts, Kodi. “Catholicism and Vodou/Voodoo.” The Voodoo Encyclopedia: Magic, Ritual and Religion, edited by Jeffrey E. Anderson, ABC-CLIP, LLC, Santa Barbara, California, 2015, pp. 46-48.
- Hearn, Lafcadio. Inventing New Orleans. University of Mississippi Press, Jackson, Mississippi, 2001.
- O’Neill Schmitt, Rory. New Orleans Vooodoo: A Cultural History. The History Press, Charleston, South Carolina, 2019.
- Fandrich, Ina J. “The Birth of New Orleans’ Voodoo Queen: A Long-Held Mystery Resolved.” Louisiana History: The Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association, vol. 46, no. 3, 2005, pp. 293–309. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4234122. Accessed 8 June 2024.
- Olivarius, Kathryn. “Death, Data, and Denial in Antebellum New Orleans.” Harvard Library Bulletin. https://harvardlibrarybulletin.org/death-data-and-denial-antebellum-new-orleans
- Neidenbach, Elizabeth Clark. “Free People of Color: Free people of color constituted a diverse segment of Louisiana’s population and included people that were born free or enslaved, were of African or mixed racial ancestry, and were French- or English-speaking.” 64 Parishes, Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, April 28, 2011. https://64parishes.org/entry/free-people-of-color
- Clark, Emily, and Virginia Meacham Gould. “The Feminine Face of Afro-Catholicism in New Orleans, 1727-1852.” The William and Mary Quarterly, vol. 59, no. 2, 2002, pp. 409–48. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3491743. Accessed 9 Feb. 2024.
- Advocate staff report. “300 unique New Orleans moments: Records of free people of color in Louisiana date back to 1722.” New Orleans Advocate, The (LA), sec. Tricentennial, 6 Oct. 2017. NewsBank: America’s News – Historical and Current, https://infoweb.newsbank.com/apps/news/openurl?ctx_ver=z39.88-2004&rft_id=info%3Asid/infoweb.newsbank.com&svc_dat=AMNEWS&req_dat=0D1CD317F8F22780&rft_val_format=info%3Aofi/fmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Actx&rft_dat=document_id%3Anews/1676653A10837290. Accessed 14 June 2024.
- Ulentin, Anne, “Free women of color and slaveholding in New Orleans, 1810-1830” (2007). LSU Master’s Theses. 3013.
https://repository.lsu.edu/gradschool_theses/3013
Further Research (for me)
- Roberts, Kodi A. Voodoo and Power: The Politics of Religion in New Orleans, 1881–1940 LSU Press, Baton Rouge, LA, November 13, 2015.
- Anderson, Jeffrey E. Voodoo: An African American Religion LSU Press, Baton Rouge, LA, March 20, 2024.
- Additional Voodoo tour (seeking recommendations)
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Old Ursuline Convent: Museum Review
I finally visited the Old Ursuline Convent museum on Chartres Street. The Ursuline Convent is the oldest building in not just New Orleans, but the entire Mississippi River Valley, and the only remaining example of French colonial architecture that was completed during the French regime.1 It’s a brick between posts style construction covered in stucco on the outside and plaster on the inside. The first floor features the original exposed cypress beams.
Altar of St. Mary’s Catholic Church The museum requires a guided tour with your visit, and the tour is not available every day. The tour explored a three rooms on the first floor and the church. It lasted about 40 minutes. They allow photos.
After the tour, you can wander around and into the courtyard for the rest of the hour, but the building was shut exactly at the hour. There are five rooms with displays — history of the Ursulines in New Orleans, important sites of Catholicism in New Orleans, the mourning practices of Creoles, cemetery traditions, and relics.
The rooms explain the history of the Ursuline nuns sent to New Orleans to educate young women and run the hospital. There are also artifacts from this history. I was impressed with the depth of history the guide shared and pleased that it aligns with the history I share on tours. I was most impressed by the artifacts recovered from the St. Peter St. Cemetery on display.
Artifacts recovered from St. Peter Street Cemetery The tour even discussed Piccolo Palermo and the influence of Italian immigration on the French Quarter and explained why we bury above ground. There was unfortunately no mention of the Casket Girls on the tour, and I didn’t think to ask…
Overall, this was an affordable and thorough introduction to the history of New Orleans through the lens of the Ursuline nuns. If you’re visiting on a weekend and want a quick overview of how things went down, this is an excellent guided option.
