Historic Baton Rouge

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y Sylvia Frank Rodrigue
and Faye Phillips
Commissioned by the Foundation for Historical Louisiana
Historical Publishing Network
A division of Lammert Incorporated
San Antonio, Texas

✧
The Baton Rouge Baseball team, shown here
ca. 1900, played against other Louisiana
town teams as well as Standard Oil teams.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
First Edition. Copyright © 2006 Historical Publishing Network
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing from
the publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to Historical Publishing Network, 11555 Galm Road, Suite 100, San Antonio, Texas, 78254. Phone (800) 749-0464.
ISBN: 9781893619678
Library of Congress Card Catalog Number: 2006937263
Historic Baton Rouge: An Illustrated History
authors: Sylvia Frank Rodrigue, Faye Phillips
cover artist: Art Kleiner
contributing writers for “Sharing the Heritage”: Marie Beth Jones, Scott Williams
Foundation for Historical Louisiana
chairman of the board: Darryl Gissel
chairman emeritus: John W. Wilbert, Jr.
executive vice-president: Lenore Feeney
treasurer and vice-president of finance: Jack Thompson
vice-president of education and research: Michèle Deshotels
vice-president of development: Emily Wilbert
secretary: Nancy Broussard
board members: Bill Brockway, Patricia Comeaux, Sylvia Duke, Charles Elliott,
Leo Honeycutt, Dick Lewis, Danny McGlynn, Ory Poret
executive director: Carolyn Bennett
advisors: Winifred Byrd, Nathalie diBenedetto, Lillie Gallagher,
Charlene Guarisco, George Jenne, Kenny Kleinpeter,
Anne Price, Sue Turner
staff: Kristin Coco, Selena Grant, Angela deGravelles, Peggy Hunt,
Mary Ellen Norris, Gerry Ryder, Barbara Somner
Historical Publishing Network
president: Ron Lammert
project manager: Curtis Courtney
administration: Donna M. Mata, Diane Perez
book sales: Dee Steidle
production: Colin Hart, Craig Mitchell, Evelyn Hart, Charles A. Newton III
PRINTED IN CANADA
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
2

CONTENTS
4 FOREWORD
5 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
6 INTRODUCTION The Birth of Baton Rouge, 1699-1810
12 CHAPTER I From Small Town to State Capital
Plantations, War, and Reconstruction, 1811-1877
24 CHAPTER II Jim Crow Meets Standard Oil
Segregation, Corruption, and Prosperity, 1878-1927
38 CHAPTER III Reinventing Government
Huey Long and the Great Depression, 1928-1940
46 CHAPTER IV Tumultuous Times
Wartime and Civil Rights Struggles, 1941-1972
58 CHAPTER V The Modern Era
Decline of Big Oil, Growth of a New City, 1973-2005
68 EPILOGUE 2005-2006
72 APPENDICES
73 ENDNOTES
76 BIBLIOGRAPHY
80 SHARING THE HERITAGE
143 INDEX
146 SPONSORS
147 ABOUT THE AUTHORS
✧
Steamboats on the Mississippi River,
common by the 1820s, quickly moved
merchandise from port to port. The
steamboat on the far left stopped in Baton
Rouge in the 1860s to unload ice.
FROM HARPER’S WEEKLY, AUGUST 20, 1862.
CONTENTS
3

FOREWORD
The history of Baton Rouge is unique and complex. We are perhaps best known for our location
on the banks of the mighty Mississippi, fascinating politics, diverse population, landmark buildings,
rich musical and literary heritage, memorable cooking, and sports teams. We’re often called the sister
city of New Orleans and our hospitality and generosity are now legendary throughout the world.
The narrative begins with our ancestors over five thousand years ago as the Indian mounds in
our midst give testament. The epilogue relates the story of Baton Rouge since Hurricane Katrina,
what has been called historically, the greatest natural disaster of all time in America. Today Baton
Rouge is not only the capital city, but Louisiana’s largest metropolis.
We live in an age of instant information. Thank you for holding this book, destined to become
a collector’s item and keepsake, in your hands and wanting more than sound bites. It is gratifying
to turn the pages of a handsome publication that chronicles in engaging prose and captivating
images our city and its citizens. The Foundation for Historical Louisiana is honored to present this
history book to you. Your purchase makes our work of preserving the cultural and architectural
treasures of Louisiana, especially Baton Rouge, possible.
The Foundation most gratefully recognizes the organizations and companies whose business
profiles made this project a reality. Their stories are meaningful and significant to our heritage.
The Foundation wishes to acknowledge the authors, Sylvia Frank Rodrigue and Faye Phillips—
two principled writers, precise editors, and diligent scholars. Their participation was the key to the
Board of Directors embarking on this important endeavor.
We sincerely hope you will enjoy “a good read” and remember that every day our deeds and
actions are writing the history book that will follow this one.
Carolyn Bennett
Executive Director
Foundation for Historical Louisiana
✧
German planter Paul Joseph Sharp and his
family settled at the Dutch Highlands in
1784, after having lived in a low-lying area
north of Plaquemine for ten years. He and
his son Joseph Sharp received a land grant
from the Spanish crown for a four-hundredacre
tract along Highland Road. In 1817 the
Sharps built the Mount Hope farmhouse out
of cypress growing on the plantation, and
today it is the only structure of its kind
remaining in the Baton Rouge area.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF CULTURE,
RECREATION, AND TOURISM.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
4

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Our gratitude lies first with the Board of Directors of the Foundation for Historical Louisiana,
who commissioned us to write this book, and with Carolyn Bennett and her staff at the Foundation
for Historical Louisiana, particularly Peggy Hunt and Kristin Coco. We are also grateful to Angela
deGravelles, Charles Elliott, and Emily Wilbert for reviewing the manuscript. We would like to
thank those archivists who have gone out of their way to assist us: Angela V. Proctor, Southern
University and A&M College; Florent Hardy and Bill Stafford at Louisiana State Archives; Virginia
Smith, former head, and Judy Smith, current head, of the Louisiana Section of the State Library of
Louisiana; Frances Huber of the LSU Museum of Art; and Melissa Smith of the Tulane University
Special Collections. We also express thanks to the staff of the Louisiana State University Libraries
Special Collections: Judy Bolton, Germain Bienvenu, Barry Cowan, Joseph Scott, Elaine Smyth;
and to Jennifer Cargill, Dean, LSU Libraries. Our appreciation goes to Judy Jumonville and John
Sykes of The Advocate Library and to The Advocate’s executive editor, Linda Lightfoot.
Thanks also to George Burkhardt for the Bacon correspondence; to Peggy Duerr for the use of
her postcard collection; to Edward Haas for his editing skills and knowledge of Louisiana history;
to Leah Wood Jewett for copy editing and fact finding; to Tara Laver for the use of her research
paper; to Tiwanna Simpson for research assistance and the use of her work on Old South Baton
Rouge; and to Pam Bordelon, Lauren Francis, Randal Hall, James Hogue, Scott Marler, Michael
Pfeifer, and Charles Vincent for supplying information.
Sylvia would like to thank her mother, Marjorie Hetrick Frank, and her uncle Richard Frank for
reading the manuscript, and both her mother and father, Robert A. Frank, for their love and
support. Thanks to Byron, Lise, Abigail, and Emily; John, Maureen, Ann-Marie, Bob, Kelly, Glen,
Terry, Ed, and Jacqueline; and to Alan and Jackie. Finally, she would like to thank her husband,
historian John C. Rodrigue, whom she met and married in Baton Rouge, and who helped to shape
and edit this book.
✧
At its 1920 opening the Columbia Theater
was hailed as the best theater for silent films
in the entire South. The fireproof building,
designed and constructed by architect
Walter E. Stephens of Baton Rouge,
incorporated the nation’s first floor lights
running along the aisles in the theater.
Across Third Street stood the Mayer
Hotel, the Istrouma Hotel, and Kean
Brothers Laundry.
COURTESY OF THE HERBERT P. AND MARGUERITE P.
LINDEE, JR., MEMORIAL COLLECTION, DIVISION OF
ARCHIVES, LOUISIANA SECRETARY OF STATE.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
5

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
6

INTRODUCTION
T HE B IRTH OF B ATON R OUGE, 1699-1810
The earliest inhabitants of the Baton Rouge area lived here five thousand years ago, and their
mysterious mounds remain as a testament to their presence. The two Indian mounds on the
Louisiana State University campus and one on state capitol grounds may have been ceremonial or
social centers rather than burial grounds or homes, but their exact purpose remains undetermined.
The conical mounds date to the Mesoindian or Archaic period—before ancient Egyptians built the
pyramids—and are older than similar mounds in this hemisphere.
Later local American Indians included the Bayou Goula, Acolapissa, Quinapisa (Mugulasna),
Tangipahoa, and Okelousa, but it was the Houma, linguistic members of the Muskhogean culture,
who occupied the land that is now Baton Rouge. At the time of European contact, approximately
seven hundred Houmas farmed in the fertile soil on the bluff, hunted the abundant wildlife, and
fished the waterways.
Spanish members of Hernando de Soto’s expedition, following the Mississippi River to the Gulf
of Mexico after his death in 1542, were likely the first Europeans to see the area, but it remained
solely the domain of American Indians until 1682, when René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de LaSalle,
claimed the Mississippi River valley for French king Louis XIV. Pierre Le Moyne, Sieur d’Iberville,
established the first French settlement in Louisiana at Fort Maurepas near Biloxi in January 1699.
Iberville led an expedition from Mobile Bay along the Gulf Coast, and he and his companions—
including his brother, Sieur de Bienville—continued their explorations up the Mississippi River.
On March 17, 1699, they arrived at the bluffs near what would become Baton Rouge. At the time
the river’s reach, or straight stretch between bends, measured more than nine miles.
In 1723 one of the explorers, ship’s carpenter André Pénicaut, penned this description of their first
sight of the high ground: “From there we went five leagues higher and found very high banks called
écorts in that region, and in savage called Istrouma which means red stick, as at this place there is a post
painted red that the savages have sunk there to mark the land line between the two nations, namely:
land of the Bayagoulas which they were leaving and the land of another nation—thirty leagues upstream
from the baton rouge—named the Oumas.” Iberville noted: “Along the shore, there were several huts,
covered with palmetto fronts, and a branchless maypole, which is reddened by the attached sacrificial
offerings of fish and bear heads. The countryside is absolutely beautiful.” i
In 1758, Le Page du Pratz, who lived in the Louisiana colony from 1718 to 1734, published his
Histoire de la Louisiane in Paris. He started the legend that Baton Rouge was named after a giant red
cypress tree “twelve yards around” and so tall “its height could never be measured, it rises so out
of sight.” The Indians and settlers used red cypress in the making of excellent boats, furniture, and
red walking sticks, or batons. Those on the expedition nearly sixty years before, however, clearly
stated that a red pole, hung with fish heads and bear heads, stood high on the bluff. That red stick
gave the area, and later the city, its name. ii
For approximately two decades the Houma and Bayou Goula remained the only inhabitants of
Baton Rouge, although some French trappers and hunters may have lived in the area on occasion.
In 1718 the king of France gave the D’artaguette family a land grant, and Bernard Diron and his
brother Pierre traveled to Baton Rouge, where they found “2 whites and 25 negroes” on the land.
Early reports of the area’s population are unclear. One 1722 report listed 30 white people, 20 black
people, and two Indian slaves on the property, but another that same year listed only ten men, five
women, and two children. iii
Slavery came to Baton Rouge with its earliest settlers. Valuable not only for their labor, Africans
also possessed knowledge, skills, and talents that helped European settlers survive under harsh
frontier conditions. A small group of people dependent on one another for survival might have
✧
In 1779 the British built this star-shaped
fort, which fell into Spanish hands later the
same year. The Spanish improved the
structure in the 1780s, but the earthen fort
decayed quickly and was replaced by the
U.S. Army’s Pentagon Barracks in 1824.
This image is a detail from “Plan of the Fort
of Batonrouge, 1814,” by Barthelemy Lafon.
COURTESY OF THE HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS COLLECTION.
INTRODUCTION
7

✧
Above: The five-thousand-year-old Indian
mounds at LSU, two of the eight mounds in
Louisiana built around the same time, sit at
the corner of Dalrymple Drive and
Fieldhouse Drive. In 1999 the mounds
were named to the National Register of
Historic Places.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF CULTURE,
RECREATION, AND TOURISM.
Below: During the eighteenth century
explorer Le Page du Pratz spent more time
with the Natchez than any other tribe.
According to his composite description,
American Indians in Louisiana usually stood
around five feet, five inches tall and had
regular features and black hair and eyes.
FROM LE PAGE DU PRATZ, HISTOIRE DE LA LOUISIANE, 1758.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
8
given rise to open relations between the
races; nevertheless, the relationship was
never mistaken for anything other than
masters and slaves. Despite limited sources, it
is clear that slaves always lived at the Baton
Rouge colony.
On January 1, 1723, Diron D’artaguette
welcomed the well-known explorer, author,
and French Jesuit priest, Pierre François-Xavier
de Charlevoix, who held the first Catholic mass
in Baton Rouge. Charlevoix reported that fifty
people lived on the site: one man (likely
D’artaguette), six women, one child, 20 French
domestics, 20 African slaves, and two Indian
slaves. Despite the priest’s blessing, by 1727
the settlers had scattered. One account stated
that “wild animals” destroyed the area and
drove settlers away, but a lack of sources
prohibits an understanding of the colony’s
demise. Baton Rouge may have been home to a
few settlers in the mid-eighteenth century.
Another French colony thrived at nearby
Pointe Coupee. iv
During this era France and England
continued to struggle over control of the New
World. Their rivalry culminated in the Seven
Years’ War, also known as the French and Indian
War, which the British won in 1759 with a
decisive battlefield victory at Quebec. The
nations did not reach a peace accord until the
1763 Treaty of Paris. In 1762, as its prospects for
a favorable settlement faded, France ceded
its western Louisiana territories and New
Orleans to Spain to keep them from falling into
English hands through the secret Treaty of
Fontainebleau. In 1763 Spain lost its Florida
colonies to the British crown, and Baton Rouge
and the area to its east became part of the colony
of British West Florida. Spain, however, kept the
area on the west side of the Mississippi River.
The British quickly took control of their new
lands. The need for a strong fortification in the
southwest led them to construct Fort Bute in
1765 on the north bank of Bayou Manchac.
Baton Rouge’s convenient location on the
Mississippi made it useful for traders and
smugglers alike. Commerce with the Spanishcontrolled
area across the river was illegal, but
the law was not enforced, resulting in a slight
increase in population and profitability for the
little settlement.
Great Britain’s territories fell under English
law, and governors in West Florida were
authorized to grant lands. The fourth governor,
Peter Chester, awarded several of Baton Rouge’s
earliest land grants, including one in 1773
issued to William Dunbar and John Ross, both
natives of Scotland. Starting in 1776, Dunbar
kept a diary that survived and has proved
valuable to researchers investigating early
plantation life and slave ownership in the Baton
Rouge area. Although some historians called the
settlement “Fort New Richmond” or “Baton
Rouge,” Dunbar never used those terms. The
early planter called the town “Mississippi
Richmond Settlement.” v
Also in 1776, Irish immigrant Daniel
Hickey built Hope Estate Plantation near the
river edge of his three hundred acres of land,
four miles south of Baton Rouge. When Daniel
died in 1808, the estate passed to his son,
Colonel Philip Hickey. In 1814 Hickey built
the first sugar mill in East Baton Rouge Parish,
but the plantation continued to produce
cotton until prices plummeted after the Civil
War, when the Hickeys switched to sugar. In
the late-nineteenth century a levee gave way,
and floodwaters destroyed the house. vi
Under British rule many English settlers
moved into West Florida, and though tensions
brewed between the northern colonists and
King George III, most settlers around Baton
Rouge remained faithful to England. White
settlers fared well under the British government,
which allowed them more democratic rights
than Spanish or French colonists experienced.
On the other hand, British law did not provide
slaves with even the minimal legal protections
Spanish rule ensured; slaveholders living in
areas under Spanish rule could free their slaves
without governmental approval and had to
recognize a slave’s right to self-purchase. In fact,
Spanish law, like the Roman law it was based on,
held that “slavery was contrary to natural law
and reason.” Slaveholders in British-held Baton
Rouge were under no such constrictions. Their
mastery was absolute. vii
In 1777, Captain James Willing, a former
resident of Natchez, tried to persuade those
living in West Florida to join the American
Revolution. West Floridians, who preferred to

emain loyal to the British, rebuffed his efforts.
Early the following year Willing returned to the
area and ransacked plantations along the
Mississippi from Natchez to Baton Rouge.
Dunbar, one of the victims, was “robbed of
everything that could be carried away—wearing
apparel, bed and table linen, and silverware. Not
even a shirt was left in the house. He was also
robbed of about two hundred pounds sterling.
Willing’s men destroyed bottled wine, burned
businesses, and shot cattle and hogs.” Dunbar
managed to keep his slaves, whom he had
moved to Spanish land across the Mississippi. viii
After learning about Willing’s raid, the
British sent more troops to area forts. As they
arrived in June 1778, Spain declared war
against England, which now had to fight
France, American colonists, and Spain.
Spanish territorial governor Bernardo de
Gâlvez, who ruled the Louisiana Territory and
New Orleans, assembled a force of about
fourteen hundred men and marched them in
the late August heat from New Orleans to
Manchac, where they captured the lightly
manned Fort Bute on September 7, 1779.
Most of the British soldiers had already
moved from the Manchac fort to a new
earthwork fortification at Baton Rouge. The
Redoubt at Baton Rouge, built by slaves and
soldiers on a plantation belonging to Samuel
Fowler and Stephen Watss, lay just south of
the present-day Pentagon Barracks. All traces
of the star-shaped fort have long since
disappeared. Through a brilliant ruse Gâlvez
took the fort and won the Battle of Baton
Rouge, thereby turning West Florida over to
Spanish rule in 1779. The West Florida
loyalists were defeated, and the Gulf Coast and
Mississippi River were now under the control
of Spain, the Americans’ ally. The last battle of
the Revolutionary War took place in 1782, and
in 1783 Britain and the United States signed a
peace treaty, the Treaty of Paris.
An epic poem by Pointe Coupee planter
Julien Poydras, “La Prise du Morne du Baton
Rouge par Monseigneur de Galvez,” glorified
Gâlvez’s capture of Baton Rouge. It was one of
the first published literary attempts in
Louisiana. Poydras, in addition to his literary
endeavors, promoted public education and
served as a politician.
For about thirty years the Spanish controlled
the little fort and settlement at Baton Rouge,
which was part of the Spanish colony of West
Florida. The transition from British to Spanish
rule brought many changes. Women enjoyed
some rights that had previously been denied
them: they were now allowed to sell property
and take legal action. On the other hand, no
longer could white male property holders elect
representatives; instead, governmental officials
were appointed, and the seat of local power was
held by the commandant of the post at Baton
Rouge and later by the commandant of the
district of Baton Rouge. The commandant,
judge over all types of disputes, also took
charge of law enforcement.
Hoping to spread Catholicism throughout the
Protestant lands, Spain imported Irish priests to
Louisiana and West Florida. In 1792 Father
Charles Burke arrived in the town to serve as
pastor of the Church of the Virgin of Sorrows,
later to be called the Church of Our Lady of
Sorrows. Parishioners built a second Catholic
church, St. Joseph’s, in 1830. In addition to
promoting Catholicism, Spanish rulers outlawed
the public demonstration of Protestant worship.
✧
Above: Around 1855 artist Marie Adrien
Persac (1823-1873) painted a gouache of
the Hickey’s Hope Estate Plantation.
Flooding destroyed the plantation house
sometime between 1890 and 1901.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY
MUSEUM OF ART.
Below: William Dunbar (ca. 1750-1810)
held one of the first land grants in Baton
Rouge and later established another
plantation near Natchez, Mississippi. In
1804, at President Thomas Jefferson’s
request, Dunbar led an expedition on the
Ouachita River and Red River with George
Hunter. Dunbar’s journal of the trip,
published the same year, was titled
Documents Relating to the Purchase and
Exploration of Louisiana.
COURTESY OF THE MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT OF
ARCHIVES AND HISTORY.
INTRODUCTION
9

✧
Above: Don Bernardo de Gâlvez (1746-
1786) served as territorial governor of
Spanish Louisiana from 1777 to 1785. He
secretly aided the American colonists in
their fight against England, and when Spain
entered the war against England, Gâlvez
captured Manchac, Baton Rouge, Natchez,
Mobile, and Pensacola. This portrait by A.
Herroro was a 1977 gift to the state of
Louisiana from the Spanish Consulate in
New Orleans.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
Below: In the 1790s, John Joyce built the
plantation house at Magnolia Mound, and
Armand Duplantier enlarged it in the early
1800s. Along with the owner’s big house and
a sugar house, the plantation contained
living quarters for an overseer and slaves as
well as barns, stables, poultry houses,
various sheds, and a smithy. In the
twentieth century the original house faced
destruction, but BREC and the Foundation
for Historical Louisiana saved and restored
it. Today the remaining buildings are open
as a historic house museum.
COURTESY OF ARTIST STAN ROUTH.
Outside the cities, however, Protestants found
more tolerance. Baton Rouge residents, accustomed
to more freedom of religion under the
British, chafed at the new restrictions.
Although the settlers had previously traded
individually with whomever they chose, now
they could only trade with Spain. The frontier
trade economy continued illicitly, nonetheless,
and melons, beans, potatoes, tomatoes, squash,
rice, and corn from the German Coast—an area
along the Mississippi River west of New
Orleans—continued to supply both New
Orleans and Baton Rouge. Cotton became very
popular at the end of the Spanish colonial
period, as did interest in growing sugar.
A local cuisine began to develop during
this time. Imported black pepper lost ground
to the popular and easily obtainable red
pepper. Readily available salt was used in
dishes made from locally grown foods. ix
Education was scarce, since only the wealthy
could afford private schooling for their children.
A lack of public schools meant that most settlers’
children were illiterate and uneducated.
Governor Esteban Rodríguez Miró successfully
increased the population by drawing
thousands of Americans, immigrants, and
slaves into Spanish lands in the late eighteenth
century. Settlers were drawn by the ease with
which they could obtain land grants and by the
tax-free system. Spain did not levy taxes on
landholders but expected them to contribute to
the upkeep of public thoroughfares by
maintaining roads, levees, bridges, and ferries.
In January 1786, James Hillen received a
Spanish land grant for the tract that became
known as Magnolia Mound plantation. With the
aid of his six slaves Hillen grew tobacco and
indigo, and five years later he sold the land to
Irish immigrant John Joyce. Joyce and John
Turnbull, his informal business partner, worked
in the mercantile business and owned several
properties in the area from Natchez to Mobile,
where Joyce constructed several buildings. Joyce
also built the house that stands at Magnolia
Mound today. In February 1798, Joyce and
Turnbull formalized their partnership. Both men
died, in separate incidents, later that same year.
Four years later Armand Duplantier, who was
appointed curator of the Turnbull children,
married Joyce’s widow, Constance Rochon. She
moved with her two children from Mobile to the
house at Magnolia Mound, and Duplantier
moved in with two of his four children from his
marriage to Augustine Gerard, who died in
1799. The Duplantiers renovated the house and
focused their efforts on cotton production. x
As the value of real estate increased, some
Baton Rouge landowners subdivided their
property to make a profit. During this era
Captain Elias Beauregard sold lots on part of
his land, starting what was known then as
Beauregard’s Village, now Beauregard Town. In
1806, French engineer Arsène Lacarrière
Latour developed Beauregard’s ambitious plan,
styled after the “Grand European Manner.”
Government Street, originally Calle del
Gobierno, divided Beauregard Town from
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
10

north to south. In 1805, at the direction of
commandant Charles Boucher de Grand-Pre,
V. S. Pintado surveyed Spanish Town. Spanish
Town Road ran through the middle of the
neighborhood. Each lot was large enough to
hold a house, a stable, and a garden. The lots
were later subdivided. xi
When the eighteenth century drew to a close,
Baton Rouge remained part of Spanish West
Florida while the Louisiana territory changed
hands again. In 1800 the king of Spain signed a
secret agreement with Napoleon, the Treaty of
San Ildefonso, which ceded New Orleans and
the land west of the Mississippi River to France.
West Florida was not included. President
Thomas Jefferson, inaugurated in early 1801,
acted on rumors of the secret treaty by sending
an emissary to France to buy New Orleans and
West Florida, unaware that West Florida
remained under Spanish rule. The following
year Napoleon sought to quell the slave
rebellion in Haiti and, when he failed, gave up
his dream of a New World empire. He sold a
vast swath of land to the United States in 1803.
William C. C. Claiborne became the governor of
the territory. This Louisiana Purchase included
New Orleans and a large area of land in the west,
but not Baton Rouge.
Already precarious, Spanish authority in
West Florida crumbled after the Louisiana
Purchase, causing great unrest in Baton Rouge
and its vicinity. To the north, south, and west,
the United States bordered Spanish territory.
Many Anglo Americans, who were in the
majority in West Florida, wanted to throw off
Spanish rule and partake of the liberties their
neighbors enjoyed.
Spain had allowed the two military forts in
the area, at Manchac and at Baton Rouge, to fall
into disrepair. They made tempting targets. In
1804 the Kemper brothers tried to take the fort
at Baton Rouge. They were easily repulsed,
though their spirit was not defeated. Rumors of
invasions by Aaron Burr one year later and by
various other groups—Kentuckians, soldiers,
Louisianians and freed slaves—another year
kept the city on edge. Adding to the unrest, the
well-liked Spanish governor, Don Carlos de
Grand Pré, was recalled to Havana in 1809,
causing a protest among the citizens.
In September 1810, declaring independence
from Spain, Fulwar Skipwith and Philemon
Thomas led seventy men from St. Francisville to
Baton Rouge. After a small skirmish—the West
Florida Rebellion—the men captured the fort
and claimed Baton Rouge as the capital of an
independent West Florida Republic. They
petitioned President James Madison to annex
the area, but he had already dispatched
Claiborne to take possession of it. Claiborne
arrived in December 1810, and the town of
Baton Rouge became U.S. territory.
✧
In 1806, engineer Arsène Lacarrière Latour
drew this plan of Beauregard Town for the
land’s owner, Elias Beauregard.
COURTESY OF THE WILLIAM WALLER SURVEY
COLLECTION, LOUISIANA AND LOWER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY
COLLECTIONS, LSU LIBRARIES. HEREAFTER LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
INTRODUCTION
11

