Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008 - (Page 44)

THE HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS COLLECTION An aerial view from the early 20th century shows the split between the French Quarter (left) and the Faubourg Marigny (right), divided by the tree-lined thoroughfare of Esplanade Avenue. itself. Faubourg Marigny reached completion in 1813. New Marigny began in 1809 with a plan drafted by city surveyor Joseph Pilie. This burgeoning development would encompass a 48 block area containing 535 lots. The streets extended northward from Good Children (now St. Claude) six blocks and ended abruptly at North Claiborne and the dense cypress swamps beyond. The original streets of the new Marigny were Morales, Urquhart, Girod, Jean Baptiste, Saintavid, Prosper, Solidelle, Josephene and Celestine. Annette and St. Bernard streets were later added. Urquhart, Annette and St. Bernard are the only streets that have retained their original names to this day. The Pontchartrain Railroad in 1831 added a modern dimension for both of the neighborhoods. As the second completed line in the United States, the “Smoky Mary” traveled the Elysian Fields neutral ground along a fivemile route to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain. From 1836 to 1852, the Creole faubourgs became a separate municipality with a recorder and council. Throughout its history, the Marigny neighborhoods nurtured businessmen, builders, musicians, educators, artisans, craftsmen and laborers who embodied the history of old New Orleans. As noted on a plaque currently on the Elysian Fields neutral ground across from Washington Square, free people of color played a significant role as settlers and contributors. Sally Kittredge Evans wrote in New Orleans Architecture Volume IV – The Creole Faubourgs, “By the beginning of the Civil War, three-quarters of the sites in the faubourg had been owned at least one time by gens de coleur libres.” The Couvent Institute stood at the corner of Touro and Dauphine. Bequeathed in 1837 by West African native Marie Couvent as a school for the “colored orphans of the Faubourg Marigny,” Madame Couvent declared “that said lands and buildings shall never be sold under any pretext whatsoever.” A school has existed on that land since 1848. Located across the street from popular La Peniche restaurant, the Couvent legacy is now the site of the St. Gerard Majella Alternative School. Civil rights emerged in the Marigny. The Press Street railroad yards marked the spot where Detective C.C. Vain arrested Homer Plessy and dragged him off a train for defying a Louisiana segregation law in 1892. Plessy’s civil disobedience engendered the 1896 Supreme Court case of Plessy v. Ferguson. The Plessy family had roots at Marais and Touro in New Marigny, and also Elysian Fields and Burgundy. In the 20th century, The Morial family lived in a Creole cottage at 1433 Touro Street. Ernest N. “Dutch” Morial became New Orleans first black mayor in 1978. Attorney Louis Martinet, who published the Crusader newspaper in the 1890s, had residences on both Burgundy and Columbus streets. Jazz music also found a welcome space in these neighborhoods. In his book Treat It Gentle, Sidney Bechet wrote of musical influences in this part of New Orleans during his youth in the early 1900s. Bechet lived in half of a shotgun double at 1716 Marais. His mentors Lorenzo Tio and George Baquet also lived in New Marigny. Musicians such as Alcide “Slow Drag” Pavageau, Alphonse Picou and 44 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Summer 2008

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008 Contents Friends Editor’s Column Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities George Rodrigue’s Louisiana: Cajuns, Blue Dogs & Beyond Katrina The Historic New Orleans Collection After The Flood Faubourg Marigny: The Creole “Suburb” Preserving New Orleans Jazz, One Generation at a Time: Conversation & Music with Tom Sancton Louisiana Foodways Louisiana Architecture Baton Rouge Photographs, 1863-1910 Jazz Notes The Ogden Museum of Southern Art Louisiana Association of Museums Nature of the “Beast” Louisiana State Museum Bookstand Sound Advice Forum

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008

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