Want to know how the Ursuline nuns factor into the history of New Orleans Voodoo? Watch my video to learn more.
- The two other examples of French colonial architecture, Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop and Madame John’s Legacy, were built in the 1770s and 1788 respectively, during the Spanish regime. ↩︎
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Half Yankee
Yes, I admit it. I am half yankee. Honestly, since I grew up north of the lake, some folks might consider me all yankee. My dad is one of those people who came to Louisiana and never left. He’s been in Louisiana longer than he lived in New York, so we let him say he’s a southerner now. He’s always been one naturally, but now he has the credentials too. If you like synchronicity, you’ll be pleased to know that my grandfather grew up on Louisiana Avenue in Brooklyn.
My grandparents in Brooklyn early 1950s. I spent a recent weekend with my grandmother in New York. She has been an avid photographer her entire life. Purely amateur with a point and shoot (on film for far longer than most of us and on a digital camera for years), she has amassed literally thousands of photos from her nine decades and several decades before she was born.
She recently moved to a condo from her home of 69 years. It was a call-in-the-troops situation after a full year of trying to carefully sort and pack a home with the stuff of four generations. In the moving fray, the photos were dispersed and misplaced.
“I can’t find my pictures,” she kept repeating to my dad and me. “I think they threw them away.”
We were part of that “they” and I knew for sure they did no such thing! We spent the weekend looking in all of the still unopened boxes and finding most of the photos. We spent 10+ hours on Saturday looking at photos from 1900-2020. She gave us any we wanted, seemingly fearing they will all be thrown out after she’s gone (NO because I will take them). I saw many photos of her I’d never seen and heard stories I’d never heard.
Nana, me, my aunt and three of my cousins looking at photos. Aunt Janet
She told us about skipping school (John Adams High School in Queens) and playing in Central Park with her friends. One day they met two young guys who followed them around. She seemed ok with that, but another creepy man also started following them. They recruited the first guys, who wound up in the photos cementing her memories, to scare off the creepy guy. The guys had slicked back hair and cigarettes rolled up in their t-shirt sleeves.
Many of her friends she maintained throughout her life. One in particular, my dad’s godmother who we all knew as Aunt Janet, was in those photos from playing hooky in Central Park and many many others throughout the years. Nana and Aunt Janet married friends and bought homes blocks from each other made by the same builder, so they were identical. They each had four children, three girls and one boy. They remained friends even after Aunt Janet moved to Georgia in retirement, and she always showed up, even at her grand-goddaughter’s wedding.
Aunt Janet died a few years ago of pancreatic cancer shortly after we celebrated her 90th birthday. We love to tell stories of Aunt Janet, who was a sculptor and had an art studio before her retirement. Nana misses her lifelong friend dearly. They were more like sisters and Nana always calls her the sister she never had. They had plans for when they were 95.
Carl
Nana has always had a pen pal. Her name was Doreen, and we have a ton of photos of the many trips Doreen made from England to New York and vice versa. Even some photos of the trip Doreen made to Louisiana to celebrate Mardi Gras. Doreen is also the reason I have a pen pal in England.
But before Doreen, Nana had a pen pal named Carl who she wrote to while he was in Okinawa during World War II. He sent her many photos of himself with his letters, and she has saved them for almost 80 years. I wonder what photos she sent him…
Fancy Ladies
My grandmother’s side of the family is the closest “old New York” ancestors that I have, particularly my grandmother’s mother’s side of the family. But she did not have an easy life. She was born in 1896 in Taberg, New York. Her parents divorced when she was very young, and she was shuffled between relatives. Nana told me that she sometimes lived with her grandparents, sometimes with an aunt. She knew Leo, my great-grandfather, as a child, but they didn’t marry until later and were 36 when Nana was born. “My parents were always the oldest of all my friends,” Nana told me.