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
12

CHAPTER I
F ROM S MALL T OWN TO S TATE C APITAL: PLANTATIONS,
W AR, AND R ECONSTRUCTION, 1811-1877
In January 1811, Baton Rougeans became American citizens, and a year later Louisiana achieved
statehood with New Orleans as its capital. On January 16, 1817, the Louisiana legislature
incorporated Baton Rouge and empowered its citizens to elect a town government; Baton Rouge had
grown from a frontier outpost to a viable town. The next sixty years brought more change, from the
advent of steamboat travel and railroads to war, occupation, the transition from slavery to freedom,
and reconstruction.
West Florida slaveholders feared the American takeover would mean the loss of their human
property, since in 1808 the U.S. Congress had prohibited further importation of slaves from Africa.
Nevertheless, slavery and the interstate slave trade continued to flourish in the United States. Of the
1,463 people living in Baton Rouge in 1810, 675 were slaves. For them, life changed little under the
new government. Enslaved women worked in town as cooks, maids, laundresses, and nurses, while
enslaved men worked as general laborers, carpenters, bakers, butchers, painters, wagon-makers,
and shoemakers. Many businesses engaged three to ten slaves at a time. In rural areas hundreds of
slaves cultivated sugarcane and cotton, contributing to the area’s economic growth.
Exploration and experimentation marked this era in the young nation’s history, and the advent
of steamboat travel proved to be a boon for the river city. In October 1811, Robert Fulton and
Nicholas J. Roosevelt, great-uncle of President Theodore Roosevelt, launched the steamboat New
Orleans from Pittsburgh on a trial run down the Mississippi River. After its first voyage the
steamboat carried people and goods between New Orleans and Natchez until 1814, when it caught
on a snag near Baton Rouge and sank. Other steamboats followed, changing the face of commerce.
Baton Rouge became an increasingly important port for shipping cotton, sugar, and other goods. i
The old fort at Baton Rouge had been deteriorating for some time and was no longer adequate to
protect the southwestern corner of the new nation. The Federal army consequently commissioned
a new one to be built just north of the dirt fort the British erected in 1779. Completed in 1824, the
Pentagon Barracks originally consisted of five sides, but in the 1830s the side facing the river was
torn down, likely because of poor construction. Lieutenant Colonel Zachary Taylor, who eventually
became the twelfth president of the United States, supervised the job’s completion. ii
Taylor so enjoyed staying in Baton Rouge that he made the town his home between military
campaigns. He lived near the fort in a house originally built for the Spanish commandant. In 1845
Taylor led the raid that started the Mexican War, taking with him men from the Rapides and Baton
Rouge companies in one of the regiments he commanded. His decisive victories made him a national
hero. After winning the war in 1848, Taylor returned to Baton Rouge as the town’s first real celebrity.
He was elected president and took office in March 1849. Though a slaveowner and steadfast
defender of slavery, Taylor surprised many by turning out to be a staunch unionist. He died in the
White House in 1850. Nine years after his death, Taylor’s Baton Rouge home was demolished. iii
Many publishing enterprises began operating in the early nineteenth century. Beginning in 1819
the first Baton Rouge newspaper, a weekly called the Gazette, was published in French and English.
The short-lived The Republic lasted from 1822 to 1824. In 1842 the first issue of The Democratic
Advocate, forerunner of today’s Advocate, was published. In 1856 the Baton Rouge Gazette merged
with the Comet, and the Gazette and Comet remained in business until 1869.
Churches played an important role in town life. In 1820 the state legislature chartered both St. James
Episcopal Church and St. Joseph’s Church, the local Catholic church. In 1855 St. Joseph’s Cathedral on
Fourth Street (formerly Church Street) was built in the Gothic Revival style according to a design by
Father John Cambiaso, a Jesuit priest who also designed the Church of the Immaculate Conception in
✧
Henry Lewis, a British-born American
artist, painted this stylized view of Baton
Rouge around 1848. The painting, based on
a sketch by an associate who toured the
lower Mississippi River to draw river towns,
appeared in Lewis’s illustrated book, Das
Illustrirte Mississippithal, published in
1854 in Germany.
COURTESY OF THE MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY.
CHAPTER I
13

✧
Above: The Old Arsenal, built in 1838,
stored gunpowder and ammunition until
1879. LSU used the building as its
veterinary science barn until the university
moved to its present-day campus. Shown
here in the early 1960s, the structure was
rescued from impending destruction and
became a museum in 1962.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF CULTURE,
RECREATION, AND TOURISM.
Below: President Zachary Taylor (1784-
1850), nicknamed “Old Rough and Ready,”
lived in Baton Rouge from 1822 until his
1849 inauguration as president of the
United States. William Garl Brown, Jr.,
painted this portrait in 1847 as Taylor
fought in the Mexican-American War.
Taylor’s victories at the battles of Palo Alto,
Monterrey, and Buena Vista propelled him
into the White House.
FRONTISPIECE FROM H. MONTGOMERY, THE LIFE OF
MAJOR GENERAL ZACHARY TAYLOR, TWELFTH PRESIDENT OF
THE UNITED STATES (NEW YORK: C. M. SAXTON, BARKER
& CO., 1860).
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
14
New Orleans. The Episcopal church building,
completed in 1895, has a different look and feel.
Both are architectural treasures. iv
A Baptist congregation formed in 1838, but
the First Baptist Church was not established
until 1874. In 1822 the Mississippi Presbyterian
Church sent a missionary, the Reverend Mr.
Savage, to Baton Rouge. Five years later the First
Presbyterian Church incorporated. In 1836 the
First United Methodist Church was established.
African American residents of Baton Rouge
attended white or black churches until the Civil
War; after the war they would be required to
attend black churches only. In 1858 the town
government established a black church and
hired a free black Methodist minister, George
Menard. That same year the first Jewish
congregation, known today as Congregation
B’Nai Israel, was formed. v
In 1835 a new facility for the incarceration of
Louisiana’s criminals opened in Baton Rouge.
Previously prisoners of the state had been held
in a parish prison in New Orleans. Slaves and
some one hundred prisoners serving sentences
of hard labor built the Louisiana State
Penitentiary prison complex, located between
Florida and Laurel Streets and bounded by
Seventh and Twelfth Streets. By selling prisonmade
goods the facility became self sufficient.
Local merchants agitated to close the prisoners’
workshops, however, because the prices of
items made by prisoners—who were not paid
for their labor—were lower than their own
prices. A fire damaged the workshops in 1841,
and in 1844 the state legislature passed an act
forbidding the sale of prison-made items that
were also manufactured locally. The state then
leased the building and the prisoners to James
A. McHatton and William Pratt, who raised
funds by leasing prisoners for hazardous work,
such as building and repairing levees. This type
of labor was too dangerous for slaves. vi
Within ten short years steamboat travel on
the lower Mississippi grew tremendously. By
1822 workers commonly unloaded and loaded
steamboat-driven barges at the foot of Florida
Street. Up to 40 passengers could travel
downriver on a steamboat from Natchez to New
Orleans in 10 days for $18 each. Because
steamboat engines had to work harder going
against the current, the ships could not carry as
many people or as much cargo as when they
floated downstream. Only 20 passengers could
go upriver from New Orleans to Natchez; they
paid $25 each and traveled for 20 days.
In 1835, transportation improved further
when H. B. Favrot received permission from the
legislature to run a ferry across the Mississippi
River at Baton Rouge. The new river crossing
made the city far more accessible, and for
generations it was the only convenient way for
Baton Rougeans to get to the river’s west bank.
Few dignitaries reached the little town, and,
when they did, it was a major event. During his
celebrated tour of the United States, the
Marquis de Lafayette, hero of the American
Revolution, stopped in Baton Rouge in April
1825 to visit his former aide-de-camp Joseph
Armand Allard Duplantier, owner of Magnolia
Mound Plantation. A crowd of enthusiastic well
wishers awaited the Marquis downtown, as did
the troops stationed in town. The Marquis
toured the newly completed Pentagon Barracks
and the rest of the army garrison, and he later
attended a ball and banquet in his honor at
Madame Legendre’s, a two-story inn at the
corner of Florida and Fourth streets.
The military maintained a strong local
presence. In 1837 the U.S. War Department
stationed a regiment of infantry, an artillery
company, and six companies of cavalry in the
town. The following year the U.S. Army built
four powder magazines to store gunpowder and
ammunition for the military post at Baton
Rouge, by then the main ordnance depot for the
southwestern part of the country. The remaining
structure, the Old Arsenal, is still surrounded by
a courtyard and high brick walls that were built
to direct any accidental explosions upward
instead of outward. For similar safety reasons
the building was erected a distance from the

Pentagon Barracks. The magazine could hold
around 3,000 barrels of gunpowder, which to
stay dry were placed atop 832 barrels of
charcoal, packed into the foundation on a
brick floor. vii
The two political parties of the day, the
Whigs and the Democrats, had been holding
meetings and rallies in the town for years. For
example, during the 1844 presidential campaign,
in which Democrat James K. Polk ran
against Whig Henry Clay, both parties held
rallies in Baton Rouge. Local partisan newspapers
claimed wildly inflated numbers of
attendees: the Democrats purported 6,000
attendees, while the Whigs claimed 12,000.
Only white men could vote, but women and
children attended political events to listen and
socialize. A local newspaper editor remarked
that women who supported the Whigs
“soften[ed] every expression that might have
been harsh and offensive, and harmoniz[ed] the
whole scene.” At the large Whig rally in 1844
women tried various ways to influence the vote.
One group wore badges that proclaimed “Whig
or No Husband.” viii
In 1846, Baton Rouge became the state
capital (the temptations of New Orleans made
it an unsuitable home for state government),
and three years later the legislature took up
residence. The mid-century influx of lawmakers
ushered in a bold new era for the town.
Architect James H. Dakin designed and built
the statehouse, now the Old State Capitol, over
five years, opening the building in 1850 but
not completing construction until 1852. Dakin
encountered such frustrations as shoddy
building materials and stingy legislators, some
still smarting over the move from New Orleans,
and at one point he threatened to quit. ix
Dakin persevered, but his design was rather
unfavorably received. Local newspapers
panned it as an “unsightly mass.” The
legislators missed the big city downriver, as
the New Orleans Picayune reported: “At Baton
Rouge members find better lodgings in the
Penitentiary than elsewhere; a good restaurant
would be a blessing; a regular mail from the
city or anywhere else would be looked upon as
a miracle, and means of speedy transportation
so soon as wanted, to any point up or down
the coast, would be hailed as a God-send.” x
The population of Baton Rouge grew significantly
in the mid-nineteenth century. From
the beginning of the century until at least
1830, about fifteen hundred people resided in
the town. By 1850 the population had more
than doubled to 3,905. Approximately 34
percent were African American; 1,092 of those
were slaves and 251 were free people of color.
Education for white children made some
haphazard progress during the era. The College
of Baton Rouge, a semiprivate high school, was
chartered in November 1837 but closed by
1844. By 1848 the first public schools opened,
two for boys and one for girls. They were
housed in various places around town; one
school for boys met in the basement of the
Methodist Church. Unfortunately the public
schools failed because of a lack of funding.
Private schools came and went, but Centenary
College, Young Ladies’ Seminary, Baton Rouge
High School, Jesuit’s School for Boys, Girls’
School of Sisters of the Sacred Heart, Mrs.
Louck’s School for Little Boys and Girls, and
the Baton Rouge Collegiate Institute remained
open. By 1860 twelve schools were open: three
church schools, six private schools, and three
public schools. xi
In 1852 the state legislature set aside funds
for the establishment of the Asylum for the
Deaf, Dumb, and Blind. In 1859 the asylum
moved into its new Gothic revival building,
just three-quarters of a mile from the state
capitol. During the Civil War the building
✧
Only one building remains from the
Louisiana State Penitentiary, which
operated in Baton Rouge from 1835 to
1917. The warden’s house, built in 1830 at
the corner of Seventh and Laurel Streets,
contained both the prison store (downstairs)
and the warden’s quarters (upstairs). The
portion to the right included a kitchen and
housing for servants. Today the structure
serves as an office building.
SKETCH BY JOHN DESMOND PUBLISHED IN LOUISIANA’S
ANTEBELLUM ARCHITECTURE (BATON ROUGE: CLAITOR’S
PUBLISHING DIVISION, 1970).
CHAPTER I
15

✧
Right: The Tessier Buildings at 342-348
Lafayette Street (also called the Lafayette
Buildings) feature ornate cast-ironwork.
Charles R. Tessier, the town’s first probate
judge, erected three two-story buildings one
at a time between 1820 and the 1850s.
COURTESY OF THE HISTORICAL AMERICAN BUILDINGS
SURVEY, LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.
Below: The Marquis de Lafayette (1757-
1834), who had fought valiantly in the
American struggle for independence from
Britain, traveled throughout the United
States in a celebrated tour many years later.
After the French nobleman visited Baton
Rouge in 1825, Second Street was
rechristened “Lafayette Street” in his honor.
This steel engraving is probably based on a
full-length portrait by French painter Ary
Scheffer. Promotional copies of the image
were made for Lafayette’s tour.
IMAGE PUBLISHED IN A. A. PARKER, RECOLLECTIONS OF
GENERAL LAFAYETTE ON HIS VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES
IN 1824 AND 1825 (KEENE, NH: SENTINEL PRINTING, 1879).
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
16
served as Union headquarters and as a hospital,
and afterward, in 1869, Louisiana State
University moved in and shared the building
with the school. The School for the Blind split
off from the Asylum in 1890 and moved to
Government Street, where it remains today as
the Louisiana State School for the Visually
Impaired. The asylum building continued to
house the School for the Deaf and Dumb until
it was condemned in 1944. xii
Health issues continued to be a problem,
and among the risks was the viral disease
yellow fever. The theory that yellow fever is
spread by mosquitoes was not put forth until
1881 and not confirmed until 1901, and in the
middle of the nineteenth century no one knew
how the disease spread or how to control it.
Yellow Jack, as the fever was commonly called,
could kill in as little as four days. Severe
epidemics hit the Gulf Coast region in the
1850s. The worst arrived in 1853, affecting
residents from Mobile to Houston and in nearly
every town in Mississippi and Louisiana south
of Vicksburg. Baton Rouge lost about 20
percent of its population when four hundred
people died. Many were buried in a mass grave
outside Magnolia Cemetery. xiii
Local residents could choose from a variety
of entertainments. Some schools held concerts
and literary readings. Residents gathered often
at the capitol to meet socially and to mingle
with soldiers. The Magnolia Race Track,
opened in 1847, was one of many gambling
outlets; others included cockfighting, raffles,
lotteries, and boat races. xiv
In 1857 the management at the Gazette and
Comet newspaper opened the Young Men’s
Library Association. The library’s book collection
contained everything from Gulliver’s Travels
to a local account, “The Chronicles of Red
Stick.” The first floor was a reading room open
every night, and the second floor contained a
hall in which lectures were given twice a week. xv
Slavery had long been a contentious issue in
the United States. Southern slave states fiercely
protected their right to hold as property the
slaves whose labor fueled the great agricultural
plantations and the entire southern economy.
Baton Rougeans relied on their slaves as well;
in 1860 the population of Baton Rouge stood at
5,428, of which just under a quarter, or 1,247,
were enslaved. By contrast, in 1860 New
Orleans had 168,675 inhabitants, of which 7.9
percent, or 13,385, were slaves. xvi
Many Americans living in free states
believed slavery was morally wrong but—
aside from the abolitionists—did not propose
to end slavery in the states where it existed.
Northerners opposed the expansion of slavery
into new territories and new states, however,
because they feared that the “slave power”—
which enjoyed increased representation in
Congress—would take over the national
government. They wanted to preserve free
western territory for white labor.
In 1860, Abraham Lincoln won the
presidential election, and in response the
slaveholding states began to secede. At a
secession convention held in Baton Rouge,
elected delegates from around the state voted
to leave the Union on January 26, 1861, less
than fifty years after Louisiana first joined the
United States. Even before the official break
with the Union, however, Governor Thomas
O. Moore ordered the state militia to seize the
U.S. Arsenal and Pentagon Barracks. Ohio
native Major William Tecumseh Sherman,
superintendent of the year-old Louisiana State
Seminary and Military Academy in Pineville
(which later became LSU), disapproved of the
seizure of Federal forts, calling the action akin

to a declaration of war. He resigned from his
position when the state seceded and offered
his services to the Union. The school closed in
1861, reopened in 1862, and closed again in
May 1863 for the remainder of the war. Some
local Catholic schools remained open, but
most schools closed for the duration. xvii
Louisiana officially joined the Confederacy
in March 1861, and the next month the Civil
War began as Confederate troops captured
Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. During
that first year Baton Rougeans watched the
war from afar, sending sons, brothers, and
husbands off to fight, hardly imagining their
own city would become a battlefield. The false
sense of security was shattered in April 1862
when U.S. Admiral David G. Farragut
captured New Orleans without firing a single
shot. At that news, many fearful Baton
Rougeans evacuated. The state government
removed the Confederate capital to
Opelousas, shipping the state archives upriver
in the middle of the night on April 24. At the
governor’s order, local men burned cotton to
keep it out of the hands of the Union soldiers.
On May 7, 1862, Federal naval forces
under Commander James S. Palmer arrived at
the port of Baton Rouge, but no officials came
out to meet them. Governor Moore had
already relocated to Opelousas. On May 9,
soldiers from the USS Iroquois retook the
arsenal and the Pentagon Barracks. Edward
W. Bacon, captain’s clerk on the ship, wrote
his sister on May 10:
This Bluff is some 40 feet high and is
surmounted by a very fine State House, the best
ever State House building I ever yet saw, a large
and well planned Deaf and Dumb Asylum,
several churches and, higher up the river, not
in sight as we approached, the U.S. Arsenal and
Barracks, which occupy some 20 acres of land.
Between these more prominent objects very
neat and pretty cottage houses contrast with
the thick trees and shrubbery, making the
whole scene one of much beauty.…
We were the first to communicate with the
shore which we did on the evening of the 8th
by a summons to surrender which was
answered by a refusal to surrender to “any
power upon earth,” and the assurance that the
place was “entirely without any means of
defense,” but that our occupation of it would
wound the sensibilities of its peaceable and
inoffensive inhabitants.
Accordingly, yesterday morning we landed
a force of some 60 men and a howitzer and
marched up to the Arsenal, having out a
strong force of pickets to protect our advance.
When we reached the Arsenal gate, I, being in
advance of all, found it locked, but squeezing
through was the first to tread Uncle Sam’s
property in his name….
In the Commandant’s Office I found a
quantity of old papers—some loose gunpowder,
some empty gin bottles and an iron
bedstead, while over the chimneypiece was
fixed the only prize I found, a very pretty pair
of Antlers. I tore them down and have them
now on board as a relic of my first active
expedition, a very important one, and all the
more so because bloodless.
✧
Above: Built on the former Thomas Gibbes
Morgan estate, the new seat of Louisiana’s
legislature was a marvel of the Gothic
Revival design.
COURTESY OF PEGGY DUERR.
Below: The Asylum for the Deaf, Dumb, and
Blind, established in 1852, occupied this
house on South Boulevard until 1859. The
building had a history of educational uses: in
1834, Philip Hickey sold the house to
Bonaventure Granet, who used it as the girls’
half of the Baton Rouge Academy, also called
the College of Baton Rouge. After the Granet
school went out of business, the town bought
the property and ran a new College of Baton
Rouge—essentially a high school—in the
same spot from 1837 to 1844.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA SCHOOL FOR THE DEAF.
CHAPTER I
17

✧
Above: On April 18, 1857, an editor at the
Daily Gazette and Comet wrote, “In
1845…the frame houses wore an ancient
dilapidated appearance, there were no good
pavements, and but a few moss covered
china trees, which were a burlesque upon
the idea of giving shade. The streets were
uneven, but little or no drainings, and we
recollect to have seen wagons and carriages
bogged in their center…. Now we can boast
of the best drained, smoothest streets, the
handsomest shaded sidewalks and family
residences to be found in any Southern city.”
FROM BALLOU’S DRAWING ROOM COMPANION,
MAY 12, 1855.
Below: Union troops occupied the grounds of
the Louisiana State Penitentiary after
capturing the city in 1862.
ANDREW LYTLE PHOTOGRAPH, COURTESY OF THE
MARSHALL DUNHAM ALBUM, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
After we had marched back again with our
drums beating and colors flying above us and
on the U.S. Property, we sent a letter of Mayor
[Benjamin F.] Bryan, assuring him that, if he
suffered our flag to be molested, his town
would pay the bitterest penalties. This
correspondence you will probably see. The
Mayor in his reply to our warning begs a good
deal more than is proper for a man who will
“surrender to no power on earth.” xviii
Bryan sent several notes to the Federal
officials on the gunboats in the hopes of
maintaining peace in Baton Rouge. He
promised that the town’s residents would not
molest the U.S. flag flying at the arsenal. After
purchasing coal from Hill & Markham to
fortify their vessels, the Union forces ventured
upriver in a vain quest to take Vicksburg.
Soon thereafter Bryan resigned, and Jordan
Holt took over as provisional mayor, serving
until 1865. xix
Union forces returned to occupy the city on
May 28, and the peaceful face of Baton Rouge
was destroyed by gunfire. Confederate guerillas
fired buckshot at one of the ship’s chief
engineers, James B. Kimball, as he and four
sailors headed toward shore in a small boat
filled with laundry. Kimball and two sailors
sustained mild injuries. Farragut ordered a
retaliatory strike against Baton Rouge, and the
gunfire hit the capitol, St. Joseph’s Cathedral,
and the Harney House Hotel. The citizens who
had remained in the city, mainly women and
children, fled; one woman died. Guerillas
blended into the fleeing crowds to escape
capture. A brave delegation rowed out to the
fleet in order to apologize, assuring the Federal
troops that local residents would cooperate.
Farragut placed General Thomas Williams
in charge of Baton Rouge, and Williams moved
a strong occupying force into town. Troops set
up headquarters at the arsenal and established
checkpoints and guard posts throughout the
town. Patrols searched for the guerillas, and
eventually captured one man named Henry
Castle, Jr. Soldiers set up campsites throughout
the city. Military occupation meant travel
restrictions for residents. Soldiers intruded in
all aspects of life: walking the streets, attending
the churches, and visiting the homes. Some
residents were surprised, however, at how
cordially the Union forces behaved, and
stoically accepted the situation. Others chafed
when the occupiers liberated slaves and took
horses and food. xx
By mid-June, Williams left the city under
the control of a small force while he, Farragut,
and David D. Porter made another move
against Vicksburg. They soon abandoned their
plans to divert the Mississippi River away from
Vicksburg by digging a canal. Hundreds of
Union soldiers, short of food and clean water
and unaccustomed to the hot Louisiana sun,
fell ill with dysentery, malaria, and other
diseases. Williams returned to Baton Rouge on
July 26, and Farragut continued downriver to
New Orleans. At one point, nearly half the
soldiers stationed at Baton Rouge were sick.
Sarah Morgan wrote the following in her diary:
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
18
These poor soldiers are dying awfully.
Thirteen went yesterday. On Sunday the boats

discharged hundreds of sick at our landing. Some
lay there all afternoon in the hot sun, waiting for
the wagons to carry them to the hospital, which
task occupied the whole evening. In the
meantime these poor wretches lay uncovered on
the ground, in every stage of sickness. Cousin
Will saw one lying dead without a creature by to
notice when he died. Another was dying, and
muttering to himself as he lay too far gone to
brush the flies out of his eyes and mouth, while
no one was able to do it for him…. O I wish these
poor men were safe in their own land! It is heart
breaking to see them die here like dogs, with no
one to say Godspeed. xxi
Aware of the reduced strength of the Union
soldiers, Confederate troops sought to make
the most of the situation by launching an
attack to recapture Baton Rouge. General John
C. Breckinridge brought approximately four
thousand men by rail from Vicksburg to Camp
Moore, a training facility northeast of the city.
Breckinridge planned for the ironclad Arkansas
to arrive at Baton Rouge at the same time his
troops did, in order to divert the wooden
gunboats guarding the city. The Confederate
ironclad was in need of repairs, however, and
its progress downriver was uncertain. As the
Arkansas drew near, Breckinridge led his men
on a nightmarish 50-mile forced march that
caused 600 soldiers to collapse.
The unit stopped by the Comite River,
about ten miles outside Baton Rouge, and
remained there for one day while the Arkansas
moved downriver. By the time Confederate
troops reached Baton Rouge on the morning
of August 5, illness had greatly reduced their
ranks. Williams led the Union troops against
the attackers and was fatally shot in the
chest. Some Federal soldiers valiantly left
their hospital beds to participate in the
battle, but the morning’s victory belonged to
the Confederates.
Rumors kept residents in a constant state
of alarm, and some, including Sarah Morgan
and her family, had fled the city a few days
before the fighting began. Others ran for their
lives on the morning of the battle, heading
south on Highland and River roads. Some of
the heaviest fighting took place in Magnolia
Cemetery, which had opened just eight years
earlier. After the battle the bodies of the fallen
U.S. soldiers were removed and buried
outside the cemetery, in what eventually
became the Baton Rouge National Cemetery.
The Confederate dead were buried in a mass
grave in or near Magnolia Cemetery. xxii
Around 4 p.m., word reached Breckinridge
that the Arkansas had stopped some four
miles away and was unable to continue. Its
sailors abandoned the ramboat and set it on
fire. The Confederates could not hold the city
without naval support, so the general ordered
an immediate withdrawal.
In the end casualties amounted to 383 for
the Union soldiers and between 450 and 467
for the Confederates. Both sides attempted to
claim victory, but in the end, a stroke of fortune
decided the battle for the Federal army.
After the battle Union soldiers ransacked the
city and would have burned it, on the orders of
Major General Benjamin Butler, had Colonel
Halbert E. Paine not asked him to spare the city
because of its orphan and insane asylums. The
Union troops withdrew but returned on
December 17. On December 28 a fire erupted
in the state capitol, likely from a flue that had
not been maintained properly, and the building
remained empty approximately twenty years. xxiii
Throughout the South, Union forces often
found themselves caretakers for slaves seeking
freedom, dubbed “contrabands” by military
authorities. Once the Federal army controlled
Baton Rouge, hundreds of African Americans
✧
Above: In 1991, Charles East, former
director of LSU Press, edited and published
the diary Sarah Morgan Dawson kept in
Baton Rouge during the Civil War. She had
moved with her parents from New Orleans
to Baton Rouge in 1850, when she was eight
years old. Her son preferred this image of
Dawson, taken in August 1899, to earlier
pictures, because it showed the lasting
beauty in her face.
COURTESY OF THE SARAH MORGAN DAWSON
MANUSCRIPTS, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: The Battle of Baton Rouge raged on
August 5, 1862. The Confederates retook
the town but had to retreat the same day.
FROM HARPER’S WEEKLY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1862.
CHAPTER I
19

