Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2007 - (Page 92)

Bygone bayou Bayou Manchac provides a running stream of historical surprises Louisiana’s waterways have shaped nearly every aspect of life in the state, and even our smallest navigable bodies of water have stories to tell. In an elegant piece of scholarship, Winding Through Time: The Forgotten History and Present-Day Peril of Bayou Manchac, author Mary Ann Sternberg combines personal observation with research, helping readers imagine this obscure waterway as it was into what it became — tracing its history from the 17th century to the present. Sternberg writes: “As I researched Bayou Manchac, I became fascinated and increasingly convinced that its story was much better than I’d suspected — more colorful, richer, and much more interesting. And I also realized that the evolution of this little waterway, though unique, is a cautionary tale for other small historic American streams.” She captures the feeling that many readers share — we zoom past historical markers while wishing for the time to learn more. Bayou Manchac, also called the Iberville River, offered the first link in a chain of waterways that comprised a “back route” from the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico, shortening travel distance by approximately 125 miles. Unfortunately, the entire length of the bayou (about 20 miles) was navigable only during a few months of the year, at the height of spring floods. Pass Manchac, despite its similar name, connects Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain, and is approximately 35 miles east of the bayou. Readers will be pleased to find a variety of maps and Winding Through Time: The Forgotten History and Present-Day Peril of Bayou Manchac by Mary Ann Sternberg Louisiana State University Press: 2007 158 pages illustrations throughout — the terrain is just far enough away from familiar roads and landmarks to be confusing; Sternberg is an adept guide. In 1698 the French sent explorer Pierre le Moyne, Sieur d’Iberville, to locate the mouth of the Mississippi. He traveled far enough up the river (about 10 miles below present-day Baton Rouge) that with the help of Native American guides he used Bayou Manchac for his return. This is one of the only recorded trips via the all-water route — Iberville’s timing was perfectly synchronized with the yearly flooding. French colonists saw the promise of Bayou Manchac as a strategic waterway. Additionally, “the land at the confluence of Manchac and the Mississippi was reasonably high, and was touted as a prime location for the colony’s new capital.” There was even talk of widening the bayou (an idea that would resurface many times). Had Governor Bienville not insisted on his own choice for the new capital, a site further downriver with its own more dependable back route to the Gulf, the Bayou Manchac location might have become much better known. In an amusing but practical bit of legal fiction, Bayou Manchac was established as the northern boundary of what the French called the “Isle of Orleans.” Governor Bienville, in order to claim more territory for his ever-growing city, encircled the “Isle” with linked bodies of water, even though the portion of Bayou Manchac nearest the Mississippi was nothing more than a “dry depression for much of the year.” Bayou Manchac thus became an international boundary during the French and Spanish colonial period. Sternberg does an admirable job of describing what life what like during this era, when fur trappers, Native Americans and settlers traveled the bayou and lived along its banks. Because the bayou was so tantalizingly close the Mississippi, engineers from the early 18th century and beyond made grand plans for a canal 92 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Fall 2007

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2007

Contents Friends & Letters Editor’s Column Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities Big Charity: A History of New Orleans’ Public Hospital Historic New Orleans Collection Making Groceries: A History of New Orleans Markets New Orleans’ Faubourg Tremé: Rooted in Tradition Jazz Notes Louisiana Association of Museums Chinatown New Orleans Louisiana Foodways A Question of Secession Louisiana Architecture Louisiana State Museum The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish Terra Incognita Bookstand Sound Advice Forum

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2007

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