My great-grandmother was prim and proper, traits perhaps passed down from her old New York family. She was a talented seamstress. She could copy designs she saw window shopping in Manhattan. My grandmother was always exceptionally well-dressed with tailored clothing as a result. She pointed to every photo of her as a young woman and explained how her mother made the clothing — coats of wool and dresses of silk. Her mother required her to call her Mother, also, not mommy or mom. She still has a beautiful dress her mother made hanging in her closet in her new condo.
Leo/a
I get my name from her father; he was Leo. I was the first great-grandchild. Nana was an only child, as was her mother who died when she was only 68 years old (when Nana was 32 and my dad was nine). Her father lived to 96, and he knew seven of his great-grandchildren. He was a sailor in the Navy in World War I, among the first car mechanics, and a patent-holding inventor. Once on a visit to Louisiana, he asked how far Baton Rouge was. He casually explained that he had passed through once on the way to Texas as part of a civilian militia that chased Pancho Villa.
My name is from her father, but my looks are all Nana. I’ve been told my entire life that I look just like my grandmother. It is never more apparent than looking at photos of Nana when she was younger. So it’s weird to hear her tell me stories about her high school graduation photo, and how much she hates it.
“My mother told me my smile was too wide, so I didn’t smile,” she shared. “I always hated that photo.”
I, too, hate photos of myself where I’m not smiling. I also have a wide smile. In fact, the same wide smile. But I’ve only ever been told my smile is beautiful.
I’m planning another weekend with Nana to look through more photos as soon as possible. My half Yankee side needs nourishing too.
Nana’s 1950 graduation photo and my 2002 graduation photo -
Newspaper Articles — New Orleans Revolt and Duels!
These are all of the newspaper articles I reference regarding duels, the New Orleans Revolt of 1768, and Pirates Alley in my video, The Ghosts of the Alleys.
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Some Thoughts on Tour Guiding
AKA the lies of tour guides…
I never expected how competitive tour guiding is in a laid back city like New Orleans, or how willingly so many lie because they think the false story is better. I want to correct the narrative by using the stories of buildings and people that aren’t widely shared to refine our historical framework of both New Orleans and the United States. I have yet to come across a story where the truth is less interesting that the bland lies typically shared by tour guides — complex stories somehow summed up neatly with a bow in 2-5 minutes with very little to challenge your preconceptions.
My tour guiding inspiration is Rick Steves and his public television show1. This is why I freely share information I learn. He democratizes traveling Europe for the United States, providing free tours and deep looks into historical spots that some may never be able to visit.
New Orleans has just under 400,000 people and about 350,000 of them claim to be some kind of tour guide. That may be a slight exaggeration (a tour guiding term I’ve learned to hide lies), but the industry of “tourism”, or restaurants and hotels according to the Data Center who counted 207,863 total workers in New Orleans in 2018, employed 14,804 and 11,647 people respectively, according to their 2018 study2. This 26,451 total (or 12.7% of all workers in New Orleans) doesn’t include a single tour guide! In contrast, the Port of New Orleans supported 21,700 jobs statewide in a 2019 report by the American Journal of Ground Transportation3.
“In 2022, we welcomed 17.53 million visitors who spent $9.1 billion. In 2019, that number was 19.75 million visitors, with $10 billion of spending,” Rich Collins wrote in a 2023 article for Biz New Orleans4. In this article, tour guides are included in a 75,000 count for individuals employed by tourism in New Orleans, or about 36% of workers in 2019. This number is nearly three times the Data Center’s estimate and probably a bit of an exaggeration, but I have also seen estimates that claim 80,000-100,000 people are employed in the tourism sector.
The products of the ports may be the biggest industry in Louisiana, but by many measures tourism outpaces other industries in the city of New Orleans. You’d think there would be plenty to share as a result. Even at the upper estimates of tourism jobs, 100,000, and the lower estimate for tourism spending in 2022 ($9,100,000,000), that works out to $91,000 per person, or plenty to share.
I still have not yet gone on a tour where some bit of untruth was shared, including my own. Not because I intended to lie but because my shallow understanding hadn’t yet connected some pieces. I am quite sure this is true for many tour guides who accidentally spread false information, but I’m not sure how many tour guides are following up to learn more and correct their own narrative. My work with NOLA VIP Services spawned in part from Albee’s desire to get the stories right by taking continuing education courses to learn more, where we met.