✧
On December 28, 1862, a fire broke out in
the state capitol, which was occupied by
Union troops and political and military
prisoners. According to the investigating
board’s official report, filed on January 3,
1863, “the cause of the fire was the foulness
and probably unsound condition of the
chimney.” The capitol, shown here in 1865,
remained empty until the Legislature
returned in 1881.
COURTESY OF THE JOHN LANGDON WARD MAGIC
LANTERN SLIDES, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
20
sought safety and refuge in the town.
By April 1863 two black regiments
formed out of local contraband camps.
Additionally, two regiments of the
Louisiana Native Guards occupied the
city. When most of the Union forces
moved to Port Hudson the next
month, one white and two black
regiments remained in Baton Rouge,
the 38th Massachusetts and the 1st and
3rd Louisiana Native Guards. Black
men in blue uniforms occupied the city
long before the end of the war. xxiv
Bloody battles continued throughout the
nation for the next two years, but the town of
Baton Rouge was spared further firsthand
sight of war. Many of its residents served the
Confederacy in various capacities: soldiers
remained away on campaign, and nurses and
stewards ministered to the ill and wounded.
The war ended at Appomattox Court House
on April 9, 1865, when Confederate general
Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union general
Ulysses S. Grant.
President Abraham Lincoln, assassinated
just five days later, never had the chance to
reunite the country as he had intended. As early
as 1862 he had urged Unionists in occupied
states to form loyal governments, and in
February 1864 Louisiana followed suit. For a
time the state operated under two governments
headquartered in two capital cities. At the
urging of General Nathaniel Banks, the areas
under Federal control (including Baton Rouge)
held elections and voted Michael Hahn as the
new governor. Hahn later won election to the
U.S. Senate, and his lieutenant governor, James
Madison Wells, succeeded him. The Federals
chose New Orleans as the new capital. At the
time Shreveport served as Confederate
Louisiana’s capital, since the Union army had
taken Opelousas in 1863. The Confederate
governor, Brigadier General Henry Watkins
Allen, had been seriously wounded at the Battle
of Baton Rouge.
Lincoln’s successor, Andrew Johnson,
allowed the defeated Confederates wide-ranging
liberties under Presidential Reconstruction.
Wells reappointed Democrat Jordan Holt to his
position as Baton Rouge mayor, and another
appointed mayor, Democrat James E. Elam,
succeeded Holt in November 1865. Elam then
won the 1866 mayoral election and stayed in
power until 1872. Thus, although former slaves
could be seen everywhere in Baton Rouge—a
scene that displeased white residents—political
control was quickly restored to the Democrats,
former antebellum leaders. The mayor and the
city’s selectmen strove to curb vagrancy,
street violence, and the seeming lawlessness
that were part of life in a postwar town. The
courts soon filled with cases involving black
citizens, and the time and cost of holding
so many trials caused the editor of the Advocate
to reminisce about the times in which such
cases were “settled with a dose of fifteen or
twenty lashes.” xxv
Though white Democrats ran the town, the
Federal military kept its base open. U.S.
soldiers, who had been a fixture in the town
for decades, remained at the Pentagon
Barracks until 1879. Seeing former slaves as
freedmen and freedwomen was upsetting
enough for white residents, but the presence
of Federal African American soldiers deeply
disturbed them. Some Baton Rougeans, called
“good and loyal white men” by the Advocate,
went so far as to boycott the 1865
Independence Day parade because black
soldiers were to march in the procession. A
captain in the U.S. Colored Infantry wrote in
response: “We have no requests to make for
kindness, or social recognition on their [the
white residents’] part—let them turn up their
noses at us if they choose—not go out when
we are around—close their door—shut their
eyes, and hold their noses while we pass by,
we will not complain about that; but do not

say any more that loyal men will not celebrate
the Fourth of July because United States
Soldiers march along the streets.” xxvi
In addition to the presence of the U.S.
Colored Troops in the city, a new African
American regiment was raised nearby, one of six
established at the war’s end by President
Johnson. The Forty-first Infantry Division drilled
and trained two miles north of town, at the old
Daugherty Plantation. Commanders Colonel
Ranald S. Mackenzie and Lieutenant Colonel
William R. Shafter also took responsibility for
signing up new recruits. In six months the 41st
Infantry grew from 101 to 577 men. In June
1867 they left town and headed west to Texas. xxvii
The year 1867 proved momentous for the city
and for the nation. Congress enacted new laws to
reconstruct the former Confederacy. These
stricter laws inaugurated Congressional, or
Radical, Reconstruction. Congress subjected
southern state governments to military authority,
called for new state constitutions that included
awarding voting rights to black men, disallowed
former Confederates the right to vote, and
mandated that the states ratify the Fourteenth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution—which
gave citizenship to the freed slaves—before they
could be readmitted to the Union.
New constitutional amendments paved the
way for African Americans to have a political
voice. Though barred from politics, slaves had
developed an elaborate system of sharing
information and news among themselves, and
they formed and discussed ideas about freedom
and change. Free black people might have had
more access to political discourse than slaves did
before the war, but neither enslaved nor free
African Americans could vote or hold office. In
April 1867 the results of a voter registration
drive indicated that black voters outnumbered
white voters in Baton Rouge, and in the
September election that year, two African
Americans—Louis Francois, a Creole of color,
and Victor M. Lange—and one white man won
election as delegates to the state’s constitutional
convention. Both Francois and Lange, an ice
cream vendor and Baton Rouge native, had been
free before the war. After this setback the
Democrats redoubled their efforts at
organization and getting out the vote. Their
campaign of intimidation against black
Republican voters, orchestrated in part by the
Ku Klux Klan, was successful; by April 1868 the
city voted against ratifying the new constitution,
though the state ratified it anyway. Baton Rouge
appeared calm over the next few years because
white leaders kept a powerful grip on the city. xxviii
Voters in East Baton Rouge Parish,
nevertheless, elected two African Americans to
serve as Republicans in the 1868-70 state
House of Representatives: Victor Lange and his
brother Robert, who died at the end of his term.
J. Henri Burch, also African American, became
the state representative from East Baton Rouge
Parish in 1870. Burch grew up in Connecticut,
went to college in New York, and in 1868
moved to Baton Rouge to teach. During his time
in the legislature he bought the Baton Rouge
Courier and changed the newspaper’s name to
The Grand Era. He published the paper from
1871 to 1878, the year armed white men forced
him to leave the parish. xxix
✧
Above: The U.S. Army called slaves who left
plantations during the Civil War
“contrabands.” In 1862, Federal officials set
up this contraband camp in Baton Rouge.
ANDREW LYTLE PHOTOGRAPH, COURTESY OF THE
MARSHALL DUNHAM ALBUM, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: As of January 1863 the Federal
military troops in Baton Rouge included the
Louisiana Native Guards, African American
officers and soldiers who fought valiantly at
the May 1863 battle at Port Hudson.
General Nathaniel Banks’s after-battle
report led the New York Times to state on
June 11, 1863, that “This official testimony
settles the question that the negro race can
fight with great prowess.” The success of the
black officers embarrassed the Union army,
and, under pressure from white troops,
Banks forced the officers out of the service.
COURTESY OF THE JOHN LANGDON WARD MAGIC
LANTERN SLIDES, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER I
21

✧
Above: Baton Rouge native George Daniel
Waddill served as a hospital steward during
the war. He met and married Joanna Fox, a
nurse and hospital matron, when they
worked together in Mississippi. At the end of
the war the couple settled in Baton Rouge
and operated a drug store at Main and
North Seventh (St. Anthony Street).
Joanna helped create the Confederate
Memorial Association of Baton Rouge, the
forerunner of the United Daughters of the
Confederacy. After her death in 1899 the
Baton Rouge chapter honored her work by
taking her name.
ANDREW LYTLE PHOTOGRAPH, C. 1880. COURTESY OF THE
WADDILL FAMILY PAPERS, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: LSU occupied the state Deaf, Dumb,
and Blind Asylum, shown here in 1880,
from 1869 until 1887, when it moved into
the Pentagon Barracks.
COURTESY OF THE WILLIAM POLK COLLECTION, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
22
Federal military presence allowed the
establishment of the first African American
school in Baton Rouge, which the American
Missionary Association opened in March
1864. The school was run by John C. Tucker,
who with five other instructors taught an
average of 212 children each day as well as an
adult evening class. Three more teachers
taught smaller numbers of students, including
one class for black women. All in all, Baton
Rouge hosted more AMA teachers than any
other city except New Orleans. xxx
In general, however, public schools suffered
during Reconstruction. Although sixteen
public schools were supposed to be operating,
in 1867 the State Superintendent of Education
found only one open school with just twentyfive
students. Unwilling to pay taxes to
support public schools, which served both
races, white residents wealthy enough to
afford tuition sent their children to private
white schools. The subsequent lack of funding
spelled disaster for the public school system. xxxi
A poor school system was not the only
indicator of continued racial tension. The city
became more segregated as black and white
families moved their living quarters farther
away from each other. For example, the
number of African American servants living in
the homes of their white employers dropped
significantly during Reconstruction. xxxii
During the 1870s, Baton Rouge became the
home of an institution that eventually brought
it tremendous renown. Closed in 1863, the
Louisiana State Seminary and Military
Academy reopened two years later under the
leadership of David F. Boyd. Four students
arrived on opening day in October 1865, but
soon nearly one hundred students signed up
for classes. A risk-taker, Boyd had no
alternative but to start from scratch because
much of the campus had been damaged. In a
reconciliatory move, Boyd brought his friend
Union general William T. Sherman to the
campus to speak in 1869. The Alexandria
campus caught fire later that year, and Boyd
quickly made new arrangements with the help
of Governor Henry Clay Warmoth. In
November 1869, Boyd moved the school and
its 133 cadets to the Asylum for the Deaf,
Dumb, and Blind in Baton Rouge. Shortly
thereafter the school was rechristened the
Louisiana State University. It still faced
difficult challenges, both political and
financial, and by 1874, enrollment declined to
fewer than ten cadets. At the time LSU had just
two faculty members: David Boyd and his
younger brother Thomas. LSU leadership
overcame numerous obstacles, and in 1877,
LSU merged with another institution to
become the Louisiana State University and
Agricultural and Mechanical College.
On the surface townspeople led a peaceful
coexistence, but violence and intimidation
were hallmarks of the era. Former slaves
experienced greater enmity from white people
than ever before. Free black men, women,
and children, no longer valuable to white
owners, could not expect the protection their
former owners had given them. Refusing to
accept former slaves as free and equal,
defeated white southerners felt desperate to
reestablish control. Riots occurred all too
frequently during Reconstruction in Louisiana
and throughout the South. New Orleans was
a hotbed of racial violence that culminated in
several street battles, including the July 1866
Mechanics Institute massacre, the March
1873 Battle of the Cabildo, the September
1874 Battle of Liberty Place, and at the end of
Reconstruction, a coup d’etat on January 9,
1877. Upstate, a horrible massacre took place
in Colfax in April 1873, during which dozens
of black men were killed in a brief battle that
had arisen from a political dispute. xxxiii
On November 7, 1870, election day, an
armed riot erupted in Baton Rouge.

Republicans swept the Louisiana elections,
winning a majority in both houses of the state
legislature and every race for Congress. After
the polls closed a riot broke out; the immediate
cause remains unknown. Armed groups fought
each other in the streets, leaving four African
Americans dead and twenty white and black
people injured. Soldiers from the local army
garrison ended the battle and enforced a hastily
declared state of martial law. They arrested sixty
men, including one black man and several
prominent citizens. Tense days followed as
soldiers patrolled the streets, but the charges
were dropped because of a lack of evidence.
The prisoners were released. xxxiv
In 1871, L. Bechel, a black Republican
mayoral candidate, ran against Elam and won
by five votes. Elam cited voting irregularities
and overcame the challenge to his office. The
following year, however, Elam lost the popular
vote to Henry Schorten. After a complex
political struggle at both local and statewide
levels, the newly victorious governor, William
Pitt Kellogg, chose Schorten, a supporter, to
serve as mayor. The Republican mayor took
office in 1873. This change in parties did not
result in many differences in life in Baton
Rouge; only five years earlier, Schorten had
been a Democrat and a member of the Seymour
Knights, a secret paramilitary group similar to
the Ku Klux Klan. Schorten won a popular
election and remained mayor for three years. xxxv
Violence coupled with physical and
economic intimidation against black citizens
and white Republicans increased as white
Democrats became more determined to
overturn a government they saw as illegitimate.
The White League, another secret organization
seeking to reestablish white supremacy, formed
in Louisiana in 1874. In September of that
year, conservative white businessmen in Baton
Rouge paid for a notice in the Advocate:
“We…do solemnly promise and bind ourselves
not to employ or aid in any manner, any
person, whether white or black, who votes
against our interests in the coming election.” xxxvi
As they had in Baton Rouge, by 1876,
white Democrats won back the state with the
help of the White League and waning Federal
control. A disputed presidential election
ended in a compromise with the office going
to Rutherford B. Hayes, who agreed to remove
Federal troops from the South. Consequently
African Americans were left with little
protection, opportunity, or hope. This action
formally ended the Reconstruction era in the
South and effectively silenced the black
political voice for generations.
In Baton Rouge, the black man “was slowly
losing contact with the white race, his
economic position was set in the laboring
occupations, the whites continued to control
his job opportunities, and his vote could only
be effectively used to select from among
Democrats. Although reconstruction had
scarcely disturbed the city, the Conservatives
felt that by the end of the decade, things were
back to normal.” xxxvii
✧
Above: An educated free man of African-
French heritage, Louis Francois worked as
a merchant before the Civil War. He served
as a sergeant in the 73rd U.S. Colored
Infantry and was elected to represent East
Baton Rouge Parish in the 1868
constitutional convention.
FROM THE COVER PAGE OF THE 1868 LOUISIANA
CONSTITUTION. COURTESY OF THE LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: During the Civil War the courthouse
on St. Louis Street hosted Union soldiers
and served as a hospital. During
Reconstruction the courthouse (right) and
city market (left) were the scene of a riot in
which four African Americans were killed.
Built in 1857, the courthouse was torn
down in 1922 to make way for the erection
of a new courthouse on the same spot.
COURTESY OF THE LEROY S. BOYD PAPERS, POSTCARD
ALBUM, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER I
23

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
24

CHAPTER II
J IM C ROW MEETS S TANDARD O IL: SEGREGATION,
C ORRUPTION, AND P ROSPERITY, 1878-1927
After Reconstruction cities throughout the former Confederacy sought growth and prosperity.
Baton Rouge’s first indicator of hope and renewed prestige arrived when it again became Louisiana’s
capital, and the newly renovated and red-painted capitol served to illustrate the changes in the city.
The legislators’ return in 1882 helped fuel a population increase: the number of residents rose
slightly from 5,428 in 1860 to 7,197 in 1880, but over the next two decades the figure ballooned
to 11,269. Population growth exceeded all expectations after the arrival of Big Oil in 1909. i
Founded as a strategic outpost, Baton Rouge had always housed a military base. Residents had
socialized with and married soldiers stationed in town. Since 1862, however, Federal soldiers had
been considered an occupying force, and on June 5, 1879, many residents rejoiced as the U.S.
Army vacated the Pentagon Barracks. Approximately two hundred acres remained vacant until
1887, when LSU moved onto the property.
The national transportation revolution made its mark on the river town. In December 1883 the
New Orleans & Mississippi Valley Railroad connected Baton Rouge to New Orleans, for the first
time linking Baton Rouge directly with another city. Within a decade a municipal streetcar line
became a reliable way to move about town.
The promise of progress belied the hard times many southerners experienced after
Reconstruction. After the failure of Federal attempts to reconstruct the South and shape it into a
racially integrated society, conservative white Democrats “redeemed” state governments
throughout the region, ejecting Republicans and reclaiming power. The goals of these Bourbon
Democrats included white supremacy, segregation, and minimal government, showcased by a lack
of support for public works. For example, after 1877, legislators spent less money on Louisiana
public schools than they had before 1861. Despite the reversal of Reconstruction-era reforms,
education improved slowly in Baton Rouge. Two private Catholic schools, St. Vincent’s Academy
for boys and St. Joseph’s Academy for girls, provided solid instruction. Other private schools
served black and white students, but public schools lagged far behind.
Following a regional trend, rulers of late nineteenth-century Louisiana focused on enriching
themselves and distancing themselves from poor white people and African Americans. The
Louisiana State Lottery Company, a corrupt enterprise disguised as an economic panacea, was the
tool of choice. First chartered in 1868 by Republicans, the Lottery’s heyday came after
Reconstruction. Run by a New York syndicate, the Lottery earned between $20 and $30 million
annually. It paid out less than half its intake in monetary prizes, however, and its owners lavishly
bribed politicians and newspaper editors in order to stay in business. Many fought against the
Lottery, including such groups as the Louisiana Women’s Anti-Lottery League. Nevertheless, the
Lottery continued to thrive until 1891, when the U.S. Congress outlawed the interstate sale of
lottery tickets. ii
Starting in 1835, Louisiana state prisoners served their sentences at the penitentiary in Baton
Rouge, except during the Civil War era, when Union troops camped in the prison yard severely
damaged the grounds. After the war convicts were put to work repairing the penitentiary. The
machinery prisoners used to make salable goods had been moved to Clinton, Louisiana, for
safekeeping, but was destroyed in raids. In 1869, Louisiana lawmakers allowed the revival of convict
leasing, a cruel, corrupt, and profitable enterprise started before the war. Samuel L. James held the
state convict lease from 1870 until his death in 1894 as a multimillionaire. James subleased prisoners
around the state to work on levees, railroads, and plantations, and a steady influx of new prisoners
supplied James with cheap controllable labor, giving him no financial incentive to treat the men well.
✧
This early 1900s bird’s-eye view of the town
shows the Baptist Church in the foreground.
Pike’s Hall, built in the early 1860s to serve
as a theater, stands to the left of the church.
In 1888 the Waterworks Company erected
the one-hundred-foot standpipe
(background, right) at 131 Lafayette Street.
It was in use until 1938. The company also
installed six miles of cast-iron water mains
and seventy-five fire hydrants. The Old
State Capitol (background, left) is shown
here with turrets and a red coat of paint. In
the 1920s the turrets were removed after
extensive storm damage.
COURTESY OF THE ANDREW D. LYTLE COLLECTION,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER II
25

✧
Above: Horse- or mule-drawn carts on
trolley rails, like these shown on Main Street
in 1893, provided Baton Rouge’s first
method of public transportation. In the
twentieth century an electric street car line
ran on the rails along Main, Lafayette,
Government, and North Nineteenth streets
(with two spurs) until 1936.
COURTESY OF THE ANDREW D. LYTLE COLLECTION,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: For decades Louisiana used convict
labor for various jobs. In 1912 these inmates
from the state penitentiary in Baton Rouge
repaired the levees protecting the town.
COURTESY OF THE LOUIS LINK PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
He brutally worked the convicts, even harder
than plantation owners had worked slaves. The
average life span of a state prisoner in latenineteenth-century
Louisiana—just six years—
testifies to the conditions. The James Gang, a
political cabal, consisted of happily bribed
legislators who strove to keep James in
business and the money flowing. iii
In the early twentieth century the system
of leasing convicts was abolished. Meanwhile
the prison’s buildings deteriorated. In 1901
Louisiana purchased Angola Farm (which
James had owned) near St. Francisville and
started to slowly close the Baton Rouge state
penitentiary and move out the prisoners. By
1917 the state penitentiary in Baton Rouge
officially closed, and the state dismantled the
buildings on the site, leaving only the
warden’s house.
From 1876 to 1882 one prominent
Bourbon ruler, Leon Jastremski, led the city of
Baton Rouge. A former Confederate captain
and drugstore owner, Jastremski abhorred
African Americans and northerners. He
shared with many other southern white
citizens a strong desire to live as though the
Confederate defeat had never occurred. He
had a personal reason: during his wartime
service Jastremski had been captured and
guarded by African American soldiers, and his
resentment of the situation fueled his hatred.
A man of his time, Jastremski drew on the
support of paramilitary groups, some of
which were known to have been committed
to politically motivated violence, to win the
mayoral election. iv
During Jastremski’s term in office the state
capital moved from New Orleans back to
Baton Rouge. Lobbying for the idea began as
early as May 1879, when at a meeting in Pike’s
Hall, Jastremski, the city council, and local
citizens agreed to donate $35,000 toward the
cost of repairing the capitol—so long as the
city would once again become the state
capital. In the early 1880s, New Orleanian
William Freret renovated the Old State
Capitol in preparation for the legislature’s
return. He added a fourth story and cast-iron
staircase and turrets. During the restoration
(before the building was painted red), Mark
Twain wrote, “It is pathetic enough, that a
whitewashed castle, with turrets and things—
materials all ungenuine within and without,
pretending to be what they are not—should
ever have been built in this otherwise
honorable place; but it is much more pathetic
to see this architectural falsehood undergoing
restoration and perpetuation in our day, when
it would have been so easy to let dynamite
finish what a charitable fire began, and then
devote this restoration-money to the building
of something genuine.” v
It was no coincidence that moving the
state capital back to Baton Rouge coincided
with the rise in segregation in the town. As
African American legislator T. T. Allain
described the situation, “Negro legislators
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
26

who had previously been served in the white
saloons and restaurants of New Orleans
would discover, to their dismay, that upriver
in Baton Rouge the custom of segregation
made no exceptions.” vi
In 1879, Jastremski, while still mayor,
started the Louisiana Capitolian newspaper. It
merged with the Daily Advocate three years
later. As a newspaper editor—and the
recipient of the state printing contract—
Jastremski enjoyed the use of a prominent
soap box even after he left public office. His
influence was such that he also served on the
LSU Board of Supervisors from 1880 to 1888.
He used his political clout to secure for his
brother, John Vincent Jastremski, a position as
superintendent of the Asylum for the Deaf
and Dumb from 1884 until his death in 1904.
Just after the war the two had opened the “J.
Jastremski and Bro” drug store. Leon
Jastremski’s wife, Sallie Land Ashton
Jastremski, was prominent as a leader of club
women in the state. In 1890 her sympathy for
“women who go out to daily toil” led her to
establish the Working Woman’s Exchange.
The former mayor lost his power in 1888,
when he fell on the losing side of the Lottery
issue. He sold his newspaper to prominent
shipping merchant William Garig, who
changed its name from the Daily Capitolian-
Advocate back to the Daily Advocate. vii
Though some like Jastremski continued to
hate northerners, toward the end of the
nineteenth century a national trend toward
reconciliation emerged, honoring the
sacrifices of Civil War soldiers without
focusing on the cause or outcome of the war
or on which side soldiers fought. Baton Rouge
celebrated its soldiers as well. Plans for a
memorial started as early as 1883, when a
writer to the Capitolian-Advocate described the
monument’s projected purpose: “Raising no
sectional feelings, sinking all political
differences, it will be a fitting and sacred
mingling of the past with the present.” viii
On Washington’s birthday in 1886,
townspeople dedicated the base of the
Confederate monument. The event coincided
with the annual firemen’s parade. Four years
later a statue of a soldier completed the
monument. Its inscription reads: “Erected by
the men and women of East and West Baton
Rouge to commemorate the patriotic devotion
of the noble soldiers of the two parishes who
wore the grey and who with their immortal
leaders, crossed over the river, to ‘rest under
the trees.’” ix
Reconciliation did not extend to African
Americans. During the late-nineteenth
century segregation—“separate but equal”
accommodations for African Americans—
became the law of the land. In practice,
however, accommodations were rarely equal.
Segregation practices, frequently called Jim
Crow, extended to all aspects of life, including
education, and it was during this era that
Southern University was established in New
Orleans. African American political leaders,
including T. T. Allain, Henry Demas, and
former governor P. B. S. Pinchback, pushed
for a public post-secondary school for black
students in Louisiana. A political deal resulted
in the April 1880 legislative bill establishing
Southern University. A board of twelve
trustees, composed of black and white men,
ran the new institution. x
In March 1881, Southern opened in New
Orleans, serving primary and secondary
grades and offering a few college-level courses
and job-training classes. Unlike white
universities of the era, from the beginning the
faculty at Southern consisted of women and
men, both black and white. Female students
attended from the start. One of the first
students was Souboule Allain, the daughter of
board member and state senator T. T. Allain.
The 1890 Second Morrill Act, passed by the
U.S. Congress, paved the way for a state
college of agriculture and mechanics for
✧
Above: Leon Jastremski (left), Baton Rouge
mayor from 1876 to 1882, is shown here
after his term in office at the Railroad
Commission Office with Russ Newsom, L. F.
Shacarer, and Dupre Stonnard. Jastremski
later obtained a position as U.S. consul to
Peru and in 1904 ran unsuccessfully for
governor of Louisiana.
COURTESY OF THE LEON JASTREMSKI FAMILY PAPERS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Left: Mayor Jastremski’s second wife, Sallie
Land Ashton Jastremski, was the daughter
of Judge Thomas T. Land of Shreveport and
the widow of Major James H. Ashton. Noted
for intellect, independent thought, and
beauty, she published her writings in
magazines and newspapers under the pen
name Olive Otis.
COURTESY OF THE LEON JASTREMSKI FAMILY PAPERS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER II
27

