New Orleans Day 3

On my last day here, I had the opportunity - thanks to family members in town willing to join me - to visit the Whitney Plantation, about an hour drive outside New Orleans. The museum is the only plantation museum in Louisiana (and as far as I can tell, anywhere) that focuses its content on the history of the slave trade, and the experience of enslaved people residing on the planation. Several of the buildings on site are original, though some of the slave cabins have been moved and/or reconstructed.

Engaging with this content in situ was a really powerful experience. The museum does a great job pairing information with exhibits throughout the site, organized in a guided audio tour.

the grounds also host several different commemorative sculptures and memorials.

The museum was hit hard by Hurricane Ida in 2021, and though the buildings sustained some damage, the site is now mostly intact. They’ve also added some panels on the tour acknowledging the need for climate resiliency in the vulnerable Mississippi River Parishes. This area along the river is already subject to battering by hurricanes, and has been experiencing coastal land loss in recent years for a variety of reasons, but is also considered part of the area known as “Cancer Alley,” due its extensive petrochemical industry. The adverse health effects that come from living in proximity to petrochemical plants have disproportionately affected the area’s primarily black population. I think it’s interesting that the museum took this opportunity to address current issues affecting the site - though not directly related to the museum’s content, this example of what is often referred to as “environmental racism” definitely seems relevant to the their mission.

New Orleans Day 2

My primary case study in New Orleans is the McDonogh 19 building, now home to the Tate, Etienne, Prevost (TEP) Center and housing. The school was one of the first two schools in Louisiana to be integrated in 1960. Three six-year-old girls: Leona Tate, Gail Etienne, and Tessie Prevost, were the first black students to enter the school (escorted by federal marshals), which was subsequently evacuated of all white students. The girls attended the school alone for about a year and a half. After hurricane Katrina, the building sat vacant for some years before the Leona Tate Foundation and Alembic Community Development (a developer specializing in affordable housing and adaptive reuse) partnered to purchase the building and convert it into affordable senior housing.

The first floor of the building, as well as the main entryway, will make up an interpretive center dedicated to framing the girls’ experience within the larger narrative of the civil rights movement. The building also features classrooms and office space shared by three nonprofit organizations.

I’ve been very excited by this case study, as it provides a great example of thoughtful adaptive reuse as well as deliberate and detailed commemoration and community engagement. The building was an established fixture in the neighborhood fabric, as schools of similar scale and style dot the central corridor of St Claude Avenue, and affordable housing was not only sorely needed but solidly supported by the community. The interpretive center provides an opportunity to acknowledge the cultural and historical significance of the space, and enhances the building’s use as a sort of community center, as well as a residence.

For more info:

https://www.leonatatefoundation.org/mcdonogh-19

https://www.tepcenter.org/partners

New Orleans Day 1

This is my first time in New Orleans, so to get the lay of the land, I booked a walking tour for my first morning. I was wary of overly sensational or watered-down tours, and ended up booking one titled “African Life in the French Quarter” through Hidden History Tours. The size of the group varies quite a bit, and though the same tour the day before apparently hosted closer to 20 people, I was the one and only person to book for that date and time, and ended up having a 2.5 hour, private tour with a very nice man named Leon. I had hoped the tour would point me towards sites of commemoration, and was not disappointed. I was guided through several examples of notable buildings and monuments that played a role in New Orleans’ colonial history and prolific, pre-Civil War slave trade.

Though we think of the French Quarter as, well, French, I learned that most of the original French colonial architecture was lost in various fires, and the neighborhood was largely rebuilt by the Spanish. This includes the Cabildo, Presbytère, and St Louis Cathedral on Jackson Square (formerly known as the Place de Armes, used for military drills and executions). The Cabildo features cast ironwork that includes vestiges of African Adinkra symbols, which Leon cited as an example of Moorish influences on the Spanish architecture. The square is now punctuated by a statue of Andrew Jackson, one of many examples of historical figures emblematic of white supremacy still honored by statues in New Olreans (though not without pushback from community groups). The square is a lively park bustling with tourists and buskers, and feels somewhat divorced from this history.

A main theme of the tour was the role of the Catholic church in both the colonial rule and slave trade in the area. France’s Code Noir, which governed the colony, stipulated various slavery regulations, and also mandated that all residents be baptized or else face expulsion. Henriette DeLille, a black nun and prominent social reformer in the mid-19th century, represents a counter-movement to the church’s historically problematic practices. She is now immortalized by stained glass depictions in a former baptistry along one side of St Louis Cathedral, as well as by a sidewalk plaque behind the church. I found her commemoration really interesting- though it seems important that the church acknowledges her role, does this acknowledgement change the role of the church in the community?

Side note: I was amused that what is apparently “America’s Oldest Cathedral” has big TVs all along the pews for your viewing convenience.

What is now the Omni Royal Hotel occupies the site of a former slave exchange. The original Hewlett and Bright slave exchange changed hands, and eventually became the St Louis Exchange Hotel around 1841. All that remains of the former hotel-slash-slave exchange (this is such a ridiculous idea to me, and I wonder whether any other slavery exchanges in the south included hotels) is a portion of the facade on Chartres street, preserved and marked with a small plaque.

An original facade of the St Louis Exchange Hotel

So far I’ve been fascinated by the wide variety of and overlap between various cultural/historical periods and architectural styles in this city. The French Quarter is a relatively small area, but because of it’s historical significance, (and tourism value) it seems to have remained at the center of a lot of these cultural discussions.