Our visitors come from around the world, each with their own personal taste. My tours will not be satisfying to some. I want visitors to have a fantastic experience on the tour that will please them the most. If that is a ghost tour of the mythical creatures that haunt New Orleans, then I am not the tour guide for them. I will burst all those bubbles. However! I would love to recommend an amazing tour guide who could satisfy that desire for those visitors, which gives me time to tour the folks who will enjoy my tour and challenge my (inadvertent?) tour guide lies.
Some Lies I’ve Told as a Tour Guide
I like challenges on my tours so I can grow. When someone questions something I say, I have an opportunity to learn something new or teach them something new. I try to question everything that seems unusual and look for sources to explain it, but some things do not seem unusual to me like they do to people from other places or who grew up in a different time.
Once someone questioned why St. Patrick’s Church claims in its tour brochure that the Irish immigrants wanted a place where God spoke English as French was spoken in St. Louis Cathedral.
“Didn’t they speak Latin?”
Wait…didn’t they? Did I just do a tour guide lie?? Turns out the Liturgical Movement started around the time that St. Patrick’s was built with the aim of helping congregations better understand the scriptures by speaking the vernacular languages in churches5. The movement culminated with Vatican II in the 1960s. The emphasis on Latin in churches was de rigueur in the first half of the 20th century, but apparently they spoke vernacular languages commonly before that6. I learned a lot because of this question, and now I can share that info and its sources with others.
I also once mistakenly claimed that Gallier Hall was city hall for a different city (lie) and that the third Jackson statue was in Virginia (it’s in Nashville). Actually that last one I did over and over until I was recently questioned! I’ve also said that O’Reilly hung the Frenchmen (they were shot).
The Pennsylvania Gazette, Philadelphia, Thursday, December 21, 1769. Page 3. I welcome pushback because that’s the only way I’ll get better and stop telling the lies. I’ll never know it all. To quote Dr. Crow, a speaker in my History of Voodoo in New Orleans class at Loyola University, “We are all still learning.” But I can try to absorb the knowledge I brush against and disperse it to strangers as I wrap my soul wider and tighter around the sticky mud and shimmering sweat in the crescent cushioned by the Mississippi, simultaneously the most American city and the most interesting city in America, my home — New Orleans.
If you have a tour guide tale you’d like help verifying like Romeo Spikes and Fire Marks, let me know. Maybe we can solve it together.
Sources:
- Rick Steves’ Europe. https://www.ricksteves.com ↩︎
- “Benchmarking New Orleans Tourism Economy Hotel and Full Service Restaurant Jobs” Robert Habans (The Data Center) Allison Plyer (The Data Center). December 7, 2018. https://www.datacenterresearch.org/reports_analysis/benchmarking-new-orleans-tourism-economy-hotel-and-full-service-restaurant-jobs ↩︎
- “Port of New Orleans supports 119,510 jobs nationally, 21,700 jobs statewide” by American Journal of Transportation. April 12, 2019. https://www.ajot.com/news/port-of-new-orleans-supports-119510-jobs-nationally-21700-jobs-statewide#:~:text=Within%20Port%20NOLA’s%20three%2DParish,%244.3%20billion%20in%20economic%20output. ↩︎
- “Tourism is Economic Development” by Rich Collins (Biz New Orleans). November 1, 2023. https://www.bizneworleans.com/tourism-is-economic-development/ ↩︎
- Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Liturgical Movement”. Encyclopedia Britannica. March 16, 2016. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Liturgical-Movement. Accessed 5 April 2024. ↩︎
- “Forbidden Translations: A Brief History of How the Mass Came to be Rendered in the Venacular” by Jeremy J. Priest (Adoremus). January 13, 2019. https://adoremus.org/2019/01/forbidden-translations-a-brief-history-of-how-the-mass-came-to-be-rendered-in-the-vernacular ↩︎
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Is Plaçage a Myth?
Disclaimer: This is ongoing thoughts about the plaçage myth(?) as I try to understand the history of New Orleans and not conclusive research.
I recently posted a video about the myth of plaçage. Some recent scholarly research explains that no one has found a contract regarding plaçage arrangements. We can spin rich tales about our history because so many records were kept via the Catholic Church and the notarial system, but we have no evidence of a written plaçage contract. This research concludes that the concept of plaçage, as explained by the tourism industry of today and of yore, is a myth.