✧
Above: In 1908 all hands aboard the
steamboat Star America prepared for a
Mardi Gras excursion cruise from Baton
Rouge. Some riverboat families spent their
entire lives working on ships like this.
COURTESY OF THE SOPHIE COOLEY PEARSON PAPERS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Baton Rouge’s Confederate soldier
monument, shown here in 1904, was
renovated and restored in time for the Civil
War Centennial. During renovations the
original stepped base was replaced by a red
brick base. In 1960 the American Legion
sponsored the Veterans’ Day rededication
ceremonies. The statue stands at the corner
of Third and North Streets.
IMAGE FROM “HISTORY OF THE CONFEDERATE MEMORIAL
ASSOCIATIONS OF THE SOUTH,” 1904. COURTESY OF THE
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
28
African Americans, and consequently
Southern was reorganized as a land-grant
institution. It remained in New Orleans, near
Tulane University, for two more decades. xi
By the turn of the century Louisiana had
temporarily rejected whole-scale corruption in
its government, but reform leaders shared their
predecessors’ views on racial and social issues.
Reflecting the prevailing opinions of the day,
the 1898 state constitution legalized severe
voting restrictions. The constitution’s goal—
ensuring that black and poor white citizens
would not have a say at the polls—was quickly
achieved. White men who had just silenced
their opposition legally, after having silenced
them for years through unlawful violence and
intimidation, ran state and local government.
The ultimate form of racial violence,
lynching, reached its zenith in the United
States around this time. Louisiana ranked
second in per capita lynchings, surpassed
only by Mississippi. Baton Rouge was not
immune: in August 1890 seventeen-year-old
William Alexander was lynched on Greenwell
Springs Road for alleged attempted rape.
Other episodes of racial violence occurred in
and around town, but as the New Orleans
Daily Picayune reported, “the citizens of Baton
Rouge are much wrought up over these acts of
violence, which they deprecate and condemn
in the strongest terms.” xii
Provisions in the 1898 constitution
suppressing African Americans ironically
helped end racial violence, since they
effectively removed threats to white control,
and within twenty years of the lynching, the
capital city became Southern University’s new
home. In 1909 legislators began discussing
the need for a centrally located public black
university, giving birth to the idea of moving
Southern. The proposal provoked controversy.
Straight University, a black private
school in New Orleans, was delighted at the
prospect of its competition leaving town. In
general, however, black New Orleanians
wanted to keep the school, while black people
in north Louisiana wanted the university
closer to them. In July 1912 Governor Luther
E. Hall signed a bill approving the move to
Baton Rouge. Part of the legislation radically
changed the make-up of the school by
mandating that only black people could teach
at the university and that only white people
could serve on the State Board of Education
(set to oversee Southern but not LSU). This
stipulation would have tragic consequences
sixty years later. xiii
With a move pending, the legislature
discontinued funding for the New Orleans
school, and more than 480 students and 14
unpaid faculty members struggled through
the 1912-13 academic year before closing
the facility. xiv

Choosing a site in Baton Rouge for a public
black university proved to be a challenge.
Some white property owners complained
about the decrease in property values, while
others questioned why black people needed
higher education at all. Eventually Scotland
farm, a beautiful spot on the bluffs of the
Mississippi River, became the school’s new
home. From the start finances were tight, and
the university had to turn away potential
students because it lacked buildings and the
money to erect them. Nevertheless, President
Joseph S. Clark reopened Southern on March
9, 1914, with seventy students. A year later
Clark instituted a Southern University tradition
that continues to this day: Founders’ Day,
March 9. The following year another tradition
began: the Jaguars played their first football
game in 1916. xv
One year after Southern’s opening in Baton
Rouge, it received a national stamp of
recognition: Booker T. Washington, influential
founder of the Tuskegee Institute and one of
the era’s most important African American
leaders, visited the university. At the invitation
of President Clark, Washington made a threeday
tour of Louisiana, arriving in Baton Rouge
early on the morning of April 15, 1915, to the
cheers of students and guests at the university.
After a talk and breakfast at Southern he made
a public appearance to a mixed-race audience
in downtown Baton Rouge. Washington’s visit
impressed the city. xvi
The university reached out to the
community when Clark started annual Farmers’
Conferences to serve local black farmers and to
raise Southern’s profile. Local and national
agriculturalists taught
planting and various
crops. George Washington
Carver, the brilliant agricultural
chemist best
known today for his work
with peanuts, spoke at
the conference in Baton
Rouge four times between
1917 and 1923. xvii
Additionally Southern
University made an
impact both locally and
statewide by housing the
State School for the Blind and Deaf for Blacks,
which opened in 1938. Baton Rouge had a
history of serving the state’s disabled through
the Asylum for the Deaf, Dumb, and Blind,
which educated white children. It split into
two schools in the 1880s: the School for the
Deaf and Dumb (which remained on St.
Ferdinand until 1977) and the School for the
Blind (which moved to its present-day
location at 1120 Government Street). The
institute for disabled black children similarly
split into two separate schools. In 1978 both
schools for the deaf were combined at a new
115-acre campus on Brightside Lane, south
of LSU.
All levels of public education in Baton
Rouge, from grade schools to universities, have
suffered from a lack of funding, but
occasionally even parochial education was
poorly financed. In 1891 the Brothers of the
✧
Above: Around 1857, John Knox built this
house on North Boulevard, which the state
purchased in 1887 to be Louisiana’s first
governor’s mansion. Shown here in 1915,
the mansion housed governors and their
families until 1929, when Huey Long razed
it. The building’s destruction provided the
excuse Long needed to build the new
governor’s mansion, which he moved into
the following year.
COURTESY OF THE CHARLES EAST PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: On April 15, 1915, Booker T.
Washington (front row, fourth from left),
visited Southern University. To his right is
Joseph S. Clark, president of Southern
University from 1913 to 1938. Clark
oversaw the college’s growth from fortyseven
students to more than three thousand.
COURTESY OF THE ARCHIVES DEPARTMENT, JOHN B. CADE
LIBRARY, SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY AND A&M COLLEGE.
CHAPTER II
29

✧
Above: Teachers at the Baton Rouge
Academy, around 1912 (from left to right):
Ms. Walker, Professor Curtis, Octavia
Head Clark, Emma Hempfield, and Joseph
S. Clark. At the time, Clark served as the
academy’s principal.
COURTESY OF THE CHARLES EAST PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Customers and employees paused
for a picture at the Brunswick Diner, near
the corner of Third and Laurel Streets,
ca. 1910.
COURTESY OF THE WILLIAM WALLACE GARIG FAMILY
PAPERS, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Sacred Heart, at the direction of the Father C.
Delacroix and the insistence of Mother Albina
of the Sisters of St. Joseph, opened a school for
boys that, due to poor accommodations and
little funding, closed after just one session.
Three years later, however, under Father J. M.
Laval, the Brothers established St. Vincent’s
Academy. They erected a one-story classroom
building and several other buildings at North
and Fifth streets. Brother Felix, first director of
St. Vincent’s Academy, improved the landscape
with flowers and fruit trees and taught in the
school, inspiring hundreds of young Baton
Rouge men.
By 1928, St. Vincent’s original wood-frame
buildings, some of which were thirty-five
years old, had deteriorated and could no
longer hold the growing number of students.
The Brothers of the Sacred Heart tore them
down and, under the direction of Father
Gassler, built a new facility near the same
location. The school then changed its name to
the Catholic High School for Boys. xviii
Catholic girls attended school at St.
Joseph’s Academy, established in 1868 by the
Sisters of St. Joseph of Medaille, though not
chartered by Louisiana until 1875. Some
private secular female academies continued to
operate, such as one on Florida Street run by
social worker Eleanor Laura McMain from the
1870s to the 1890s. Small groups of students
also attended various home schools.
In 1910 the Baton Rouge Academy, a school
for black boys and girls, was established.
Future Southern University president Joseph
Clark headed the school in its early years. The
McKinley High School, built in 1926 on what
is now Thomas H. Delpit Boulevard, replaced
the 1912 elementary and secondary school for
African American children on Perkins Road. xix
Though some Baton Rouge girls attended
grade school, like their counterparts across the
country, they were barred from public
universities. Private women’s colleges provided
education for those who could afford the
higher tuition. Slowly state schools nationwide
began to admit women, but LSU lagged
decades behind its counterparts in admitting
women to the “Ole War Skule.” In 1882 the
University of Mississippi first admitted
undergraduate women and hired its first
female faculty member in 1885. The
University of Alabama allowed women to
enroll in 1893. In 1881, LSU president
Thomas Boyd first brought up the idea of
admitting women, but it was not until 1904
that R. Olivia Davis, the first female student,
entered Louisiana State University. Davis, a
mathematics teacher at Baton Rouge High
School, took a calculus class and then
continued in the graduate program, earning
her masters’ degree in 1905. The following
year LSU admitted its first female undergraduate
students, 31 women, including 17
graduates of Baton Rouge High School. One
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
30

woman in the 1906 entering class, Louise
Garig, graduated in 1910 and taught English
at LSU for the rest of her life. Her sister,
Mercedes, was LSU’s first female instructor. xx
As they had struggled to be admitted to the
state’s public university, Louisiana women had
to fight to be active in politics. The 1879
constitution gave a small concession, the right
for women over twenty-one to be appointed
to school boards, but in reality few were
allowed to serve. xxi
Resourceful black and white women found
ways to influence society despite their
exclusion from politics. They organized
literary and social clubs, such as the Women’s
Club formed in 1892 by Julia Reddy and
others. They joined clubs for or against causes
like temperance and the lottery and sought to
improve daily living conditions for adults and
children alike. African American women at
Southern University formed a chapter of the
Women’s Christian Temperance League.
For many, membership in these clubs—
and the camaraderie and training that went
with it—led women to join the fight for
suffrage. Since 1848 women in the United
States had sought the right to vote on an equal
basis as men, and from 1878 until 1919 a
constitutional amendment had been proposed
in every session of Congress.
While some men and women opposed
women’s suffrage in any form, women’s groups
in every state sought to influence their
legislators to ratify the amendment. In 1913,
Mattie Singletary of Baton Rouge founded the
first formal organization in Louisiana, the State
Equal Suffrage League. Before
the year’s end more than two
hundred women had joined.
Among other accomplishments,
league members saw
the addition of a women’s
section to the Baton Rouge
State-Times. The league
sponsored suffrage debates
and essays and gave prizes to
school children who presented
strong arguments. They
also showcased their platform
through the Better Baby
Shows at the Baton Rouge fair,
where they offered a variety of household items
and information about the health and care of
children. xxii
In Louisiana and other states, however,
women favoring states’ rights—and extending
the franchise to white women only—
organized against the ratification of the federal
constitutional amendment, which covered all
women, regardless of race. In Baton Rouge
Anne Pleasant, wife of Governor Ruffin G.
Pleasant, led the Anti-Federal League, a group
comprised of more than 130 members who
sought to advance a state suffrage amendment.
Similarly, Governor Pleasant and feminist Kate
Gordon backed white women’s suffrage but
not the federal amendment.
In June 1920 the Louisiana House of
Representatives passed the state amendment,
but the Senate vetoed both the state and the
federal amendments. Like other men fearing
the loss of political control, anti-suffrage state
✧
Above: When LSU occupied the Pentagon
Barracks, a community of university
professors, families, and students thrived in
Spanish Town as the original lots were
subdivided. Around 1920 Louise and
Mercedes Garig, among the first women
undergraduates and instructors at LSU,
rested with friends on their porch at
University Walk. Their father, William
Garig, served on the Board of Supervisors
and donated funds to build the downtown
campus’s Garig Hall.
COURTESY OF THE WILLIAM WALLACE GARIG FAMILY
PAPERS, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Nurses at Baton Rouge General
Hospital posed on the steps at one of
the medical center’s two Government
Street locations.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
CHAPTER II
31

✧
Above: The Pentagon Barracks, erected in
1824, played a major role in the history of
Baton Rouge. The barracks served as a
military base until 1879, when the complex
became the home of Louisiana State
University. In May 1897, as shown here,
floodwaters reached almost to the barracks.
After LSU moved to its current location, the
barracks served as apartments, state offices,
and a museum.
COURTESY OF THE LEROY S. BOYD PAPERS, POSTCARD
ALBUM, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: In 1926 parish schoolchildren
gathered on the grounds of the Baton Rouge
High School, which was built one year
earlier at 2825 Government Street.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA STATE ARCHIVES AND THE
STATE LIBRARY OF LOUISIANA.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
32
senator E. L. Simmons thought approving the
state amendment would allow women to vote
to approve the federal amendment. To those
who assumed black women could be kept
from the polls in the same way black men
were, Simmons said: “History fails to record
where a man has ever really controlled any
woman yet, regardless of her race.” xxiii
On the night of August 18, 1920, when the
federal suffrage amendment became law, a
victory celebration took place in Baton Rouge
on North Boulevard near City Hall. Suffragists
paraded in cars around the city, triumphantly
waving the banners they had held during the
state legislative session. xxiv
More clubs formed in town after the passage
of the amendment. Women representing a
variety of groups—Music Club, Study Club,
Rest Room League, Jewish Reading Club, local
chapters of the United Daughters of the
Confederacy, Charity Ward Association, and
the Housewives League—chose to work
together to establish the Women’s Club and
obtain a meeting site for all the clubs to use. In
1921 the combined forces of the organizations,
led by Women’s Club President Virginia
Wilkinson Tucker, raised funds to purchase the
Christian Church building on East Boulevard.
The club started a weekly newspaper, The
Women’s Enterprise, and the Women’s Club
quickly became a popular gathering spot as
well as a strong influence on cultural activities
in Baton Rouge. A new building, erected in
1941 at 259 East Boulevard, was later saved
from destruction through the help of donations
from the Pennington family and others. xxv
The downtown region grew during this
era. Catfish Town consisted of seven blocks of
warehouses holding cotton, lumber, and other
products for shipment on the Mississippi
River. Much of the city’s African American
population lived in this district. Baton Rouge’s
earliest neighborhoods, Beauregard Town and
Spanish Town, remained prominent parts of
the city. Although modern-day Beauregard
Town boasts houses built at its founding,
most homes in Spanish Town were destroyed
during the Civil War. Black or poor white
families occupied the few remaining houses.
Rebuilding in Spanish Town began slowly but
boomed in 1887 when LSU moved into the
former U.S. Army garrison next door. Most of
the buildings standing in Spanish Town today
were built between 1885 and 1925. xxvi
Part of an old plantation became available
for housing in the early twentieth century.
Robert A. Hart, Baton Rouge mayor from
1898 to 1902, purchased Magnolia Mound
the year he left office. Over the next decades
he subdivided the land until by 1929 only 75

of the original 800 acres were left. The main
house deteriorated while Hart lived in a
smaller building (now called the Hart House)
he erected on Iowa Street. His niece, Marie
Blanche Duncan, purchased the estate in
1929 and sold off more land, including what
became the Magnolia Terrace subdivision. In
the 1950s Duncan undertook renovations of
the plantation house, installing electricity and
adding indoor bathrooms, but by the 1960s
the house was uninhabited and neglected.
When developers threatened the plantation
house to make way for apartments, local
residents joined together to save it. xxvii
While the city grew and education
improved somewhat, yellow fever and
flooding remained threats to the safety and
health of the city’s residents. A yellow fever
epidemic broke out in 1878, when between
August and November 236 people died from
the fever in Baton Rouge and more than 4,000
died in New Orleans. It was the worst
outbreak since 1853, when 202 Baton Rouge
residents died. xxviii
Eighteen years passed before another severe
outbreak of the disease, and some thought
yellow jack had been conquered. Nevertheless
an 1897 epidemic killed nearly three hundred
people in New Orleans. At the first sign of
trouble in the Crescent City, the Baton Rouge
city council met to decide how to proceed.
Tempers flared, and members of the council
argued violently. The Weekly Advocate noted
that the council “has thoroughly demonstrated
that it is utterly incompetent to manage affairs
in a crisis such as we have been undergoing.” xxix
But the city went on full alert to halt the
disease, enforcing a quarantine against people
and freight. Volunteer squads manned fifteen
picket posts around the city, at various entry
points, including the steamboat and ferry
landings and on Perkins and Clay Cut Roads.
LSU delayed the start of classes. As during
other outbreaks, the city was tense with
residents trapped between the desire to flee
and the civic duty to stay and see the city
through the crisis. Perhaps because of the
vigilance of the townspeople, Baton Rouge
lost few if any people during the outbreak. xxx
The precursor to the Baton Rouge General
Medical Center opened soon afterward. In
1900 a train wreck on the Yazoo &
Mississippi Valley Railroad left two passengers
severely injured, and Dr. Thomas Puller
Singletary cared for them at a building at the
corner of Florida and Church Streets. He
realized that doctors could better treat
patients if they were brought to one location,
and in 1908 Singletary opened the Baton
Rouge Sanitarium in a new three-story
✧
Above: Tent camps housed flood refugees,
most of whom were African American, near
Catfish Town in 1912.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
Below: Industrial development began in
Baton Rouge in 1909 when Standard Oil
established a plant north of downtown on
Choctaw Drive. Deep water navigation on
the Mississippi made Baton Rouge an
attractive choice. Work at the plant, shown
here in 1927, caused the river city’s
population to increase to thirty-one
thousand by 1930.
FROM LOUISIANA: THE GATES AJAR (BATON ROUGE, 1928),
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF
AGRICULTURE AND IMMIGRATION.
Bottom, left: In the late nineteenth century
Baton Rouge set up picket posts to keep
people with yellow fever out of the town.
COURTESY OF THE JOSEPH ST. CLAIR FAVROT FAMILY
PAPERS, LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER II
33

✧
Above: In 1917, World War I soldiers
enjoyed watermelon donated by Baton
Rouge residents beside the Old State
Capitol. They likely were on their way from
Alexandria’s Camp Beauregard, which
opened in 1917 to train soldiers, to New
Orleans to be sent overseas.
COURTESY OF THE CHARLES EAST PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Victory Park, commemorating the
sacrifices of World War I, featured gardens,
a pergola, a memorial fountain, reflecting
pool, bandstand, swimming pool, and
bathhouse, which is in the far right of this
1927 photograph. Florida Street is in the
foreground. In 1932 a portion of the park
was sacrificed for a post office and
courthouse. Interstate 110 chopped off the
eastern portion, and in 1993 the Russell B.
Long Federal Building and Courthouse was
built on the remaining land.
FROM BATON ROUGE, LOUISIANA, USA (BATON ROUGE, 1927).
Opposite, top: LSU and Tulane University
started a historic football rivalry in 1893.
The game winner took “The Rag,” a flag
bearing the colors of both schools and the
state seal. After seventy-six consecutive
games the series ended in 1994, but a tengame
series was rekindled in 2006 at Tiger
Stadium, thanks to the addition of a twelfth
game to the college football season. Before
World War II, Baton Rouge celebrated the
LSU-Tulane game day with a parade on
Third Street.
COURTESY OF THE CHARLES EAST PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
building on Florida Boulevard. The top floor
was rented to the Charity Ward Association.
The sanitarium grew quickly and moved in
1923 to a larger building at the corner of East
Boulevard and Government Street. The same
year Our Lady of the Lake Hospital opened
across from the LSU campus on University
Lake. In 1927 the Baton Rouge General
Hospital moved to a second location on
Government Street, and in 1950 the
institution moved to Florida Boulevard. xxxi
In May 1897, floodwaters from the river
broke through the levee at Baton Rouge,
sending water almost up to the Pentagon
Barracks. Although damage was minor,
concern about a major flood led local citizens,
the city council, and the Yazoo & Mississippi
Valley Railroad to contribute to the
reinforcement and maintenance of the Baton
Rouge levees. Despite the worry, a local
newspaper editor pointed out that if a major
break were to occur, only a “comparatively
small portion” of the city would be flooded.
He was wrong. xxxii
In 1912 a huge flood hit. The Mississippi
overflowed its banks, broke through the
levees, and submerged Catfish Town. In
addition to its own displaced residents, Baton
Rouge had to house hundreds of refugees who
streamed into the city. The flood affected a
large portion of the Mississippi Valley.
The deluge and aftermath presaged the
great Mississippi River flood of 1927, which
caused little damage to Baton Rouge but
covered land in Louisiana and Mississippi to
the north and south of the city. Baton Rouge
again helped its neighbors in a variety of
ways. Herbert Hoover appointed Southern
University’s President Clark as assistant
reconstruction officer in the aftermath of the
flood. Hoover, who at the time was President
Calvin Coolidge’s secretary of commerce,
visited Baton Rouge on his tour to survey the
damage. Local clubs volunteered assistance,
and the Red Cross treated more than ten
thousand evacuees at a Baton Rouge camp. xxxiii
In the early part of the twentieth century,
big industry arrived in town. The Standard
Oil Company of Louisiana, part of the New
Jersey Standard Oil corporation, built an
expansive refinery on 225 acres of cotton
fields just north of Baton Rouge. When it
opened in November 1909, the plant
employed 700 workers and could process
1,800 barrels of crude oil per day. xxxiv
Standard Oil also built a pipeline to move
oil between Baton Rouge and Arkansas, where
another pipeline connected to oilfields in
Oklahoma. The company hired skilled labor
from out-of-state to build the refinery and
pipeline, and local jobs went mainly to
unskilled laborers. Within two years Standard
Oil controlled the state’s transportation of oil
as well as its refinement; in Texas, by contrast,
local independent oilmen produced oil, with
profits benefiting the local communities.
Louisiana’s wealthy elite made deals with the
New Jersey company, enriching themselves
rather than providing new benefits for
Louisianians. Nevertheless, by 1920 the
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
34

efinery employed three thousand men, and
oil was shipped from Baton Rouge to nearly
every country in the world. xxxv
The arrival of Standard Oil brought an
influx of residents to Baton Rouge, and the
population increased dramatically, through
slow but steady growth, from just under
15,000 in 1910 to nearly 22,000 in 1920.
New residential developments, such as the
Garden District, Roseland Terrace, Drehr
Place, and Kleinert Terrace sprang up to fill
the housing needs. The new homes varied in
styles and sizes, from shotgun houses to
Craftsman bungalows, and from Colonial
Revival houses to English cottages. xxxvi
As the city grew, people settled along
economic rather than ethnic lines. For example,
Italians, Cajuns, whites, and East Asians often
lived together in a neighborhood. On the other
hand, African Americans remained segregated
in Scotlandville (an independent city), Eden
Park, and Old South Baton Rouge, the area
between LSU and downtown. Many Southern
University faculty members moved into a
subdivision that developed near the school
in Scotlandville. xxxvii
When World War I erupted in Europe
in 1914, the United States assumed a role of
neutrality that lasted until April 1917, when at
President Woodrow Wilson’s request Congress
declared war on the German government.
Eventually 2,000,000 American soldiers went
overseas, including approxi-mately 1,500
from Louisiana who lost their lives in service
to their country. More than thirty LSU
students and alumni died. An armistice ended
the fighting in November 1918, and the war
was formally ended in June 1919 with the
signing of the Treaty of Versailles. xxxviii
Memorialization of World War I soldiers
came faster than the erection of the
Confederate monument, which was not
completed until twenty-five years after the
Civil War. In 1919, townspeople voted to fund
a new park dedicated to the memory of World
War veterans, and the eight-acre Victory Park
was built on the remains of the former state
penitentiary between Laurel and Florida
streets. In 1926 the Community Club Pavilion,
with seating for two thousand, became part of
the park as well. Victory Park was popular
with white residents, who enjoyed recreation,
picnics, concerts, and dances. xxxix
Heralding great changes for the city, in
1918, LSU’s president Thomas Boyd
purchased Gartness Plantation as the
university’s future site. In 1920 the university’s
further development was assured as John M.
Parker became governor and pledged to build
up LSU, particularly the agricultural program.
Under Parker’s leadership the legislature taxed
unrefined natural resources sent out of state
for processing and dedicated a significant
amount of the revenue to the university. LSU
✧
Below: Starting in 1925 LSU moved from
the downtown campus to its spacious new
accommodations on the old Gartness
Plantation on Highland Road.
COURTESY OF THE LSU PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, RG A
5000, UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER II
35

