A Unique Slant of Light: The Bicentennial History of Art in Louisiana - (Page 8)

Mississippi River to protect France’s claim to the territory. Land-clearing at the New Orleans site began in the spring of 1718 under the supervision of Bienville. By the end of the year very little land had actually been cleared of its thick, jungle-like growth, and only a few palmetto huts had been constructed. In 1719 a flood wiped out all that stood, causing officials to consider moving the town upriver, possibly to Bayou Manchac or even to the bluffs of Baton Rouge, an idea that was discarded given the limited options, even though very little progress was made in developing the village for the next three years. Administering the colony was difficult, and the crown was never quite sure how to handle it. During the six decades under French rule, Louisiana bounced back and forth between the crown’s governors and speculating private interests who developed and exploited the colony’s natural resources for hoped for profits. By 1712 the king, unhappy with the colony’s negligible growth and the French treasury depleted by the War of Spanish Succession (1701-1714), granted Antoine Crozat a fifteen-year charter to Louisiana. Crozat, a wealthy French merchant, was not new to the business of colonial trade. He held stock in the Guinea Company, with its profitable African trade, and in the Asiento Company, which carried on a lucrative slave trade between Africa and the New World. Under the terms with the French crown, Crozat gained all commercial rights to Louisiana 8 COLONIAL THROUGH ANTEBELLUM LOUISIANA FRANÇOIS-GÉRARD JOLLAIN Le Commerce que les Indiens du Mexique Font avec les François au Port du Missisipi, ca. 1720 Engraving with watercolor; 18 x 32 in. The Historic New Orleans Collection south of the Illinois District possessed by the crown including all the area between Mexico and the Carolinas. Crozat’s dreams of riches failed and in 1717 the colony returned to the crown. Waiting in the wings was John Law, an adventurous Scotsman who founded the Banque Generale of France in 1716. In September 1717, the crown granted Law and his Company of West an exclusive charter to Louisiana. Two years later the Company of the West merged with other colonial companies to form the Company of the Indies, which promised even greater things for Louisiana. Law’s adventure in Louisiana ranked among the greatest public relations schemes in European history. Company handbills and promoters persuaded thousands of southern Germans and Swiss to settle in Louisiana along the banks of the Mississippi River now known as the Côte des Allemands, or German Coast. But Law, too, was to fail. By 1720 Law’s so-called “Mississippi Bubble” was in deep financial trouble. Soon after the collapse of Law’s company, the Company of the Indies reorganized and, with fresh investments, tried to revitalize the Louisiana venture,

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A Unique Slant of Light: The Bicentennial History of Art in Louisiana

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