Plaque outside of St. Anthony’s Garden for Henriette Delille. I can’t help but see irony in the name Place de Henriette Delille. When I started researching the life of Henriette Delille, I realized that she is thought to have been a placée before joining religious life in more recent research. The source cited for the details of plaçage, however, is the now debunked(?) older research. The life of the Venerable Henriette turns on her rejection of the plaçage system she was born into, according to her biographies. If the concept of plaçage is a debunked myth, how does the life of the Venerable Henriette change?
What we know as of now
We know that free women of color often married free men of color. We also know that they outlawed “mixed race” marriages for much of the 19th century (legalized in 1868 only to be re-criminalized in 1894 until 1972, five years after Loving v. Virginia). Further, we know that women of European descent had loving and chosen relationships with men who had African ancestors, such as Mrs. Parlongue who lived for almost a decade with Mr. Parlongue, a free person of color, only marrying officially in 1872. In the same way, women with African ancestors sometimes chose to enter relationships with men who had European ancestors, even though they could not marry. We find lots of evidence of fathers leaving inheritances to their “illegitimate” children in the records.
We know that free people of color in New Orleans enjoyed prosperous lives. Under the French, enslaved people were able to buy their freedom with the Code Noir, which they instituted in 1724 in New Orleans. But we have records of free people of color as early as 1722. We know that the first ships with enslaved people as cargo arrived in New Orleans in 1719. From the very beginning of the European takeover, people of African descent were free in New Orleans.
Free people of color are said to have enjoyed even more liberal treatment under the Spanish regime (1762-1803), whatever that means. By the time the Americans took over (1803), the relationship between people of European descent and those of African descent was souring. The Americans did not take as kindly to the three caste system as the laid back New Orleanians did. It seems that they operated as at least three “races” — those enslaved, those with any African or Native ancestry (divided further by terms to indicate which ancestor was African), and those with only European ancestry — with ever decreasing privileges for those deemed “of color”. Society never treated free people of color equally even though free people of color prospered and provided many of the inventions and much of the culture we still cherish in this city.
Another thing we know is that the Haitian Revolution pushed people to New Orleans around 1803. During this time many enslavers who were banished came to the city, along with free women of color who had fewer opportunities to prosper.
My thoughts on plaçage as of today
In a world where enslavers actively prevented some people from learning to read or write, only relying on written documentation of historic events as proof is an act of ignorance. We cannot continue to use only the documentation left by those of European descent to tell the whole story of the history of New Orleans. We cannot continue to reject rich oral histories that detail how a significant portion of the people lived.
There is an African proverb on display at the Free People of Color Museum. It was also how my teacher for two courses I’m taking now (African History of New Orleans and the History of Voodoo) chose to start. “Until the lion tells his story, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” We’ve been denied so much truth by only telling a part of the story. We cannot learn from history until we know it all.
I do not have any conclusion. And I am not sure plaçage is a myth. My next reading assignment is Wicked Flesh: Black Women, Intimacy and Freedom in the Atlantic World by Dr. Jessica Marie Johnson. I think Dr. Johnson’s research and analysis will illuminate details of the era that I do not yet understand.
I’d also love any reading suggestions from you.
Sources:
- https://afropunk.com/2016/10/know-your-black-history-deconstructing-the-quadroon-ball/
- https://afropunk.com/2015/06/op-ed-race-forward-time-to-drop-antiquated-racial-designations/
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A Tale of Irish in New Orleans
Museum Review: New Canal Lighthouse Museum
March is Louisiana’s Irish American Heritage Month, and my personal immigrant connection to New Orleans is through my Irish Heritage. Today, we credit Irish immigrants with making New Orleans into one of the world’s cosmopolitan cities, helping to shape the accent, and building the New Basin Canal. I always knew that some of my mom’s ancestors came from Ireland to New Orleans. I recently realized that their immigration coincided with the years of the “Potato Famine” or the “Great Hunger”.
My grandmother’s grandmother was a first generation Irish New Orleanian born in 1861. Her parents were both born in Ireland, as was her eventual husband. Her family settled in the Irish Channel. She ran a boarding house on Chippewa Street, like many other Irish women who immigrated to New Orleans and other American cities.