✧
Above: Annual firemen’s parades, held on
Washington’s Birthday (February 22) from
around 1870 to 1914, were a favorite event
for the capital city, celebrated more lavishly
than Mardi Gras. During the early 1900s
this float stopped in front of the home of
Julius Weis at 313 Fifth Street.
COURTESY OF THE ANDREW D. LYTLE COLLECTION,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Funded by public bonds in 1923,
City Park originally included a large
swimming pool with a clubhouse, a baseball
stadium, a zoo, and a merry-go-round.
COURTESY OF PEGGY DUERR.
purchased more land, including parts of the
Arlington and Nestledown plantations, and
broke ground for the new campus in 1922.
The layout followed a plan envisioned by
Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., the famed
architect who, with his firm, designed more
than 250 public parks and 60 university
campuses. Individual buildings were designed
by architect Theodore C. Link, known for the
Union Station in St. Louis. xl
On Thanksgiving Day in 1924 the newly
constructed Tiger Stadium hosted its first
football game when LSU played its rival,
Tulane. Perhaps distracted by the new setting,
the Tigers lost that day, but they went on to
have many winning days, and indeed, to win
the national championship in 1958 and 2003.
The chimes of the Memorial Tower, built in
honor of LSU students and alumni killed in
World War I, rang publicly for the first time
on that same November day. xli
Campus construction proceeded fitfully,
as contractors and funding came and went,
but students attended classes at the new
campus starting in the 1925-26 school year.
The campus was formally dedicated on
April 30, 1926. The celebration lasted three
days, with games, concerts, and a big
barbecue. It was not until 1932 that the
university was completely moved from the
north end of Third Street and firmly situated
on the new campus. xlii
In the early days of the twentieth century,
Baton Rouge celebrated multi-day Port
Pageants and Homecoming Celebrations in
addition to the yearly fireman’s parade. In
April 1923 local author and politician Joseph
St. Clair Favrot wrote and directed the seventh
historical pageant, which included a nineteenfloat
parade and a musical program depicting
scenes from the city’s past, present, and
“Golden Future.” Two bands performed: the
LSU band, under conductor F. T. Guilbeau,
and the “Stanacola” Standard Oil Band, under
conductor J. E. Snee. xliii
Golfers played either at the exclusive Baton
Rouge Country Club or out of town until City
Park Golf Course opened in 1926. The 9-hole,
25-acre public course, encompassed by
Perkins Road, Dalrymple Drive, and Lakeshore
Drive, was formerly part of Richmond
Plantation. American golf course designer Tom
Bendelow laid out the course, and local
horticulturist Steele Burden landscaped it. City
Park, which was funded by public bonds in
1923, also included a large swimming pool
with a clubhouse, a baseball stadium, a zoo,
and a merry-go-round, now gone. The site is
on the National Register of Historic Places, a
victory for Baton Rouge preservationists. xliv
With Standard Oil, the arrival of Southern
University, and a new campus for Louisiana
State University, Baton Rouge was poised for
growth. A boom in construction yielded a
new parish court house, which Edward F.
Neild and Clarence E. Olschner designed. It
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
36

was completed in 1922 at 215 St. Louis
Street. In 1913, Joseph K. Roumain erected
the twelve-story Roumain Building, Baton
Rouge’s first “skyscraper,” at 343 Third Street.
A new office building went up in 1922: the
Triad Building, later the Taylor Building, at
Florida and Third. The 1924 fire station at
417 Laurel Street was later renamed after fire
chief Robert A. Bogan. xlv
Transportation options increased in 1924
when a new ferryboat began operation. The
George H. Walker carried trains, passengers,
and freight across the Mississippi at Baton
Rouge. Two other ferries, The City of Baton
Rouge and Louisiana, served cars and
passengers. They docked at the foot of North
Street and operated between Baton Rouge and
Port Allen until 1968. In 1925 the Yazoo &
Mississippi Valley Railroad Company erected
a red brick stationhouse between the railroad
tracks and the levee, across River Road from
the capitol. It served passengers until 1971.
Infrastructure improved, thanks in part to
Mayor Hart, who modernized the city during
his turn-of-the-century term by issuing bonds
to raise money to build schools and improve
roads. Bond sales paid for the paving of
city streets, the building of a white high
school and a black public school, and
improving sewers and drains. As a result, by
1920 more than 17 miles of paved and hardsurfaced
roads crisscrossed the city, and 28
miles of sewer lines served its residents. xlvi
By 1926 the population had increased to
forty-five thousand residents. That September
the Baton Rouge Municipal Dock, completed at
a cost of $550,000, was erected on the east bank
of the Mississippi, near the current I-10 bridge.
Previously offloading was done by hand, and
during flood season the river level rose and fell
dramatically, sometimes as much as forty-seven
feet, making for difficult work. This deepwater
port enabled ocean-going vessels to offload
heavy cargo onto barges for upriver transport or
to rail cars for inland shipment.
The movie industry first came to Baton
Rouge in 1926 for the filming of Uncle Tom’s
Cabin, a silent film that starred Marguerita
Fisher as Eliza and James B. Lowe as Uncle
Tom. It was one of Hollywood’s first movies to
use a mix of black and white actors. Some two
hundred Baton Rouge citizens served as extras
in the film. xlvii
A new downtown building opened in 1927:
the ten-story Hotel Heidelberg, at 201
Lafayette Street. The luxurious hotel, designed
by Edward F. Neild of Shreveport, replaced the
Istrouma Hotel at Third and Florida and the
Louisian Hotel at Lafayette and Main as the
premier downtown hotel. The latter two
were later demolished, but the Heidelberg
remains, and still sits across Lafayette Street
from the Hotel King, which opened in 1928.
When the Heidelberg was renovated and
expanded in 1957, its name was changed to
the Capitol House Hotel, and the Hotel King
was renamed the Heidelberg. The Capitol
House continued to operate until the
1980s, but in 1973 the Hotel King/
Heidelberg was converted into offices.
After a two-decade hiatus, the Capitol
House reopened as the Hilton Baton
Rouge Capitol Center in 2006. xlviii
The Hotel Heidelberg symbolized
power in the life of the city and the state
over the next several decades. Both Huey
Long and his brother, Earl Long, used the
hotel bar as an unofficial office, and Huey
wrote Every Man a King in his suite at
the Heidelberg. xlix
Although Baton Rouge had experienced
remarkable economic development,
Louisiana as a whole lagged behind the
rest of the nation in such areas as
education and income, and it still faced
the challenge of racial segregation.
✧
Above: In addition to riding the ferry
east and west between Baton Rouge and
Port Allen, travelers could catch
northbound or southbound trains at the
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad
passenger station.
FROM “PICTORIAL REVIEW OF BATON ROUGE, LA,” D. W.
THOMAS, P. 36 (BATON ROUGE: 1921).
Below: Built in 1927 the Hotel Heidelberg
(later Capitol House Hotel) sits between
River Road and Convention Streets and
Lafayette and Florida Streets. The Roy
Heidelburg hotel chain owned Baton Rouge’s
King, Heidelberg, and Istrouma Hotels.
COURTESY OF JIM AND CAROLYN BENNETT.
CHAPTER II
37

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
38

CHAPTER III
R EINVENTING G OVERNMENT: HUEY L ONG AND
THE G REAT D EPRESSION, 1928-1940
Life in Baton Rouge and Louisiana changed forever when thirty-four-year-old Huey P. Long
entered the statehouse. Long took his seat as governor on May 21, 1928, and he overshadowed all
others during his seven-year romp through Louisiana.
Long’s inauguration, attended by more than fifteen thousand people from all over the state,
kicked off the political tempest with a ball at the new Heidelberg Hotel. Throughout his years in
office the Kingfish frequently spent nights at his suite on the seventh floor, just steps away from
the room of his personal secretary, Alice Lee Grosjean. For the most part his wife, Rose McConnell
Long, kept their three children—Rose, Russell, and Palmer—at the family home in Shreveport.
Occasionally they traveled to the capital city for special events. i
The Kingfish held no love for Baton Rougeans, who had not supported Long in the election. He
did not hesitate to follow the advice of the poor, rural voters: “stick it to them.” Long sought to
dominate the neighborhood—and its disdainful residents—with a grand new mansion. When he
learned the seventy-year-old governor’s home had termites, he hired convict labor to tear it down.
The antique furniture and china that had served Louisiana’s governors for decades were never
recovered. Suddenly lacking a mansion for their governor, the Louisiana legislature had no choice
but to allow Long to erect a new one. He commissioned the New Orleans firm of Weiss, Dreyfous,
and Seiferth to supervise construction. Long’s new home looked suspiciously like the White House
in Washington, D.C., giving rise to early speculation that Long had designs on the presidency—
which, of course, he did. ii
The 1929 stock market crash initially hit more prosperous states harder than Louisiana. Baton
Rougeans, relatively flush from economic growth and development in the 1920s, raised funds for
such local and national charities as the Red Cross, the Catholic Orphanage, the Protestant
Orphanage, the Salvation Army, and the Blundon Orphanage for Colored Children.
Nevertheless, the Great Depression soon affected the Pelican State. By 1930, when the
population of East Baton Rouge parish stood at sixty-eight thousand, the Depression threatened
businesses, closed factories, and put thousands out of work in the capital city. The early 1930s
proved difficult for local residents, but several New Deal construction projects provided some
employment. In June 1931 the new Municipal Airport opened at the east end of Government
Street. The same year, the Civil Works Administration proposed building a combined highway and
railroad bridge over the Mississippi River north of the city. Work began in 1932, employing some
1,450 men, and was completed in 1940 at a cost of $10 million. iii
In 1932 the Federal government appropriated land at Victory Park for a new U.S. Post Office and
Courthouse. New Orleanian Moise Goldstein designed and built the structure that still stands at 707
Florida Street. In exchange for part of the park, the government donated to the city the old U.S. Post
Office and Courthouse, at 355 North Boulevard, which became City Hall. Local government offices
were housed there until 1957. The building became home to the City Club of Baton Rouge. iv
In response to the Great Depression the governor hired thousands of loyal state employees to
fill newly created jobs. Long arranged a “deduct”: each employee was required to kick back a
percentage of his or her salary to the administration each month. These extorted funds went to the
governor, and state jobs were coveted as steady income during trying times. Long also raised taxes
on such goods and services as gasoline, soft drinks, insurance, and electricity. v
More jobs and more people came to Baton Rouge when in November 1938 the Ethyl Gasoline
Corporation built a new plant to produce tetraethyl lead, a chemical compound developed in 1922
that reduces engine knock when added to gasoline. vi
✧
In 1940, rare snow covered the grounds at
the new capitol, which was completed in
1932. Fonville Winans leaned out of the
small airplane he was flying to take
this photograph.
COURTESY OF THE RICHARD W. LECHE PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER III
39

✧
Above: Huey Long is shown here around
1930, exiting a voting booth.
COURTESY OF THE HUEY P. LONG ALBUM, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Top, right: On September 12, 1935,
approximately 175,000 people—more than
double the population of Baton Rouge—
attended Huey Long’s funeral. His casket
was buried in the sunken gardens in front of
the capitol.
COURTESY OF THE RUSSELL B. LONG PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
40
In 1931 and 1932 the governor provided
more construction jobs when he chose to
erect a new state capitol, the tallest in the
nation. For Long, newer was always better,
and a project on the grand scale he envisioned
would employ workers and satisfy his desire
for a permanent mark on state government.
LSU’s move away from the Pentagon Barracks
resulted in the availability of prime real estate
downtown. In order to provide enough space
for the colossal new capitol building and its
grounds, Long demolished old LSU buildings
and scooped away graves of some two
hundred early residents buried in the old
army post cemetery. Only the Pentagon
Barracks, the Old Arsenal, and one Indian
mound survived the demolition.
The George A. Fuller Company of Washington,
D.C., known for its work on the
Lincoln Memorial, built the skyscraper. The
structure stands 450 feet high, fulfilling the
governor’s wish, and it was built in just
fourteen months at a cost of $5 million. Inside,
the capitol contains nearly six acres of floor
space. It stands as a glorious monument to Art
Deco design and to the hubris of Huey Long.
Artwork decorates the edifice and the interior,
and twenty-seven landscaped acres surround
the building. vii
Long would have been pleased to tear down
the old capitol, but local preservationists,
including Virginia Wilkinson “Virgie” Tucker
and Ethel Claiborne “Puffy” Dameron, stopped
his plans. The women sat on the steps of the
capitol and declared, “Over our dead bodies
will you tear down this building!” The capitol
was saved. viii
The Kingfish’s policies differed from those of
any previous governor. He made education a
top priority, giving textbooks to schoolchildren
in public and parochial schools and increasing
funding to LSU. He kicked off a tremendous
road-building program that resulted in
thousands of miles of newly paved, asphalt,
and gravel roads. He cultivated the idea of
popular rule, tearing down the elite power
structure that had traditionally run the state.
He removed the poll tax, which had kept some
poor white citizens from voting, and instituted
the homestead exemption, a measure that
relieves poorer Louisianians from paying any
property taxes and ensures low property taxes
for all homeowners. Although Long portrayed
himself as a friend of the common man and a
big-business buster, his seizure of absolute
power in Louisiana made him the closest thing
to a dictator the United States has ever known. ix
Personally the Kingfish was both charming
and rude. While wooing the masses he kept his
subordinates in line through curses, insults, and
derogatory nicknames. He became known for
outrageous acts: he once received a German
naval commander while wearing silk pajamas
and he later met a U.S. major general and his
staff while dressed in a one-piece underwear
suit. Stories of his legendary antics abound. x
Even though residents of Baton Rouge, New
Orleans, and Shreveport voted against him, in
1930 the Kingfish won election as a U.S.
senator. He remained governor until January
1932, thwarting his lieutenant governor, Paul
Cyr, from taking the top post, and ensuring the
election of successor Oscar K. “O.K.” Allen.
Long strode off to take his seat in Washington
but dictated instructions to the new governor,
thereby gaining far more power. Becoming
senator was a step toward increasing his national
reputation, as Long sought to challenge Franklin
D. Roosevelt in the 1936 presidential election.
Over the next few years he became ever
more ruthless and powerful. Both as governor
and senator, Long ruled absolutely in
Louisiana, taking charge of all areas of
government and earning for himself and his
policies the disdain of many middle- and
upper-class citizens, mainly concentrated in

the cities. His opponents were his enemies,
and he sought to suppress them.
Focused on breaking away from the conservative
establishment, Long’s policies stirred
political activists to rally against him. In 1929
he was impeached, but not convicted, while
attempting to run a bill through the legislature
to increase taxes on Standard Oil. In
December 1934, after strengthening his forces,
Long hid the tax in a last-minute amendment
that was passed by a legislature packed with
his supporters. Consequently, Standard Oil cut
hundreds of jobs. Thus, Long was able to
strike blows against both Standard Oil and
Baton Rouge. xi
In early January 1935, while Long secretly
negotiated a tax reduction agreement with
Standard Oil, frustrated Baton Rougeans met to
discuss the company’s mass firings and
spontaneously formed the Square Deal
Association to fight back. It included all sorts,
from former governors to fired Standard Oil
workers. Mildred Roussel organized and led a
women’s division. Other chapters of Square
Dealers sprang up around the state, with
members sharing one agenda: how to get rid of
Huey Long. xii
Long planted Sidney Songey, a spy, in the
association to keep track of the talk of revolt and
assassination. On January 25, 1935, after Long
fired all 225 state workers in East Baton Rouge
Parish—another tactic to subdue the capital
city—and the Square Dealers learned that a
member had been arrested, the organization
launched an armed revolt and took control of
the courthouse. At Long’s request Governor
Allen declared martial law in the parish and
called out the National Guard. Around midnight
when they heard of their fellow Square Dealer’s
release, the group relinquished the building.
They did not realize that the man in question
was Songey, who told stories of a sensational
plot to kill the Kingfish, impugning seven
prominent Baton Rouge men. xiii
As hundreds of guardsmen arrived in the
city to enforce martial law, some one hundred
Square Deal leaders met at the airport. Many
later said they were lured to the airport by a
phone call. They met five hundred guardsmen,
who threw tear-gas bombs until most
surrendered. A few escaped. A second crowd
of citizens, protesting the actions that had just
occurred, was also hit with tear gas. Only one
person was seriously hurt, a Square Dealer hit
by one of his own men in the confusion. xiv
Martial law was in force in the parish until
July. It was unlawful for crowds (of two or more)
to gather; for firearms to be carried, bought, or
sold; and for anything critical to be published
about any state official, directly curtailing the
publication of the Manship family’s newspapers,
the Advocate and the State-Times. Around this
time Long undertook the writing and publication
of a book explaining his plans for the
presidency: My First Days in the White House.
Long coveted the executive office. xv
On September 8, 1935, the Kingfish’s
aspirations came to an abrupt end when he was
shot in the new capitol, it is generally believed,
by Carl Austin Weiss, a local ear, nose, and
throat surgeon. Long’s bodyguards started
shooting, killing Weiss, and possibly hitting
Long. The course of events is still disputed. To
many around the state and in Baton Rouge,
Weiss was a hero, and his funeral was well
✧
Above: Governors and their families occupied
the two-story mansion at 502 North
Boulevard, starting with Huey Long in 1930
and ending in 1963, when Jimmie Davis took
up residence at the city’s third gubernatorial
mansion at 1001 Capitol Access Road. In the
1960s the mansion housed the Louisiana Art
and Science Museum, and in the 1970s it
opened as a historic house museum. Today
the mansion serves as headquarters for the
Foundation for Historical Louisiana.
COURTESY OF PEGGY DUERR.
Below: The Municipal Airport, shown here
in 1932, provided air service until the
military’s Harding Field airport (later the
Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport) opened
in 1948 to civilian air traffic. The library at
Goodwood Boulevard and Independence
Park sits on the airport’s old runways.
COURTESY OF “GREATER BATON ROUGE PHOTOGRAPHS,”
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER III
41

✧
Above: City National Bank President Wade
H. Bynum (1868-1946) served as mayor of
Baton Rouge from 1903 to 1910 and again
from 1923 to 1940, leading the city through
both a time of expansion and the Great
Depression. His wife, Belle Hart Bynum,
was the daughter of former mayor Robert
Hart and a well-known civic leader in her
own right.
FROM MARK T. CARLETON, RIVER CAPITAL: AN
ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF BATON ROUGE (AMERICAN
HISTORICAL PRESS, 1996).
Below: In August 1940 the Highway 190
bridge across the Mississippi opened to trains
and vehicles. The 108th Cavalry of New
Orleans was first to cross the $10-million
bridge. At the dedication ceremonies Baton
Rougeans enjoyed an airshow and a concert
by the Standard Oil “Stanacola” band.
COURTESY OF THE RICHARD W. LECHE PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
42
attended by many prominent Louisianians.
Long, in great pain, lived for thirty hours after
he was shot before succumbing to his wounds.
On September 10 he died at Our Lady of the
Lake Hospital. On September 12, 1935,
approximately 175,000 people—more than
double the population of Baton Rouge—
attended Huey Long’s funeral. His casket
was buried in the sunken gardens in front of
the capitol.
A variety of changes came to LSU while
Huey Long was in power. In the early 1930s,
Long built dormitories at Tiger Stadium,
providing new seats for football games and
new housing for students. In 1931 he
influenced the appointment of LSU President
James Monroe Smith, who later was convicted
of embezzling university funds. By 1932,
Louisiana spent more than $24 million on
buildings for the new LSU campus, which had
grown to 3,000 acres. In 1935 the university
awarded the first doctoral degree in the state. xvi
Long also directly influenced a renaissance at
LSU. Although he was never an LSU student—
he had been accepted and won a scholarship in
1909 but could not afford the other expenses—
Long embraced the institution, nurtured it, and,
through his usual manipulation of the state
legislature and funding, ensured its growth
despite the Depression. “If there’s any title I’m
proud of, it’s Chief Thief for L.S.U.,” Long
boasted. In November 1930, Long started to
take charge of the Board of Supervisors,
eventually stacking the group with men loyal to
him. He established a student aid fund, a
forerunner of today’s TOPS scholarships, to
provide tuition and living expenses. xvii
LSU needed the financial assistance. Dorm
space was scarce, and the beginning of the fall
semester saw hundreds of LSU students
camped out in tents borrowed from the U.S.
army. Various structures were erected, including
the Music and Dramatic Arts building and the
Huey P. Long Field House, with a swimming
pool and other athletic facilities. In 1931 Long
started the LSU medical school in New Orleans.
The landscape changed when in 1934 the East
Baton Rouge Parish Police Jury gained federal
funds to drain a swamp near campus and create
University Lake near City Park Lake, which had
been built in the 1920s. xviii
Although the Kingfish mainly focused on
the football team and the marching band, he
meddled in academic matters as well. The
governor’s aid came at the price of academic
freedom—particularly for those who published
their opinions against him. Long ordered the
destruction of an issue of the student newspaper,
the Reveille, that criticized him for
anointing a student as state senator. The
student editor, Jesse H. Cutrer, snuck out two
copies in his pants. LSU president Smith
censored the newspaper and expelled seven
students, including Cutrer, who all went on to
earn degrees at the University of Missouri
Journalism School. Other students protested,
even going so far as to hang the president in
effigy and call him “James Moron Smith.” xix
Insisting that Louisiana would be the
greatest state in the nation, Long wanted its
flagship university to be the best as well. He
told the dean of the graduate school that money
was no object: LSU should pay higher salaries
than other institutions. Because of the country’s
economic straits, most universities and colleges
were laying off professors, putting LSU at a
distinct advantage for hiring outstanding
scholars. LSU employed European refugees and
northern and midwestern faculty, ushering in a
new era of intellectual stimulation on campus.
As a result, in 1935 three institutions were
born: the literary journal Southern Review, the
Journal of Southern History, and the LSU Press.
All became known internationally for
publishing outstanding scholarship.
The Southern Review’s founding editors,
Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren,
published twenty-eight issues between 1935

and 1942. With a reputation for excellence and
worldwide admiration, the journal was
supported by President Smith. After he left
campus the Southern Review was caught up in
the turmoil of reform and budget cutbacks, and
despite protests from around the nation,
funding ceased. Warren resigned and moved
north, and a few years later so did Brooks.
Although both wrote many books, Warren is
best known for his novel All the King’s Men,
loosely based on the life of Huey Long. The
book won the Pulitzer Prize in 1947 and was
turned into a movie, released in 1949, that won
three Oscars. Another cinematic version of the
book, filmed in Baton Rouge, was released in
2006. Brooks is remembered for his incisive
literary criticism, particularly The Well Wrought
Urn (1947). In 1964, Lewis P. Simpson and
Donald Stanford revived the literary magazine,
publishing the first issue in winter 1965. Since
that time the Southern Review has continued the
quarterly publication of fine poetry, fiction,
interviews, critical essays, and book reviews.
Funding for the scholarly journal of the
Southern Historical Association, the Journal of
Southern History, was also cut. It was published
for a time by Vanderbilt University then the
University of Kentucky before moving
permanently to Houston’s Rice University in
1959. It is one of the most well-respected
journals in the history profession.
The LSU Press continued its mission of
scholarly book publishing uninterrupted. Over
the years the University Press has published
more than a thousand books of history, political
science, literary studies, poetry, fiction, and
local interest. In the latter part of the twentieth
century, director L. E. Phillabaum published
three Pulitzer Prize-winning books: the novel A
Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
and poetry collections The Flying Change by
Henry Taylor and Alive Together by Lisel
Mueller. In 2006, Claudia Emerson’s poetry
collection, Late Wife, won a fourth Pulitzer for
the Press.
Southern University struggled for funding.
No governor embraced the school, and federal
money was not funneled toward the erection of
new buildings in Scotlandville. Nonetheless,
Southern grew during the 1930s. The number
and types of courses increased as did
enrollment. By 1938, when President Joseph
Samuel Clark retired, the Scotlandville campus
hosted 1,150 resident students and included
37 buildings.
The next president of Southern, Felton
Grandison Clark, son of J. S. Clark, served
from 1938 to 1968. Felton Clark, one of the
first students to attend Southern University in
Baton Rouge and only the eighth African
American to earn a Ph.D. at Columbia
University, had taught at Howard University
before returning to Baton Rouge in 1934 to
serve as dean of the college at Southern. xx
Soon after Long’s assassination, Richard W.
Leche was elected governor. Unlike Long, Leche
had no quarrel with President Roosevelt, and he
was able to secure greater federal funding to put
Louisianians back to work. Works Progress
Administration projects included building
Nicholson Hall, Alex Box Baseball Stadium, and
the John M. Parker Coliseum as well as adding
twenty-four thousand seats—and more
dormitory rooms—to the north end of Tiger
Stadium in 1936. Other federal funds
contributed toward the erection of more LSU
buildings, including Himes Hall and the Faculty
Club. The student body
continued to grow, and LSU’s
future looked rosy.
LSU President Smith,
however, had started to dabble
in commodities trading, using
money he stole from the
university, and he lost nearly
$500,000. In 1939 he admitted
to Leche the loss of $200,000
and asked to work off the debt,
but LSU board members,
present at the meeting, refused.
Smith resigned and fled
✧
Above: Unidentified callers instructed
captains in the Square Deal Association, a
group that stood up against Huey Long, to
convene at the Municipal Airport, while
Long told Governor O. K. Allen to send five
hundred National Guards and state police
to meet them. The Square Dealers were
subdued with tear gas and placed under
technical arrest.
COURTESY OF THE LOUISIANA STATE MUSEUM
Below: Governor Richard Leche signed
autographs for schoolchildren from
Thibodaux in May 1938.
COURTESY OF THE RICHARD W. LECHE PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER III
43

✧
Above: For decades the Clark family headed
Southern University in Baton Rouge. Shown
here in the mid-1940s are son Felton
Grandison Clark, father Joseph Samuel
Clark, and wife and mother Octavia
Head Clark.
COURTESY OF THE ARCHIVES DEPARTMENT, JOHN B. CADE
LIBRARY, SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY AND A&M COLLEGE.
Below: In 1938, LSU graduate Margaret
Richardson Dixon, who began her career
ten years earlier as a reporter for the State
Times, became the first woman city editor
for the Morning Advocate. Shown here in
1948 (sitting) with Elaine Schroeder for a
December 20 Newsweek article, she
continued to work her way through the
ranks, becoming assistant managing editor
in 1942 and managing editor in 1948.
Known for her incisive political reporting,
Dixon earned many awards and held the
position of president of the Louisiana-
Mississippi Associated Press Association
in 1955.
COURTESY OF THE MARGARET DIXON PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
44
with his wife, Stella, to Canada, as the national
news exposed his embezzlement. He turned
himself in to police in Ontario. His wife was
acquitted, but Smith served time in a federal
penitentiary and at Angola state penitentiary. xxi
Despite the Chamber of Commerce’s 1938
pronouncement that “Baton Rouge…has always
been unique for the economy of its governmental
operation and its absence of graft and
corruption,” the Long machine, consisting of
Huey Long supporters, committed widespread
fraud in state agencies, including LSU, and
federal programs, such as the popular Works
Progress Administration. The extent of the
corruption became public during the Scandals
of 1939, and dozens were indicted. Leche
resigned the governorship, was convicted of
defrauding the state and federal governments,
and went to prison. His successor, Lieutenant
Governor Earl K. Long (Huey Long’s brother),
served from 1939 to 1940. Earl Long lost the
1940 gubernatorial election to reform candidate
Sam H. Jones. xxii
The people of Baton Rouge carried on as
they always had, despite the incompetence and
corruption of elected officials, businessmen,
and university administrators who lived in the
city. Various luminaries visited in 1937: Cecil
B. DeMille spent time in the capital city to
prepare for the filming of The Battle of New
Orleans; the president’s son Elliott Roosevelt
met with Governor Leche; and the nation’s first
lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, spoke at LSU about
her responsibilities at the White House.
Local white and African American women
worked to improve the city in various ways.
The Baton Rouge Business and Professional
Women’s Club, which had formed in 1925,
started scholarships and funds to help local
girls, operated a soup kitchen, and backed the
movement to establish a city library. In the mid-
1930s they worked on the Louisiana Beauty
Pageant. In 1938 they raised nearly $200 for
their scholarship fund through their work on
the Miss America Beauty Pageant. Another
important organization for business women
was the Beta Sigma Phi, which formed in 1935.
This group focused on humanitarian activities,
such as raising money for cancer research,
volunteering at the Baton Rouge General
Hospital, helping worthy students enter the
School for the Deaf, and providing funds to the
Young Women’s Christian Association. In 1941,
African American women formed the Matrons
Club for social and civic activities. xxiii
Ruth H. Preston and Ruth Stanley organized
the Baton Rouge chapter of the League of
Women Voters and held their first meeting in
October 1940 at City Hall. The overwhelming
majority of the early members were connected
in some way to LSU, though only one hailed
from the Deep South. The year after its
founding the group helped organize a City-
Parish Health League to promote local health
clinics and education. In 1942 the Baton Rouge
League combined with chapters in New
Orleans and Monroe to form the Louisiana
League of Women Voters to encourage women
to become more involved in politics and
community programs. Preston, the first
president of the Baton Rouge chapter, became
president of the statewide organization. xxiv
Members of women’s clubs, aware of the
need to restore and preserve the Old State
Capitol, resolved to turn it into a museum.
Other civic leaders, such as local historian
Joseph St. Clair Favrot, whose Louisiana
Creole family came to Louisiana in colonial
times, joined in the movement to save the
building. The group asked Governor Leche to
help. In 1936 he promised to find the funds,
and the next year, the Works Progress
Administration started renovations under the
direction of William C. Martin. He described
the Old State Capitol as the “prettiest building
in the South, but it’s the dirtiest place I ever
saw.” Workers cleaned off layers of dirt,
uprooted a five-foot live oak tree growing in
one turret, and removed the remaining turrets
that had been added in the 1880s (the largest,
and heaviest, turrets had been removed in
1915). The live oak was transplanted to City
Park. The capitol received further repairs,
including electrical rewiring, in 1947. In
1954, the next time the building was
threatened, State Representatives Percy
Roberts and Rolfe McCollister, Sr., sponsored
a bill to save it from demolition. xxv
In the 1920s and 1930s white Baton
Rougeans could choose from many forms of
entertainment. Family-oriented activities generally
occurred at one of two major parks, City

Park and Victory Park. Wealthier residents
enjoyed two private country clubs with golf
facilities. Three major movie theaters served
white residents, the Columbia on Third Street
(later the Paramount), the Hart, and the
Theater Louisiana. Smaller movie houses,
such as the Tivoli on Main Street and the
Ogden on Government Street, also served a
large clientele. A number of local bridge clubs
met regularly. Louisiana Federation of Music
concerts and Baton Rouge Civic Theater
productions took place at the Woman’s Club
on East Boulevard. The Community Club at
Victory Park was a hot spot for nighttime
entertainment, as was the rooftop ballroom at
the Heidelberg Hotel.
Third Street and the downtown area
became a shopping mecca. Bates & Thigpen
and Latil Stationery Company, stores that
opened in the 1920s, still served customers
in 2006. xxvi
For many, the best entertainment of the
1930s was the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and
Bailey Circus. Once a year the circus train
arrived at the railroad depot, and then a
parade consisting of local high school bands
and the circus traveled east along North
Boulevard to a spot called Bogan’s Pasture. The
circus remained in Baton Rouge for a week
before moving on. xxvii
During the long-lived era of segregation,
African Americans who lived east of Spanish
Town in an area called “Easytown” found
daytime recreation at the 3.4-acre Progress
Park. Evening entertainment could be found
at the Prince Hall Masonic Temple, which
housed the Temple Theater and the Temple
Roof Garden. The theater showcased
movies and acts for local residents. The
structure also held professional office
space. The Grand United Order of Odd
Fellows erected the four-story brick building,
located at 1333 North Boulevard, in 1924
as the District Grant Lodge No. 21.
Community leader and grand master of the
Odd Fellows, B. V. Baranco, Sr., oversaw the
building’s construction.
In addition to major concerts by big-name
musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Cab
Calloway, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, B.
B. King, and Fats Waller—who drew the
largest crowd—the legendary Temple Roof
Garden was the scene of a variety of social
occasions, including dances, wedding
receptions, and sorority and fraternity parties.
The ballroom served as a basketball court for
a variety of semi-professional teams, since
African Americans had no other gymnasium
available to them in Baton Rouge. The Masons
later purchased the building from the Odd
Fellows, and it is now on the National
Register of Historic Places. xxviii
The McKinley Theater, at 1362 East
Boulevard, served African American
audiences from 1936 to 1959. Another
popular venue for black Baton Rougeans was
the three-story Grand Theater on South
Twelfth Street, which operated until the mid-
1930s. It also housed a theater and a dance
floor, and hosted parties and banquets in
addition to live bands playing jazz,
Dixieland, and blues. Sometimes bands
played on the street outside on what were
called Rambler Nights. Eventually the
building was condemned, and it burned
down on May 23, 1986. xxix
At the end of the 1930s, the parish of East
Baton Rouge had a population of 88,500, of
which 38 percent were African American. The
city itself was home to 43,719 in 1940. The
residents of Baton Rouge had weathered Huey
Long’s political cyclone and began to prepare
for an even greater storm, one that affected the
entire world.
✧
Above: In 1938 the Louisiana legislature
commissioned New Orleanian Charles Keck
to sculpt a $50,000 memorial statue for
Huey Long’s grave.
COURTESY OF CHESTER B. ROBINSON PHOTOGRAPHS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: The Long machine continued after
Huey Long’s death. These key players
rejoiced after election results were announced
in November 1935: (from left) Florence Love
Allen, Governor Oscar K. Allen, Blanche
Revere Long, Lieutenant Governor-elect Earl
K. Long, Rose McConnell Long (Huey’s
widow), Governor-elect Richard Leche, and
Elton Reynolds Leche.
COURTESY OF THE RICHARD W. LECHE PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER III
45

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
46

CHAPTER IV
T UMULTUOUS T IMES: WARTIME AND C IVIL R IGHTS
S TRUGGLES, 1941-1972
Tensions in Europe escalated in September 1939, when Adolf Hitler invaded Poland, and France
and the United Kingdom declared war against Germany. Louisianians kept a sharp eye on events
overseas, even as their own elected leaders were convicted of widespread corruption. In 1940
Louisiana’s economy began to improve, as the outbreak of war in Europe effectively ended the
Great Depression. Standard Oil expanded to produce synthetic rubber, a commodity that became
vital to the war effort. Residents of Baton Rouge found themselves with more money to spend:
retail sales jumped 25 percent between the 1939 and 1940 Christmas seasons. The city’s
population skyrocketed from 44,000 in 1940 to 110,000 in just five years. Municipal repairs and
construction continued, as the WPA approved street building and repairs in March 1941. i
The buildup to the war affected residents directly in July 1940, when four men tried to dig their
way into Baton Rouge’s DuPont Ethyl plant. The criminals escaped but left behind four sticks of
dynamite, an incident that shocked Louisianians and led to increased security at chemical plants.
A few months later, four military airplanes flew over the city during nighttime training exercises
from Barksdale Air Force Base. Frightened callers jammed the phone lines reporting the event. ii
Along with the rest of the jittery nation, in the summer of 1940 Baton Rougeans sought to raise
money and supplies by running collection drives. The Boy Scouts alone collected 16,540 pounds
of scrap metal. Newspaper carriers delivered war stamps and war bonds, which residents
purchased to raise money for their allies. iii
The following year, for the first time since Reconstruction, U.S. armed forces set up a base at
Baton Rouge. Harding Field, dedicated on September 28, 1941, encompassed eight hundred
square acres in northern Baton Rouge. Over the next four years countless men and women trained
at Harding Field, primarily to learn how to fly military planes. The Women’s Army Air Corps
arrived at the base in May 1943.
War drives and increased military presence in the states hardly prepared the nation for the
shock of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941. With that quick strike, the
official neutrality of the United States ended. Everyday life in the state capital changed drastically.
Blackouts, deemed essential for security, were practiced often. In March 1942 the spotlight on
Huey Long’s grave in front of the capitol was turned off for the war’s duration. Men and women
served as aircraft spotters, standing at the top of the capitol. Shortages became common, as stores
ran low on silk, coffee, meat, ice cream, chewing gum, and black pepper. Gasoline, tires, and sugar
were rationed. The Old State Capitol played a role in the war effort, serving as office space for the
rationing board. Unfortunately the offices were robbed in April 1944 by people seeking ration
coupons for gasoline, shoes, food, and sugar, to resell on the black market. iv
New industry arrived almost immediately. The Aluminum Company of America opened a local
plant in 1942, and within two years, it employed 800 workers and produced enough aluminum
each month to make 2,000 fighter planes. The Ethyl Gasoline Company expanded. Military
business expanded, too, as the army concentrated its supplies for the state in Baton Rouge.
Aware of the need for properly trained soldiers to aid the war, LSU officials contracted with
the Federal government to operate an Army administrative school. In just six months the
school trained more than two thousand enlisted clerical and administrative personnel for the
Army Air Corps in conjunction with the base at Harding Field. The following year LSU became
one of 196 colleges of the Army Specialized Training Program, hosting during the 1943-44 school
year some 1,700 trainees and 3,100 civilian students. All the trainees were called up for duty in
March 1944. v
✧
The mechanical crew at the Standard Oil
Refinery waited for their paychecks in
December 1943. Today ExxonMobil
encompasses nine facilities in Baton Rouge
and Port Allen. The main plant, the
petroleum refinery, produces oil, gasoline,
and diesel fuel. Built in 1940, the chemical
plant sits just north of the refinery and
produces paint, hoses, tires, and diapers.
EDWIN ROSSKAM PHOTO. COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL
ARCHIVES AND RECORDS ADMINISTRATION, RECORDS OF
THE OFFICE OF WAR INFORMATION.
CHAPTER IV
47

✧
Above: On May 14, 1940, the inaugural
parade of reform Governor Sam Houston
Jones rolled down Third Street en route from
the Heidelberg Hotel to LSU’s Tiger
Stadium. Festivities at LSU, both capitols,
and Victory Park marked the day, as Jones
broke the stronghold the Long faction had
kept on the state for twelve years. Along
with Jones rode his wife, Louise Gambrell
Boyer Jones, and their children—Jimmy,
Billy Boyer, Bob, and Carolyn Jelks.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
Below: Some members of the Women’s Army
Air Corps trained at Harding Field during
World War II.
COURTESY OF THE F. ROSALIND SELLMER COLLECTION,
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.
African Americans and women found
unprecedented opportunities for advancement
during wartime. As Southern University
President Felton G. Clark noted in 1941, “No
better argument for the better integration of the
Negro into the opportunities of American life
and democracy can be given than the record of
serving his country in a crucial hour as the
present one.” Black soldiers fought for freedom
abroad; at home, they were still treated as
second-class citizens, though they saw some
small improvements in social and economic
conditions. In East Baton Rouge Parish African
American teachers petitioned the school board
to equalize the pay for white and black teachers
of similar experience. Though the milestone
request was not granted, the fight for equality in
politics and American society had begun.
Women took jobs that had been reserved for
men and became more politically active. World
War II dramatically changed every aspect of life
in the city, so much so that the Baton Rouge of
1940 was barely recognizable a few years later. vi
Baton Rougeans quietly celebrated victory in
Europe on May 8, 1945, with memorial services
at local churches and the closure of schools and
businesses. So many premature celebrations
occurred during the two weeks before the
official word came that the news felt almost
anticlimactic. According to the Advocate, “Baton
Rouge was tired.” The war ended on August 15,
1945, when Japan surrendered. When the news
reached Baton Rouge, a joyful crowd gathered
spontaneously on Third Street, celebrating with
confetti and horns. Governor James H.
“Jimmie” Davis, who had been elected in 1944,
declared a two-day holiday. vii
In 1948, Jimmie Davis moved out of the
governor’s mansion on North Boulevard, and
Huey Long’s brother Earl moved in. That same
year Huey’s son, Russell B. Long, won election
to the U.S. Senate, and Longs again ran
Louisiana. For the next four years Earl Long
ruled in a flamboyant style reminiscent of his
brother’s. He set up new programs for the
state, providing aid to children and the
elderly, building new schools and new roads,
and expanding the university system. All
these programs required new revenue, so
Long raised taxes on beer, tobacco, cigarettes,
and more. By the end of his term, the tax
burden on Louisianians had increased by 50
percent—though they still paid less in taxes
than residents of most other states. viii
One of Earl Long’s major accomplishments
occurred with little fanfare but had major
consequences. Long actively supported the
extension of voting rights to African Americans,
and by 1952, Louisiana had the highest total of
black voters in the South. The number of black
people registered to vote rose from 7,000 to
nearly 110,000, 17 years before the Voting
Rights Act was made law. ix
Earl Long left another legacy, too; he tried to
exercise political control of the LSU Board of
Supervisors and many state agencies. He
repealed civil service and fired state employees.
Reform governor Robert F. Kennon won the
1952 election (at the time, governors could
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
48

serve only one term consecutively) but in
1956, Earl Long won the governor’s seat again.
In 1959 he drew national attention to the state
because of his shenanigans with stripper Blaze
Starr in New Orleans, a tirade he delivered to
the state legislature in support of black voting
rights, his being committed to a mental
institute, and his ingenious way of getting
himself released. He lost a bid for lieutenant
governor in early 1960 in an election that is
seen as the end of the Long era. He was elected
to the U.S. House of Representatives later that
year, but he died soon after the election and
never took his seat in Congress. x
Local government underwent a reorganization
in 1949, when new regulations
eliminated the police jury and city commission
council and extended the city limits from about
five square miles to about thirty square miles.
The title of the top official became mayorpresident,
indicating that the office-holder
would run the city and serve as president of the
Parish Council. The City Council was a part of
the Parish Council, and since a majority of the
parish councilmen were also city councilmen, in
the public mind the groups were often thought
of as one entity. Not until 1982, however, would
the city-parish councils become a consolidated
body, the Metropolitan Council. xi
Residents in the parish had long enjoyed
various local parks, but the rising postwar
population demanded more facilities. By the
mid-1940s Victory Park had become mainly
ornamental, occupying just 5.5 acres of green
space. It was still larger than the African
American’s only recreational area, Progress Park
on north Thirtieth Street. City Park, open to
white residents only, occupied more than 160
acres. In 1946 the state legislature established the
Recreation and Park Commission for the Parish
of East Baton Rouge (BREC) to develop and
maintain park facilities and to offer recreational
opportunities. BREC quickly became an integral
part of life in the parish, opening dozens of parks
in Baton Rouge, Baker, and Zachary.
Around this time the Baton Rouge Civic
Theater opened. Its first production, The Male
Animal, was held at the Women’s Club in
December 1946. The first season theater
members put on plays at the LSU law
auditorium and the recreational center on St.
Louis Street, among other locations, but by
1948 the group had moved into an old movie
theater at Harding Field. In 1951 the group’s
name was changed to the Baton Rouge Little
Theater, and ten years later the Little Theater
moved into its current home at the former
Bon Marche Regional Shopping Center on
Florida Boulevard. xii
As in many other cities, some important
buildings in Baton Rouge have been allowed to
fall into disrepair and be torn down. For
example, in 1944 the impressive gothic School
for the Deaf and Dumb, which had been
erected before the Civil War, was condemned.
It was dismantled over the next three years. A
few residents always protested and occasionally
had some grand successes, as when Virginia
Wilkinson “Virgie” Tucker spearheaded efforts
to save the Old State Capitol from Huey Long’s
wrecking ball. In 1949 the Daughters of the
American Revolution started planning to
convert the Old Arsenal into a museum.
Abandoned after use by the National Guard
and the state police, the arsenal was targeted
for destruction so that a state library could be
built on its site. The DAR’s efforts to save the
building took time, but in 1960 the
indefatigable Virgie Tucker led a campaign to
clean and restore the arsenal. The Louisiana
Society of the DAR combined with other state
and local agencies to restore the building, and
in 1962 they opened the museum. xiii
In 1950 another war drew soldiers from
Baton Rouge overseas to assist the United
Nations efforts to defend South Korea against
✧
Above: Baton Rouge native and LSU student
Warren R. “Russell” Lobdell (front, center)
enlisted in the Army Air Force in June
1942. He trained to be a fighter pilot at
Harding Field and is shown here on July 18,
1943. In April 1944 Lobdell was deployed
to England as part of the Ninth Air Force to
fly combat missions. He was killed when
German fighter pilots shot down his P-47
Thunderbolt fighter in June 1944.
COURTESY OF THE WARREN RUSSELL LOBDELL PAPERS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: African Americans found new ways
for advancement during World War II, with
many, such as Henry Allen, Jr. (center),
joining the armed forces. Allen was born in
Baton Rouge in 1915 and enlisted in the
Army at Camp Beauregard in 1944. He
served until the end of the war.
COURTESY OF THE AFRO-LOUISIANA HISTORICAL AND
GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER IV
49

✧
Above: Earl Kemp Long (1895-1960)
worked as a farmer and salesman before
following his brother Huey Long into
politics. He served as governor in 1939 and
1940, then again from 1948 to 1952 and
1956 to 1960. He is shown here in August
1939 with his wife, Blanche Revere Long,
greeting Opal Fern Harris (left) and Elaine
Harris (right), at the Longs’ first party in
the governor’s mansion.
COURTESY OF THE EARL K. LONG PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: The R. Buckminster Fuller geodesic
dome in Baton Rouge opened as a repair
shop for the Union Tank Car Company in
October 1958. It is large enough to enclose
a football field.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
50
the invaders from Communist North Korea. A
coalition of more than forty countries sent aid,
while the United States provided 90 percent of
the manpower. The war ended in July 1953
with an armistice agreement between North
Korea and the United Nations. xiv
At home an optimistic Baton Rouge styled
itself as “Home of America’s Most Beautiful
Capitol,” “The Chemical Center of the South,”
and “The World’s Most Complete Oil Center.”
The oil industry, on the rise in Louisiana, built
up an impressive industrial corridor on the
Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and
New Orleans. Later it came to be called
“Cancer Alley” as a result of the health
problems caused by pollutants.
Other businesses grew as well. The Greater
Baton Rouge Port Commission, created in 1952,
constructed cargo docks, grain elevators, and
terminals, making Baton Rouge the Mississippi
River’s farthest inland deep water port. In 1955
shopping centers opened at Delmont Village on
Plank Road, University Shopping Center outside
LSU, and Westmoreland Village at Acadian
Thruway and Government Street. Baton Rouge
gained two television stations: WAFB, CBS TV
channel 9, established by Thomas E. Gibbons in
1953, and WBRZ, ABC TV channel 2,
established by Douglas L. Manship, Sr., in 1955.
In 1954, architect R. Buckminster Fuller
patented his design for geodesic domes, and
in October 1958 a dome Fuller designed
and built opened in Baton Rouge. The building,
off Highway 61 at Brooklawn Drive, was
constructed as a repair shop for the Union Tank
Car Company. At the time it was the world’s
largest circular building without internal
supports. The all-steel dome has a diameter of
384 feet and rises to a height of 125 feet—as
high as a ten-story building. Ownership of the
dome later passed to the Kansas City Southern
Railway, and the dome closed in 1983. xv
With her husband Elton Huckaby, local
radio and television personality Orene Muse
Huckabay began publication of a society newspaper,
The Register, in 1949. The editors
became known for their “Mad Hatter’s Brunch,”
an annual event that raises money for charity.
In the early days, the money was raised to
benefit the March of Dimes in its fight against
polio. Huckabay continued publication until
1980, and in 1989, Wanda Horn and Chris
Russo Love began InRegister. xvi
The city’s growth was mirrored in the
growth of LSU, preceded by a major
housecleaning after President James M.
Smith’s prison sentence. During World War II
more women than men enrolled, but after the
war the national G.I. Bill, which paid for
college education for veterans, led to a huge
influx of former soldiers on campus. xvii
Integration at LSU started shortly before
the 1954 Supreme Court ruling in Brown v.
Board of Education of Topeka that “separated
educational facilities are inherently unequal.”
Graduate student Roy S. Wilson, the first
African American student at LSU, was allowed
into the law school by court order. Alexander
Pierre Tureaud, Sr., a lawyer at the forefront of
the legal fight for civil rights in Louisiana,

epresented his case. Several other black
students earned graduate degrees in the
1950s, and in 1961 Pearl Andrews, the first
female African American to graduate from
LSU, received her master of education degree.
The first African American undergraduate
at LSU was Alexander Pierre Tureaud, Jr.,
son of the famous lawyer. Tureaud Jr. stayed
for six weeks in the fall of 1953, until a
court order forced him to leave. Integration
of the undergraduate study body was delayed
until 1964, when six African American undergraduates
enrolled. xviii
Baton Rouge’s love for LSU sports reached
new heights. In 1958 All-American halfback
Billy Cannon led the LSU Tigers to their first
National Football Championship, under coach
Paul Dietzel. Ten years later a star player lit up
the basketball court: “Pistol” Pete Maravich
played at LSU from 1968 to 1970, under his
father, head basketball coach Press Maravich.
Pete Maravich played in the National Basketball
Association and, when he died in 1988 at the
age of forty, Governor Charles E. “Buddy”
Roemer III renamed the LSU Assembly Center
the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. xix
Baton Rouge’s religious community developed
along with the city’s increased
population. In 1952 the Mount Zion First
Baptist Church, located at 356 East Boulevard,
opened under the Reverend Theodore J.
Jemison, who would remain at the pulpit until
his retirement in 2004. Over the years it
would become the largest Baptist church
serving African Americans in Baton Rouge.
Two years later the Congregation B’Nai
Israel, founded in 1858, built its temple at
3354 Kleinert Avenue. In 1955, local architect
A. Hays Town built the fourth home of the
First Baptist Church of Baton Rouge at 529
Convention Street; later the church erected a
second site at the corner of Perkins Road and
Bluebonnet Boulevard.
In July 1961, Pope John XXIII established
the Diocese of Baton Rouge, comprising the
twelve Louisiana civil parishes located in
south Central Louisiana. St. Joseph’s Catholic
Church became St. Joseph’s Cathedral, and
Robert E. Tracy was installed as the first
bishop of Baton Rouge.
As the national outlook brightened in the
1950s and economic development increased
in Baton Rouge, African American men and
women sought benefits equal to those enjoyed
by white people in all areas of life. Despite
paying the same taxes as white residents,
black people were denied access to the same
public spaces. In June 1953, local African
Americans demonstrated their discontent by
boycotting the public buses.
The public bus system forced black
passengers to pay up front but enter and sit by
the back door, a humiliating display of
segregation’s inequities. In March 1953 the
city council voted to discontinue the practices
of reserving seats in the back for black riders
and in the front for white riders, opting
instead for a “first come, first served” plan.
Mildred DuBois wrote the bill, Ordinance
222, and received personal threats for her
efforts, since the vote appeared to be a blow to
segregation. The NAACP approved, but bus
drivers hated the law. Following passage of
the ordinance, black passengers challenged
the drivers—Martha White was the first
African American to sit in the white section—
and their side was formally upheld. On June
15, bus drivers retaliated by going on strike. xx
Three days later the state attorney general,
Fred LeBlanc, noted that the local ordinance
conflicted with state segregation laws. He
instructed bus drivers to reserve front seats for
white passengers, and on June 19 the drivers
✧
The June 1953 Baton Rouge bus boycott,
encouraged by Reverend Theodore J.
Jemison and Raymond Scott, preceded the
Montgomery bus boycott by two years. For
five days African Americans organized a
system of free rides in order to move about
town. The mass protest ended peacefully
but did not result in the integration of the
bus system.
COURTESY OF THE A. E. WOOLLEY PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER IV
51