“Many Irish women, married and widowed, ran boarding houses as a means of support. Married Irish women could do so as well as sew on contract or help out in other kinds of family enterprise. The mother of Archbishop Williams of Boston had immigrated to the United States as a single woman and after marriage managed a boarding house while her husband worked as a blacksmith. When he died she ran both the boarding house and a grocery story in order to underwrite her son’s education. Some of the Irish boarding houses run by women also expanded into hotels and restaurants.”
Hasia R. Diner, Erin’s Daughters in America: Irish Immigrant Women in the Nineteenth Century
Early recognition that the epidemic affected strangers who were coming to town for Mardi Gras. Mardi Gras day in 1815 was February 7.
Richmond Enquirer. March 1, 1815.New Basin Canal
The mass immigration of Irish people in the mid-19th century coincided with the building of the New Basin Canal in New Orleans. “Substantial Irish communities exploded in size across the last half of the nineteenth century in San Francisco, Omaha, Memphis, New Orleans, Cleveland, Detroit, and Denver. The Irish showed up in large numbers wherever workers were needed,” Diner writes.
In the 1830s and 1840s, they hadn’t yet figured out how Yellow Fever spread. But they knew it killed many people who did not grow up in New Orleans. The nickname “The Stranger’s Disease” appeared during this era. They chose to hire Irish people to dig the canal because the cost of losing enslaved people who may die during the construction was greater than the cost of paying Irishmen to dig. They did not also lose an asset when an Irish person died. The Irish had no defenses against the tropical disease. A coinciding cholera epidemic caused the death of 8,000 or more Irish immigrants digging the canal. Ghost stories will tell you that they buried them where the fell — under the sidewalks lining Ponchartrain Boulevard today.
The Lighthouse Museum
The New Canal Museum is located in the lighthouse at the mouth of the New Basin Canal. This is the only portion of the canal that remains today. Before the mid-20th century when it was filled, the canal cut from the lake to the area near where the Superdome is today. There was a turning basin at the end. The canal made it easy to move goods into the city using the lake as a shortcut. The turning basin made it possible for large barges to turn around instead of having to back out of the canal.
Display about how many women Lighthouse Keepers served at this location. The museum is where I learned about the Victorian hinges still used all over New Orleans. There are images of the lighthouse completely destroyed during hurricanes, but the hinges remain locked in place.
This location is also unique in how many women served. A significant portion of the tour focused on these special women.
I signed up to visit the New Canal Museum through the New Orleans Public Library’s Culture Pass. There is a volunteer tour guide who is extremely knowledgeable about the lighthouse, the canal, and New Orleans. He provides a free tour. He also knew about the Irish influence on New Orleans, including pointing me to to the Celtic Cross Memorial on Pontchartrain Boulevard, which I will share in a coming post.
Irish New Orleans: Other options for learning more about the Irish influence on New Orleans
New Canal Lighthouse Museum
Celtic Cross Memorial on Pontchartrain Boulevard
Irish Cultural Museum
St. Patrick’s Church
Gallier House and Gallier Hall
Irish Channel
Irish New Orleans Trivia
James Gallier was born James Gallagher in Ireland.
Alexander O’Reilly, an Irish mercenary at the service of the Spanish crown, was the Spanish governor who murdered the Frenchmen and gave the famous street its name.
The New Orleans Revolt of 1768 in The Derby Mercury Derby Derbyshire, England April 6, 1770 Page 1 Margaret the Bread Lady was an Irish immigrant whose time in New Orleans was so impactful that a statue of her at the intersection of Prytania and Camp streets was one of the first public statues of a woman in the country.
Margaret the Bread Lady between 1890-1901 
Margaret the Bread Lady in 2024 Delphine LaLaurie was born Delphine MaCarty. Her great grandfather was a captain in the Irish regiment of Albemarle who escaped the tyranny of the English kings to France and became a knight of St. Louis. Delphine’s grandfather came to Louisiana from France in 1732.
Source:
Diner, Hasia R. Erin’s Daughters in America: Irish Immigrant Women in the Nineteenth Century. The Johns Hopkins University Press © 1983 Baltimore, Maryland.