✧
Above: Artist Caroline Wogan Durieux
(1896-1989), shown here in a 1943 Fonville
Winans photograph, supervised the Works
Progress Administration art program in
Louisiana. Later she taught at LSU from
1942 until the mid-1960s. She is known for
her witty, satirical lithographs and for
developing the electron print (using
radioactive ink) with the university’s
Department of Nuclear Science in the 1950s.
COURTESY OF THE CAROLINE WOGAN DURIEUX PAPERS,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: A. P. Tureaud, Jr., the first black
undergraduate student at LSU, is shown
here in 1988.
MORNING ADVOCATE PHOTO BY BILL FEIG/CAPITAL CITY
PRESS. COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
52
returned to work. Meanwhile, as the news of
LeBlanc’s decision spread, Reverend Jemison
and tailor Raymond Scott promoted a boycott
of the buses in a radio broadcast. From June
19 until June 24, African Americans walked to
work or used the free rides organized by their
community. Black and white leaders
negotiated an agreement, and the boycott
ended peacefully. The Baton Rouge bus
boycott showed the willingness of Southern
black people to try mass protests and served as
a template for Martin Luther King, Jr.’s, 1955
bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, which
made Rosa Parks a household name.
Unfortunately the bus boycott had little longterm
local impact: Baton Rouge buses were not
integrated until 1962, thirteen years later. xxi
Public education also showed early signs of
change. After the Brown v. Board of Education
ruling outlawing racial segregation, local
African American parents sued to desegregate
the Baton Rouge schools. Filed in 1956, the
lawsuit was not settled until 2003. xxii
While LSU struggled with integrating its
graduate program, the leaders at Southern
University felt reluctant to challenge the white
State Board of Education that ran the school.
Instead they expanded their outreach. In
January 1958, Southern opened a black
graduate school, in part as a way to pacify
white leaders and keep integration at bay. If
African Americans had their own graduate
schools, the reasoning went, they would not
need to integrate those at white universities.
In 1959, Southern University New Orleans
opened, and another branch opened in 1964
in Shreveport-Bossier City. xxiii
The turbulent 1960s began with the
reelection of Jimmie Davis to the governor’s
office. He vowed to keep public schools open
and segregated, and fights for and against civil
rights rocked Louisiana and Baton Rouge.
Administrators at Southern University
tried to keep their students from protesting,
but in March 1960 the integration of Baton
Rouge lunch counters began. Seven Southern
University students staged a sit-in at the lunch
counter at Kress’s department store on Third
Street. Thanks to Jemison, all the students
were bailed out of jail after their arrests for
“disturbing the peace.” The following day,
more students staged a sit-in at Sitman’s drug
store at the corner of Chimes Street and
Highland Road, where two were arrested, and
at the lunch counter of the Greyhound bus
station at the corner of Florida and Lafayette
streets, where seven were arrested. A day
later some two thousand Southern students
walked out of class and marched downtown
to hold a protest and prayer vigil at the
capitol. At the direction of the university’s
governing board, Southern president Clark
suspended, then expelled, the sixteen
students who had been arrested. In 2004
Southern University chancellor Edward
Jackson gave honorary degrees to each of the
sixteen former students, noting “They sat
down so we could stand up.” xxiv
More civil rights protests continued in the
city during December 1961 and January
1962, with Southern University students
taking a primary role. In response to the
growing unrest Clark closed the campus on
January 18, 1962, and hundreds of students
left the university.
The following year five young African
Americans tried to swim at the public pool in
Baton Rouge’s City Park. On July 23, 1963,
twenty-year-old Betty Claiborne; her sister
Pearl George, who worked for the local
NAACP; and three friends were arrested in the
park’s dressing room. A group of 30 to 50
African Americans accompanying the five
were chastised by city officials for their unruly
“mob action.” George later said, “They had
paddy wagons there, they had sheriff’s officers
there with rifles, and—actually, you would
think we were some type of animals.”
Convicted of aggravated battery for her part in
the attempt to integrate the City Park pool,
Pearl George served six months at the parish
jail. She went on to become a representative
on the Baton Rouge Metro city council. Her
sister, Claiborne, was convicted of a
misdemeanor and spent ten days in jail. xxv
In 1964, when the U.S. Supreme Court
ruled it unconstitutional to segregate park
facilities, Baton Rouge closed its nine public
swimming pools rather than integrate them.
On August 10, 1965, local chapters of the
NAACP and CORE marched from City Park to
the downtown Municipal Building to ask

Mayor W. W. “Woody” Dumas to reopen and
desegregate the city’s swimming pools. Five
pools reopened that year, but the City Park
pool was paved over with concrete, and its
dressing rooms became an art gallery.
In May 1963, when integration began in
the public schools, a local biracial
committee—the first in the state—was
created to avoid explosive action over school
transfers. No riots occurred when four local
high schools, including Baton Rouge High,
were integrated in September 1963. The
absence of violent action that other southern
cities experienced gave Baton Rouge a
reputation for amicable race relations, but
that notion ignored tensions within the black
community and distrust of the biracial
committee. On July 22, 1965, the Morning
Advocate proclaimed its satisfaction with the
“virtual miracles of progress in race relations
that have already been achieved” and praised
the “bright outlook.” xxvi
Nevertheless, race relations deteriorated.
Two years later Baton Rouge was thought to
be the city in Louisiana most likely to “blow
up.” A 106-mile march from Bogalusa to
Baton Rouge in August 1967, calling attention
to the lack of jobs for African Americans, was
kept relatively peaceful only by the presence
of eight hundred National Guardsmen
Governor John McKeithen ordered to
accompany the marchers. Officers found
wires under the Highway 190 bridge over the
Amite River, signaling a bomb, and
neutralized the threat before marchers
reached the spot, averting a potential disaster.
More National Guardsmen and police with
shotguns patrolled Baton Rouge, where
tensions ran high. xxvii
Anger among black Baton Rougeans over
police brutality and killings erupted in the
summer of 1969. In separate incidents in
early and mid-July two young black men were
shot in the back by police. After the second
shooting, some six hundred African
Americans marched from the area where
James Oliney, Jr., was shot to the Municipal
Building and held a peaceful protest rally.
Violence erupted, however, and some African
Americans set fires, broke windows, attacked
white bystanders, and shot at buses.
✧
Left: In 1958 the LSU football team won its
first national championship. Halfback Billy
Cannon, the star player, sits in the front
row, second from the right (#20). The Tigers
would not repeat their success for another
forty-five years.
COURTESY OF THE LSU PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, RG A
5000, UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES, LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: In March 1960 seven students from
Southern University staged a sit-in at the
Kress Department Store lunch counter,
which at the time served only white
customers. Shown here are Janette Houston
Harris, JoAnn Morris, and John W. Johnson,
with Marvin Robinson and Donald Moss in
the background. Police removed the students
from the store, searched them for weapons,
and arrested them for disturbing the peace.
HISTORIC ADVOCATE PHOTO BY JOHN BOSS,
COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
CHAPTER IV
53

✧
Above: Originally organized in 1859, the
Mount Zion First Baptist Church at 356
East Boulevard was a key meeting spot for
African Americans during the civil rights
struggles of the 1960s.
COURTESY OF MOUNT ZION FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH.
Top, right: Betty Claiborne spent time in jail
for her attempt to integrate the pool at City
Park. Later she explained why she tried to
enter the pool: “I felt I was a citizen, I was a
student, my parents paid taxes. I felt I had
a right to be at City Park, and I had a right
to swim.” Decades afterward, when her
arrest record interfered with Rev. Betty
Claiborne’s prison ministry, Governor
Kathleen Babineaux Blanco pardoned her
on Martin Luther King, Jr., Day in 2005.
HISTORIC ADVOCATE PHOTO BY MARK SALTZ,
COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE AND BETTY CLAIBORNE.
Right: In the 1960s the Foundation for
Historical Louisiana sponsored preservation
pilgrimages to draw attention to historic
buildings in need of maintenance. Evelyn
Martindale Thom, the foundation’s president
from 1965 to 1967, appeared in costume
with Mayor Woody Dumas in 1963.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
54
McKeithen alerted the National Guard,
ordered 250 state police to the city, and
imposed a strict curfew, avoiding a full-scale
riot. Later at the request of the NAACP,
Dumas took steps to calm tensions and
improve relations. Police Chief Eddie O.
Bauer sought to integrate the police force and
promised that he would not allow any police
officer to show disrespect or to brutalize any
members of the community. Nonetheless, the
officer who shot Oliney, Ray Breaux, was
exonerated and remained on the force, further
contributing to African Americans’ mistrust of
the police. xxviii
The city remained on edge. NAACP
members picketed in front of the Municipal
Building for weeks, and they organized a
selective buying campaign to bring economic
pressure to bear against white merchants.
Violent incidents continued; a patrolman was
struck by a picketer at Church’s Fried
Chicken. Police and young African Americans
clashed on Highland Road. Picketers were
arrested at the Winn Dixie on Plank Road and
at other stores around town. xxix
Meanwhile labor relations in Baton Rouge
deteriorated over the right-to-work proposal in
the state legislature. In April 1970, in an
attempt to emphasize labor’s frustration, men
belonging to the International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers set two dynamite bombs to
call attention to a seventy-five-day strike
against Gulf States Utilities. One bomb caused
significant damage to the Senate Chamber at
the Capitol, and the impact poked a pencil into
the ceiling, which still remains in place. The
other exploded at the Baton Rouge Country
Club but did little damage. No one was hurt. xxx
The racial unrest persisted. On a Friday in
early January 1972 a small group of African
Americans from Illinois and California calling
themselves Black Muslims, or “Young
Muslims,” met in a rented room at the Temple
Theater on North Boulevard, the site of so
many concerts and dances over the years. The
outsiders planned to “return the city to black
people” and told those at the meeting to come
out at noon on Monday. The weekend was
quiet, but on Monday, January 10, another
meeting was held at the theater at 10 a.m. The
Black Muslims parked their cars in the middle
of North Boulevard in order to block the road
between Thirteenth and Fourteenth Streets. A
group of about one hundred African Americans
formed in front of the Temple Theater, and a
local businessman and civic leader, William
Reed Canada, tried unsuccess-fully to get the
crowd to disperse. xxxi
Reporter Maurice Cockersham investigated
the scene and went to the WBRZ-TV studios
to file a report and call police. He returned to
North Boulevard with his colleague Bob
Johnson, a popular news anchorman, and
they met up with another WBRZ newsman,
Henry Baptiste. Crowd leaders asked the three
to leave, but when they did not go
immediately, they were attacked. Cockersham
and Baptiste managed to escape with minor

injuries, but Johnson never fully recovered
from the massive head trauma he sustained. xxxii
Police arrived on the scene with wreckers
and ordered the Black Muslims to move their
vehicles. When they refused, someone fired a
shot, touching off a bloody riot that injured
some thirty-one people and killed four, two
police deputies—Ralph Hancock and
DeWayne Wilder—and two Muslims—
Thomas Davis and Samuel Upton. During the
melee some Muslims shot at deputies, and
some officers pummeled black men with
shotgun butts and nightsticks. Rocks and
glass bottles flew through the air. Some
eyewitnesses claimed that the Black Muslims
carried guns, while others insisted they were
unarmed. Some theorized that police officers
may have accidentally shot their own. In the
end about twenty African Americans went to
jail, and McKeithen ordered hundreds
of National Guard soldiers stationed in
black neighborhoods, at gun stores, and
at city hall to suppress further violence
that night. Eventually nine of the Black
Muslims were sentenced to prison terms of
twenty-one years. xxxiii
Expressing his shock and dismay, Mayor
Dumas told reporters that Baton Rouge
enjoyed good relations between the races and
that outside black agitators would not be
allowed to “take over this city.” On the other
hand, young African Americans at the Black
People’s Tribunal held later that month,
including an assistant professor at Southern
University, claimed that white arrogance was
the cause of the violence. xxxiv
A second tragic incident in 1972 proved
again that race relations were not as healthy as
the white community believed. As the fall
semester started, a group called “Students
United” began to agitate for reform at
Southern. The students wanted the governing
board—which was all-white, as it had been
since 1914—to be representative of the
university. Demands included a university
administrator who showed respect for the
students and more state funding for the
university, which had been chronically short
of money since it first moved to Baton Rouge.
Group leaders met with university President
G. Leon Netterville, Jr., who had replaced
Felton Clark, and the newly elected governor,
Edwin Edwards. Policy change was not
forthcoming, and tensions escalated through
the fall, culminating in a disaster that closed
the university for the rest of the year.
On November 16, 1972, a student protest
on the Southern University campus went
horribly awry. Students had been told to wait
in the Administration Building for the
president to return, but police ordered them to
leave. One policeman misinterpreted an order
and threw tear gas canisters before his fellow
officers were ready, causing several to fire their
weapons. Sheriff’s deputies killed two twentyyear-old
sophomores, Leonard D. Brown and
Denver A. Smith, who each sustained multiple
buckshot wounds. Brown died on campus and
Smith died shortly afterward at Our Lady of the
Lake Hospital. The tragedy at Southern
brought national attention and an outpouring
of outrage and sympathy.
Later a commission formed to study the
event, headed by Louisiana’s attorney general,
concluded that “Leonard Brown and Denver
Smith were shot as they were running away
from the entrance of the Administration
Building. They were not under arrest and
were not resisting arrest and were not armed.
They were shot as they ran along the escape
route which the law enforcement agencies had
planned as such in the event gas was used.
There was no justification for their being
shot.” Nevertheless, no one has ever been
charged with the crime. xxxv
Four years later the Smith-Brown
Memorial Union was named in honor of the
✧
Top: Leonard Douglas Brown (1952-1972)
from Gilbert, Louisiana, was a sophomore at
Southern University when he was shot by law
enforcement officers on November 16, 1972.
COURTESY OF THE ARCHIVES DEPARTMENT, JOHN B. CADE
LIBRARY, SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY AND A&M COLLEGE.
Above: Denver Allen Smith (1952-1972)
from New Roads, Louisiana, was also a
sophomore at Southern when he was shot on
November 16, 1972. No one has been
charged for the students’ deaths.
COURTESY OF THE ARCHIVES DEPARTMENT, JOHN B. CADE
LIBRARY, SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY AND A&M COLLEGE.
Left: Spurred by U.S. involvement in
Vietnam, in 1968 some 4,300 students
signed a petition to end compulsory ROTC
training at LSU. A few demonstrated in
front of the student union. The American
Association of University Professors joined
the students by submitting a report opposing
the practice. In 1969 the Board of
Supervisors voted to make ROTC voluntary.
COURTESY OF THE LSU PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, RG A
5000, UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES, LSU LIBRARIES.
CHAPTER IV
55

✧
In the early 1960s, Shreveport architect
William C. Gilmer designed the new
governor’s mansion in the Greek Revival
Style, shown here in 1963, around the time
Jimme and Alvern Davis took up residence.
The building contains 25,000 feet of space
in three floors and a basement.
COURTESY OF THE LLMVC VERTICAL FILE, LSU LIBRARIES.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
56
students who were killed. In 1974 a new state
constitution provided for a new Board of
Supervisors for the Southern University
System, with no restrictions on race or
gender, to oversee the day-to-day governance
of the university and its satellite campuses.
Baton Rouge also felt the controversy over
U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Like their peers
across the nation, college students at LSU held
demonstrations against the war. Men and
women took advantage of Free Speech Alley to
share their viewpoints, and in May 1970 a
group of several hundred students marched
from campus to the Old State Capitol to
protest the military involvement in Vietnam
and to protest the use of military troops on
college campuses. xxxvi
Countless other Baton Rougeans involved
themselves in the Vietnam War, whether as
servicemembers or locally in such clubs as the
anti-war Baton Rouge Peace Action Coalition
and the pro-war Concerned Parents
Association. Local women whose husbands
were stationed away attended monthly
meetings of the Waiting Wives Club of the Red
Cross. In Baton Rouge, wives of two prisoners
of war sought media attention for the plight of
their husbands, Captain Neal Jones and Major
Lawrence Barbay—both graduates of Baton
Rouge High School—and asked that citizens
write to the president of North Vietnam to
request humane treatment for all the captives
and adherence to the Geneva Conventions.
Prisoners of war were treated horribly in
North Vietnam, which called captive soldiers
“criminals,” not POWs. In March 1973 U.S.
ground troops left Vietnam, though the U.S.
never attained its goals. A few new residents of
Baton Rouge arrived as refugees from Vietnam,
and many soldiers returned home. xxxvii
In the late 1950s the federal government
made interstate highways a national priority,
and major highway construction in the 1960s
drastically altered transportation in Baton
Rouge and Louisiana. In the mid-1950s,
engineers began survey work for Interstate 10,
which would become a major hurricane
evacuation route, and the new bridge across
the Mississippi River. In 1963, construction
started on the I-10 bridge, and it was formally
opened to traffic in April 1968. Around the
same time the I-10 connection to I-12 was
completed. The expressway extension, I-110,
took longer than anticipated, not opening for
use until 1970.
Two powerful storms hit south Louisiana
during the mid-1960s: in October 1964,
Hurricane Hilda brought eighty-mile-per-hour
winds and spawned tornados. On September 9,
1965, the eye of Hurricane Betsy passed over
New Orleans, which was still recovering from
Hilda. By the time Betsy reached Baton Rouge,
the still-powerful storm sustained winds of 58
miles per hour with gusts of up to 92 miles per
hour, causing significant damage. xxxviii
Jimmie Davis and his wife, Alvern Adams,
moved into the new plantation-style mansion
in 1963. The forty-room house is patterned
after the plantation house at Oak Alley in
Vacherie, Louisiana, though various portions
incorporate other designs, such as a cast iron
railing on the Beauregard House on Chartres
Street in New Orleans. Some lamps were
original to the mansion Huey Long had built.

In 1966 a dispute broke out over whether
to preserve the house at Magnolia Mound or
allow it to be destroyed to make room for new
development. The Foundation for Historical
Louisiana showed strong support and
leadership for preservation, and BREC
purchased the historic house at Magnolia
Mound, thanks to voters having approved a
one-mill tax to provide additional funding for
BREC. BREC kept the land, and the
Foundation for Historical Louisiana underwrote
the cost of restoring and furnishing the
house, which was added to the National
Register of Historic Places in 1972. Today the
Magnolia Mound house, one of the first
structures erected in Baton Rouge, is fully
restored and open to the public.
BREC opened one of the best places in
Baton Rouge for family recreation, the Baton
Rouge Zoo, on Easter Sunday in 1970. One
popular voice helped hasten the zoo’s arrival:
William P. “Buckskin Bill” Black, a television
performer who started at WAFB-TV in 1955.
Every weekday morning he repeated the
call, “Remember, kids, Baton Rouge needs
a zoo!” xxxix
Formal artistic endeavors blossomed. In
1940, four women who played in a local
string quartet—Bobby Lorio, Sylvia Weiss,
Ione Ramsey, and Mayme Sue Ruhl Welch—
dreamed of forming a symphony orchestra
for Baton Rouge. The efforts of Lorio and
her husband, Cecil Lorio, paid off when the
Baton Rouge Civic Symphony Orchestra
played its first concert at the end of the
decade. The symphony played at high school
auditoriums and at LSU before moving
into the Riverfront Centroplex in 1979. In
the 1970s the orchestra changed its name to
the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra.
Further, the Baton Rouge Ballet Theater was
chartered in 1963. Among other productions,
since 1991 the dance company has staged
a yearly classic, The Nutcracker: A Tale from
the Bayou.
In response to the growing population
and growing need for health care, in 1968
two new hospitals opened in Baton Rouge:
the Earl K. Long Memorial Hospital and
Woman’s Hospital.
Baton Rouge had become the second
largest city in Louisiana by 1970, with a
population of 165,963; East Baton Rouge
Parish was home to 285,167 residents.
Despite the population growth, its prime
location on the Mississippi River, new
highways easing travel, and its status as a state
capital, Baton Rouge still lacked many of the
amenities of a dynamic urban area. xl
By 1972 legal segregation had ended in
Baton Rouge. The city was about to enter a new
era, one marked by both dramatic economic
expansion and major economic crisis, and
exemplified by a politician known for his
charisma and corruption: Edwin W. Edwards.
✧
Above: Models posed by the elephants’
cage at a February 1979 style show
sponsored by the city’s social magazine,
The Register. Opened in 1970 on Easter,
the Baton Rouge Zoo occupies some 140
acres east of Scotlandville and houses about
1,800 animals.
COURTESY OF THE REGISTER RECORDS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: Local tomboy Donna Douglas went
on to win beauty contests, including “Miss
Baton Rouge,” and to a career as an actress
and gospel singer. Shown here with co-star
Buddy Ebsen, she is best known for her role
as Elly May Clampett on The Beverly
Hillbillies, which ran from 1962 to 1971.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
CHAPTER IV
57

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
58

CHAPTER V
T HE M ODERN E RA: DECLINE OF B IG O IL,
G ROWTH OF A N EW C ITY, 1973-2005
In 1972 another flamboyant politician came to the capital city: Democrat Edwin W. Edwards. A
Cajun lawyer, he served an unprecedented four terms as governor and profoundly influenced
Louisiana’s society and reputation. Often compared to Huey Long for his lust for power,
storytelling abilities, and populist policies, the charismatic Edwards differed from Long in
background and habit—Edwards did not smoke or drink—but like the Kingfish he exercised
formidable control over state government and used political power for personal gain. His first term
started when the state was flush with oil and natural gas revenue, and in a short-sighted fit of
optimism Edwards cut other taxes and eliminated the state property tax. i
Exxon (now ExxonMobil) had become the largest petroleum refinery in the world. As a result of the
oil industry’s dramatic growth, Baton Rouge experienced a population increase of nearly 30 percent
over the course of the 1970s as well as a major expansion of building projects and cultural amenities. ii
In 1980 David C. Treen—the first Republican governor in Louisiana since Reconstruction—
succeeded Edwards. Soon a worldwide surplus of oil and gas, created from the discovery of new
sources, caused crude oil price to drop. President Ronald Reagan’s deregulatory policies resulted in
a lowering of prices at gasoline pumps. Oil seemed plentiful nationwide, so demand for Louisiana’s
main product fell. Dependence on the oil industry now became a liability, plunging the state into
an economic depression while the rest of the country experienced a boom. Baton Rouge’s prospects
fell, too, and for the first time ever, the city saw a decrease in population.
Constitutionally prohibited from serving a third consecutive term, Edwards began campaigning as
soon as he left office. In their desire to relive the happy 1970s, Louisianians ousted Treen in 1984 and
elected Edwards to an unprecedented third term. Two years later Edwards stood trial in federal court
in New Orleans on charges of racketeering, bribery, and mail and wire fraud, but the case resulted in
a mistrial. He was tried again the following year but acquitted. Edwards ran for governor again,
promoting gambling and a statewide property tax, but he withdrew from the race after finishing
second to Charles “Buddy” Roemer III in the 1987 primary election. In 1989, Edwards, a legendary
womanizer, divorced his wife Elaine Schwartzenburg Edwards after forty years of marriage.
The efforts of Edwin Edwards and others to promote gambling resulted in new opportunities for
entertainment at the end of the twentieth century. In 1991, voters approved riverboat casino gambling,
and three years later, the Belle of Baton Rouge and Casino Rouge began operations in the capital city.
Edwards returned as governor in 1992 in a memorable election against David Duke, former
grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. In 1994, Edwards married his longtime girlfriend, registered
nurse Candy Picou, at the Governor’s Mansion. When asked by a reporter in 1997 if he had ever
broken the law, Edwards responded, “Probably so. But nothing intentionally. I’ve been in public life
for forty years. Laws change. Rules change. I may not be innocent. I’m just not guilty.” iii
In 2000, Edwards was convicted on federal charges of money laundering, racketeering and
fraud in relation to riverboat casino licensing, and on October 21, 2002, he reported to prison.
Edwards had inspired admiration among many who appreciated both his razor-sharp wit and biggovernment
policies, and his conviction surprised a populace accustomed to seeing him escape
punishment for corruption. iv
Governor Murphy J. “Mike” Foster III served two terms and brought a more businesslike
approach to government. Additionally, he changed Baton Rouge by seeking to bring state
government workers together downtown in a new Capitol Park, resulting in a spate of demolition
and new construction. In 2003 three old governmental office buildings near the capitol were
imploded to make way for new construction. By 2006 the following structures had been erected:
✧
During the late twentieth century the
international community in Baton Rouge
grew, fostered by the petrochemical industry
and local universities. Students from the
Baton Rouge Chinese School performed at
the Old State Capitol for the 1998
International Heritage Celebration. Front
row (from left to right): Andrea Chao, Anna
Chang, and Casey Tsai; back row (from left
to right): Rebecca Chia and Mary Liu.
COURTESY OF SHEILA Y. LEE
CHAPTER V
59

✧
Above: Kip Holden, with his wife, Lois, left,
delivered a victory speech in November
2004 after his election to the position of
Mayor/President of Baton Rouge.
ADVOCATE PHOTO BY RICHARD ALAN
HANNON/CAPITAL CITY PRESS. COURTESY OF
THE ADVOCATE.
the Poydras building just north of Capitol
Lake, the eight-story Claiborne building at
1201 North Third Street; the twelve-story
LaSalle building at Third and North Streets
(its parking garage houses the Lamar YMCA);
and the twelve-story Galvez Building at Fifth
and Main Streets (its six-story parking garage
houses the Main Street Market). The new
Louisiana State Museum, located within the
Capitol Park area at 660 North Fourth Street,
opened in 2006. Two more buildings,
Iberville and Bienville, are slated to be
complete in 2006, midway through the term
of the state’s first female governor, Kathleen
Babineaux Blanco.
On January 3, 2005, fifty-two-year-old
Melvin L. “Kip” Holden became East Baton
Rouge Parish’s first African American mayorpresident.
A lawyer and a Democrat, for twenty
years Holden served as metro councilman and
state senator and representative. He had run
unsuccessfully for mayor in 1996 and 2000.
Although a majority of the parish’s population—56
percent—was white, in the 2004
election Holden won 54 percent of the vote
against incumbent Bobby Simpson. Many of
Holden’s supporters, in fact, were upper-middle
class white residents. v
In the 1990s and early 2000s, residents were
particularly concerned about crime, as a visiting
student was shot when he rang the wrong
doorbell and two serial killers stalked the area.
Criminal activity was uncovered in some
local churches as well. Charismatic preacher
Jimmy Swaggart, cousin of country singers Jerry
Lee Lewis and Mickey Gilley, became an
Assemblies of God minister in 1958 and gained
popularity through his gospel albums, radio
shows, and television show. He denounced
other evangelists whose misdeeds became
known, including his rival, Marvin Gorman of
New Orleans. In retaliation, Gorman hired a
detective to take photographs of Swaggart
during his tryst with a prostitute at a Travel Inn
in Metairie. In February 1988, Swaggart begged
forgiveness for his sins on television. The
denomination defrocked him, and Swaggart
lost much of the empire he had built, though he
still broadcasts internationally televised weekly
church services and a radio show.
The Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge grew
over the decades. The second bishop, Joseph
V. Sullivan, was installed in 1974 and
succeeded by Stanley Joseph Ott in 1983,
Alfred C. Hughes in 1993, and Robert W.
Muench in 2002. As cases of sexual abuse in
the U.S. Catholic church became publicly
known, scandal struck Baton Rouge. In 2004
the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge settled a
sex-abuse lawsuit against Bishop Sullivan by
an unnamed plaintiff. As a result, a private
school named after Bishop Joseph Sullivan,
who died in 1982, changed its name from
Bishop Sullivan High School to its originally
intended name, St. Michael the Archangel
Diocesan Regional High School.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
60

Although recent religious history in Baton
Rouge has had its dark spots, hundreds of
churches, synagogues, and temples in the
parish provide regular spiritual comfort for the
city’s residents. Religions represented locally
include Catholic and Protestant Christianity,
Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam.
Baton Rougeans saw changes in their
educational institutions. LSU expanded
beyond the main quadrangle and strived to
achieve recognition as one of the top 1 percent
of U.S. colleges and universities, adopting
admission standards for the first time in 1988.
In May 2000, Nelson Mandela, president of
South Africa, visited Baton Rouge for four days
at the joint invitation of Southern University
and LSU. Both universities granted him
honorary degrees, and a ceremony at Southern
commemorated the founding of a new
institute, the Nelson Mandela School of Public
Policy and Urban Affairs. During a banquet at
the Radisson Hotel, held to raise funds for a
children’s charity, David Duke briefly protested
outside before leaving peacefully at the request
of hotel security. A political prisoner for nearly
twenty-seven years, Mandela was released in
1990, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993,
and was elected the first president of postapartheid
South Africa in 1994. Mandela
thanked Southern for working with South
African people of color by helping colleges in
his country and urged graduates to continue
their educations. vi
In 1996 a new college offering associates’
degrees opened, initially working from the
computer center at LSU. In August 1998 the
Baton Rouge Community College moved to a
campus on Government Street, and BRCC
welcomed more than eighteen hundred
students—twice the original projection. The
school has grown steadily, with enrollment at
about five thousand in 2004.
Other institutes of higher education in
Baton Rouge include Louisiana Technical
College at Baton Rouge, Our Lady of the Lake
College, ITI Technical College, Delta College
of Arts and Technology, and the Culinary Arts
Institute of Louisiana.
In the public schools a major dispute was
finally resolved: on August 15, 2003, a court
order settled the forty-seven-year-old East
Baton Rouge Parish school desegregation case,
after more than fourteen months of courtordered
mediation. For some fifteen years
following a 1981 ruling, students were bussed
across town, causing an increase in both the
number of private schools and in “white
flight” to the suburbs. Out of a total of
approximately fifty-three thousand school-age
children in 2000, nearly three-quarters of
white school-children attended private or
home schools, while three-quarters of
children in the public schools were African
American. In 2005 more than 45 private
schools offered elementary through junior
high school education, and 19 offered high
school education. The largest private schools,
in terms of enrollment, are Episcopal High
School and St. Thomas More School.
Meanwhile, in 2002, Baker and Zachary
withdrew from the Baton Rouge school
system and formed their own system. vii
In 1978, Our Lady of the Lake Regional
Medical Center—the largest private medical
center in the state—moved from its original
location north of the capitol to Essen Lane.
While continuing operations at its Florida
Boulevard location, in 1994 the Baton Rouge
✧
Above: Dolores Margaret Richard Spikes
graduated from Southern University in the
1950s, earned a masters in Illinois, and
returned to Baton Rouge in 1971 to join
Southern’s faculty. While teaching and
raising a daughter, Spikes earned her Ph.D.
at LSU. She rose through the administrative
ranks, becoming chancellor at both the
Baton Rouge and New Orleans campuses,
and in 1988 (as shown here) Spikes became
the first woman in the United States to be
president of a university system.
STATE-TIMES PHOTO BY JOHN H. WILLIAMS/ CAPITAL CITY
PRESS. COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
Below: In May 2000 South African president
Nelson Mandela enjoyed a piece by the
Southern University Jazz Ensemble during
his visit to Baton Rouge.
ADVOCATE PHOTO BY ARTHUR D. LAUCK/CAPITAL CITY
PRESS. COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
Opposite, bottom: The Jimmy Swaggart
Ministries complex is on Bluebonnet
Boulevard, between the Mall of Louisiana
and Perkins Road. In an era when TV
evangelism captured a large national
audience, Swaggart boasted the highest
ratings, with broadcasts reaching more than
two million households each week from the
Jimmy Swaggart Ministries Complex. He
is shown here with his wife, Frances, and
son, Donnie, as he read a statement to the
news media.
MORNING ADVOCATE PHOTO BY BILL FEIG/CAPITAL CITY
PRESS. COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
CHAPTER V
61

✧
Above: Baton Rougeans love to eat, and
though dozens of outstanding restaurants
serve the city, one chef stands out. In 1970
John Folse began his career at the Baton
Rouge Howard Johnson’s Restaurant. He
went on to open Lafitte’s Landing in
Donaldsonville in 1978, and in the mid-
1980s Folse began a catering facility at
White Oak Plantation. In addition, he now
runs a culinary institute, a bed and
breakfast, pastry division, a cheese shop,
and a recording studio, and he is the author
of several cookbooks. The Louisiana
Legislature gave him the title “Louisiana’s
Culinary Ambassador to the World.”
COURTESY OF CHEF JOHN FOLSE AND COMPANY.
Below: In November 1977 the city parish
governmental building and the Riverside
Centroplex opened on South River Road.
The Centroplex (now the River Center)
included an arena for concerts and sporting
events, an exhibit hall, and a theater for
symphony and ballet performances.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
General Medical Center opened a new site
on Picardy Avenue between Bluebonnet
and Essen. Four additional full-service
medical centers serve Baton Rougeans: Earl K.
Long Medical Center, Woman’s Hospital,
Summit Hospital (Oschner Medical Center of
Baton Rouge), and Lane Regional Medical
Center in Zachary. Smaller specialty care
centers abound. viii
A unique, state-of-the-art nutritional research
center, the Pennington Biomedical Research
Center of LSU, opened in 1988 with research
labs and a research kitchen, clinics, and service
labs. C. B. “Doc” and Irene Pennington provided
initial funding. The center’s research revolves
around preventive medicine, nutrition, lifestyle,
and chronic disease. Ongoing clinical trials
include studies on diet, weight loss, blood
pressure, and diabetes.
In the mid-1980s, Baton Rouge hosted two
international sporting events. In July 1983 the
Sixth International Special Olympics Summer
Games were held at LSU. Approximately
60,000 people attended the opening
ceremonies, and 4,000 athletes competed. In
August 1985 the National Sports Festival VI
(now the U.S. Olympic Festival) took place in
the city, with about 3,800 participants and 34
sporting events.
Southern University’s superstar, Willie
Davenport, represented the United States at
the Olympics five times, winning a gold
medal in 1968 and a bronze in 1972 for
track and field events. He later competed in
the Olympic Winter Games on the U.S.
bobsled team. Inducted into the Southern
University Hall of Fame and the National
Track and Field Hall of Fame, Davenport was
voted one of Louisiana’s top twenty-five
athletes in 1999.
In 1987 a dynasty began, as the LSU
women’s track team won the first, to
date, of eleven indoor national
championships and thirteen outdoor
national championships. The men’s track
team won the indoor national
championship in 2001 and 2004 and the
outdoor championship three times
between 1989 and 2002. ix
Baseball has been important for Baton
Rouge universities. In 1960, after leaving
Southern University, Lou Brock played with
the Chicago Cubs and St. Louis Cardinals, and
in 1985 Brock was inducted into the National
Baseball Hall of Fame. Between 1991 and
2000 LSU baseball coach Skip Bertman led the
Tigers to five national championships. Their
1996 crown featured Warren Morris’s two-out,
two-run homerun in the bottom of the ninth
inning that gave the Tigers a 9-8 victory over
the University of Miami, in one of the greatest
college baseball games ever played. LSU star
athlete Ben MacDonald is one of a number of
former LSU baseball players who have gone on
to major league careers. The Jaguars won the
Southwestern Athletic Conference baseball
championship in 2005.
From 1990 to 1992 Shaquille O’Neal
played basketball at LSU. The Orlando Magic
drafted him in his junior year, and O’Neal
went on to play for the Los Angeles Lakers
and the Miami Heat, becoming one of the
most dominant players in the game. Dale
Brown coached the LSU men’s basketball team
from 1972 to 1997 and led the Tigers to the
NCAA Final Four in 1981 and 1986. Women’s
basketball at LSU leapt into national
prominence under former head coach Sue
Gunter, Basketball Hall of Famer and the
winningest coach in LSU history, who died
in 2005. Coach Dana “Pokey” Chatman, a
former player under Gunter, led the Lady
Tigers to their first Final Four appearance
in 2004 and to the SEC championship in
2005, assisted by key players Temeka Johnson
and Seimone Augustus of Baton Rouge.
Football, however, reigns in Baton Rouge.
Charles “Cholly Mac” McClendon coached LSU
football from 1962 to 1979, leading teams to
thirteen bowl games. Tiger football enjoyed
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
62

uneven success during most of the 1980s and
1990s, but in 1999 Nick Saban was hired as
head coach, and in 2003 he led the Tigers to
their second national championship. Locals
dubbed him “St. Nick.” Saban moved on to the
NFL a year later to coach the Miami Dolphins.
In 1974 the first Bayou Classic, a football contest
between the Grambling State Tigers and the
Southern University Jaguars, was played. The
Jaguars won the National Black College
Championship in 1997 and SAC football
championship 1999 and 2003.
More major weather-related disasters
occurred during this era. In April 1983 nine
inches of rain in thirty-two hours caused the
Amite and Comite rivers to overflow,
submerging portions of Livingston, East Baton
Rouge, and Ascension parishes. Baton Rouge
neighborhoods Shenandoah and Old Jefferson
sustained some of the worst flooding. Evacuees
waited out the flood at fire stations on
Government Street and Harding Boulevard. All
told, more than five thousand buildings
flooded; the total damage ran about $170
million, including $50 million worth of
damage in East Baton Rouge Parish. Nearly
twenty-two hundred families applied for aid
from the Red Cross. The deluge broke fivehundred-year
records. x
Although February 13, 1899, was the
coldest day ever recorded in Baton Rouge,
with the temperature no higher than two
degrees, the second coldest occurred during
the Christmas Freeze of December 21-25,
1989. On December 23 the temperature stood
at eight degrees, and the freeze triggered an
explosion in a corroded pipe the next day at
the Exxon refinery that could be heard—and
felt—as far away as six miles. Two men at the
plant were killed; the fire burned for fourteen
hours. The blast forced an evacuation in the
Istrouma neighborhood, broke windows, and
sent insulation flying. Exxon was later ordered
to pay a fine of $5,000 to the Occupational
Health and Safety Administration. xi
Hurricane Andrew was probably the most
substantial tropical storm to hit the city in the
twentieth century. In August 1992, Andrew
pounded Florida before moving over the Gulf
and heading through Louisiana and Baton
Rouge. Although in 1965, Hurricane Betsy’s
winds were stronger, Andrew’s heavy rains and
persistent thirty-mile-per-hour winds lasted for
nearly four hours and caused greater damage
from trees falling into houses, crushing cars, and
taking down power lines. Some residents went
without electricity for as many as eight days. xii
The 1970s oil boom spurred local spending
and an effort to revitalize the downtown area. In
1975 the Louisiana Art and Science Museum
moved into the old Yazoo & Mississippi Valley
Railroad Company passenger station. Across
River Road a twelve-block area was cleared and
transformed into the Riverside Centroplex,
which includes a ten-story governmental
building, an arena, a theater, a library, parking
garages, and beautiful landscaped terraces that
lead from St. Louis Street to River Road. Most of
the city and parish governmental offices moved
to the area in 1979, when the $100-million
construction program was completed.
✧
Left: Months after taking office, Governor
Edwin W. Edwards appointed his wife,
Elaine Schwartzenburg Edwards, to serve
out the term of deceased Senator Allen J.
Ellender. Her swearing-in ceremony took
place in Washington, D.C., on August 7,
1972. From left to right: Senator James O.
Eastland, Senator Russell B. Long,
Representative Hale Boggs, Governor
Edwards, Representative Otto Passman,
Elaine Edwards, and Representative
Joe D. Waggonner.
COURTESY OF THE RUSSELL B. LONG COLLECTION,
LLMVC, LSU LIBRARIES.
On January 24, 2004, the Louisiana State
University Tigers, winners of the national
college football championship, and the
Southern University Jaguars, winners of
the Black College National championship,
took to the streets of Baton Rouge.
Football teams, coaches Nick Saban and
Pete Richardson, cheerleaders, and
marching bands combined in a rare event.
Some 70,000 to 100,000 people attended
the downtown celebration at the Parade
of Champions.
ADVOCATE PHOTO BY ARTHUR D. LAUCK/CAPITAL CITY
PRESS. COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
CHAPTER V
63

✧
Above: As part of the 1976 Bicentennial
festivities Baton Rouge held a “read-in.”
Here poet Pinkie Gordon Lane is shown
with an unidentified man on North
Boulevard. Lane was the first African
American to earn a PhD from LSU. She
taught English at Southern University
for many years and in 1989 became
the first African American poet laureate
of Louisiana.
COURTESY OF THE PINKIE GORDON LANE PAPERS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: From 1980 to 2004 musician
Tabby Thomas ran Tabby’s Blues Box and
Heritage Hall, a favorite venue for live
music. For twenty years the Blues Box was
on North Boulevard, as shown here in 1994,
but road construction forced a move to
Lafayette Street in 2000.
ADVOCATE PHOTO BY PHILIP BARR/CAPITAL CITY PRESS.
COURTESY OF THE ADVOCATE.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
64
In the early 1970s the first residential
district, Spanish Town, enjoyed a formal review
by the Baton Rouge Planning Commission. In
1978 the entire neighborhood was placed
on the National Register of Historic Places.
Five years later Beauregard Town was added to
the register.
The Municipal Airport closed in 1976, and
the airport at Harding Field became the city’s
commercial airport. Baton Rouge voters
approved Mayor Tom Ed McHugh’s 1995
proposed $25-million airport expansion, and
today the airport has a renovated terminal and
new parking garages. Also in 1976 the twomillion-square-foot
Cortana Mall opened at
Florida Boulevard and Airline Highway. The 1.3-
million-square-foot Mall of Louisiana opened on
Bluebonnet Boulevard in October 1997. xiii
The Louisiana depression of the 1980s
slowed progress downtown, but in 1987 the
new Baton Rouge Downtown Development
District began a campaign to revitalize and
promote the downtown area of the city.
In restoration work, the Old State Capitol
hosted a joint session of the Louisiana
Legislature in 1990 as part of the campaign to
raise awareness of the building and to fund
new restoration efforts. Renovations on the
interior began two years later, and in 1994 the
secretary of state’s office reopened the
building as a museum. Repairs to the exterior
started in 2004 and are expected to be
complete in 2007. In the 1990s, first lady
Alice Foster and the Foundation for Historical
Louisiana undertook a major restoration of
the Old Governor’s Mansion, returning it to
its original grandeur. xiv
Preservation and development often clash,
and many of the city’s rare historic buildings
have been destroyed to make way for new
structures or for parking lots. Audiences at the
Paramount Theater, a landmark at 215 Third
Street, declined over the years until the final
feature presentation was shown in 1978. The
following year its owners, the Hart family,
destroyed the historic building to make way for
parking lots. On a Sunday morning in
November 2003 a developer razed the old Baton
Rouge Ice House on Main Street, a rare
antebellum row building, to make way for a
proposed condominium development. Its
sudden destruction led to the formation of the
parish’s Historic Preservation Committee, which
seeks to protect the city’s unique structures
while ensuring its growth.
In 1998, Plan Baton Rouge, a private group
of community leaders led by Elizabeth “Boo”
Thomas, urged residents to discuss the city’s
future. A week-long charette that June included
daily meetings with outside consultants, several
civic organizations, and local citizens. One
consultant, Alexander Garvin, later wrote, “A
New Yorker is impressed by southern-style
citizen participation. In three decades as a city
planner, I thought I’d seen it all. But nothing
prepared me for the enthusiasm I witnessed
during one memorable week in late June in
Baton Rouge…. To me, the event was a
landmark in citizen participation.” xv
Downtown, the two-year Centroplex
expansion, an effort to attract more conventions,
resulted in the December 2004 opening
of the Baton Rouge River Center. The expanded

facility included a convention center, exhibition
hall, theater, arena, and ballroom, and it
dominated the southern end of River Road at
Government Street. In 2001 the Sheraton Baton
Rouge Convention Center Hotel opened across
Government Street from the River Center to
house convention-goers. In May 2003 the
Louisiana Art and Science Museum added a
new attraction, the Irene W. Pennington
Planetarium and its ExxonMobil Space Theater,
to promote science education in Louisiana.
In recent years options for entertainment
and cultural activities in Baton Rouge have
multiplied. Two new television stations went on
the air in the 1970s: WVLA, NBC TV channel
33, began broadcasting in 1971, and public
television came to Baton Rouge in 1975 with
WLPB, TV channel 27. FOX arrived in 1991 at
WGMB, TV channel 44. WBRL, WB TV
channel 21, and KZUP (originally WZUP) TV
channel 19, both went on the air in 1999. In the
early 2000s WBXH, UPN TV channel 39, began
broadcasting locally.
Baton Rouge joined the 1976 national
bicentennial celebration. In preparation for the
events, some areas downtown received a face
lift. Boyd Avenue was rechristened Spanish
Town Road, and crepe myrtles and dwarf azaleas
were planted at the street corners where Boyd
intersected with Fifth Street and with North
Street. The intersection of Main and Fourth
streets was improved with plantings, benches,
and resurfacing. Third Street was renamed
Riverside Mall, a marketing ploy that annoyed
many; in 1992 it reverted to its original name. A
week-long party took place in July, filled with
music, arts and crafts, dance, and fireworks. xvi
In 1980, Rockin’ Tabby Thomas opened the
legendary Tabby’s Blues Box and Heritage Hall on
North Boulevard. It quickly became a treasure in
the local music scene, and Thomas brought in a
number of well-known blues musicians, such as
Tab Benoit, Kenny Neal, and Phil Guy. Thomas’s
famous musician-actor son, Chris Thomas
King—who won two Grammys for the album O
Brother Where Art Thou—also appeared at the
club. In mid-2004 Thomas suffered a stroke.
Later that year he closed the venue after one last
night of great music played by both local and
nationally known musicians. Afterward he said,
“It was fantastic. For all the years I’ve been
playing, I didn’t really realize how much they
love the Blues Box. I love it myself.” xvii
In the mid-1980s several new attractions
came to Baton Rouge. In May 1982 the USS Kidd,
one of three Fletcher class destroyers that have
been preserved, became part of the Louisiana
Naval War Memorial. Built in 1943, the ship was
named for Rear Admiral Isaac C. Kidd, Sr., a
Baton Rougean killed in the December 7, 1941,
attack on Pearl Harbor. The ship was first
launched in 1943 and saw action in World War
II and Korea. Her first crew took “Captain Kidd”
as its mascot and became known for its practice
of ransoming rescued sailors for ice cream, which
inspired its nickname, “Pirate of the Pacific.” In
1975 the navy removed the Kidd from service,
and the vessel was preserved through the efforts
of one of its crewmen. It has been restored to its
August 1945 condition. The Naval War
Memorial, located on South River Road, also
includes an observation tower and museum
complex, and its Nautical Center houses a replica
of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall.
The city tried to revitalize Catfish Town
with an upscale shopping and restaurant
district in 1984. Historically the location
contained wharves, warehouses, and housing
for African Americans. Although large crowds
attended its opening, the mid-1980s Catfish
Town failed and became mainly office space.
Golf has long been a popular sport in Baton
Rouge, and in 1986 the Country Club of
Louisiana, a residential development featuring
an eighteen-hole golf course—designed by Jack
Nicklaus—was built on Highland Road. The
844 acres of land had belonged to the
Kleinpeter family, early settlers of the area who
in 1913 established the Kleinpeter Farms Dairy.
After the Christmas and New Year’s
holidays, attention in south Louisiana turns to
✧
Above: From 1961 until his death in 1988,
sculptor Frank Hayden taught drawing,
sculpture, aesthetics, and art appreciation at
Southern University. His sculpture of the red
stick that gave Baton Rouge its name (shown
here) stands at Scott’s Bluff on campus, and
other major works can be found in local
churches and downtown at the Galvez and
Riverfront plazas. In 1980 Hayden
completed a monument to Leonard D. Brown
and Denver A. Smith, the students killed in
1972, which stands near the student union.
COURTESY OF THE REGISTER RECORDS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
Below: From 1989 to 1991 the Baton Rouge
Fairgrounds hosted the summertime U.S.
National Hot Air Balloon Championship.
The tournament returned to the capital city,
from 2003 to 2006, at the Pennington
Biomedical Center on Perkins Road.
Owners of the colorful balloons participated
in daytime competitions and evening
balloon glows.
COURTESY OF MARSHA AND ROBERT AUCOIN.
CHAPTER V
65

✧
Above: In 1949 the Krewe of Romany, the
oldest Mardi Gras organization in Baton
Rouge, started holding its annual debutante
ball. On January 31, 1987, Grand Duchess
Judy Jackson Averette left the governor’s
mansion on her way to the “Victorian
Elegance” ball.
COURTESY OF THE DAVID KING GLEASON ESTATE.
Below: In 2004 the Spanish Town Parade’s
theme was “Flamingoes Gone Wild.” The
“Krewe of Road Kill” waved from its float as
parade-goers cried out for beads.
COURTESY OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE PRESERVATION OF
LAGNIAPPE IN LOUISIANA.
Mardi Gras season. Baton Rouge holds several
parades. Le Krewe Mystique de la Capitale,
which began in 1976, is the oldest operating
Baton Rouge krewe. A flambeaux parade,
started in the early 1990s, takes place in the
Southdowns neighborhood the Friday night
before Mardi Gras. The Krewe of Orion,
formed in 1998, was the first traditional New
Orleans-style daytime parade. Starting in
2000, the Capital Area Animal Welfare Society
(CAAWS) began the Mystic Krewe of Mutts
parade, for which participants dress their pets
in costume. In 2002 the Krewe of Artemis, an
all-female krewe, started its yearly night
parade, and in 2003 the Krewe of Jupiter
began the capital city’s first New Orleans-style
coed nighttime parade. Started in 1981, the
irreverent Spanish Town Mardi Gras parade
quickly became one of the city’s favorites.
Floats take aim at politicians, a perennial
source of amusement in Louisiana. Over the
years themes have included “Louisiana’s Dirty
Laundry” and “La. Purchase—Name Your
Price.” The signature color is pink, and the
signature bird is the flamingo, so the floats
always have a generous supply of pink beads
as well as the usual Mardi Gras colors. During
Mardi Gras season, plastic pink flamingos can
be spotted on lawns and in City Park Lake.
Other festivals during this era included
FestForAll, an annual arts and music festival
which ran for twenty-five years. In 1999 it was
replaced by the Bonne Fete festival, to
commemorate Baton Rouge’s three-hundredth
anniversary. After its first year Bonne Fete
organizers charged admission, causing the 2000
and 2001 attendance to drop. Finally the fete
was cancelled. FestForAll was revived, and it
runs concurrently with Baton Rouge Blues
Week. The annual International Heritage
Celebration, started in the mid-1990s, honors
traditions and food from forty countries, and its
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
66

sponsor, the Baton Rouge Center for World
Affairs, also holds an annual “Passport to the
World” cooking competition. An annual Earth
Day celebration is held in the spring. The
Louisiana Center for the Book kicked off the first
statewide book festival in Baton Rouge in 2002.
In 1998, In the Company of Dancers and Of
Moving Colors Productions merged under the
second name, to bring together dance, theatre,
live music, and the visual arts. The 40 to 80
members of the organization stage elaborate
productions and perform at festivals and
schools. The outreach component, C.L.O.S.E.R.
to the Arts! (Churches, Libraries, Open-air
spaces, Schools, and Everywhere we can Reach),
brings artistic performances to the community.
Another local dance company, the Mid City
Dance Project, is known for its annual rendition
of The Nutcracker.
Several theaters bring comedy and drama to
Baton Rouge. The Little Theater remains at Bon
Marche. LSU Theater provides an opportunity
for students to hone their skills, and Swine
Palace Productions, founded in 1992 by Barry
Kyle at LSU, mixes students with professional
actors in a variety of productions. The Swine
Palace is named after its home, a former livestock
judging pavilion on the LSU campus.
The movie industry grew in Louisiana as
state tax breaks paved the way for filmmakers.
Directors have filmed approximately fifty
movies and documentaries in Baton Rouge,
including Sex, Lies & Videotape, Kingfish: A
Story of Huey P. Long, The Dukes of Hazzard,
and Everybody’s All American.
One of Baton Rouge’s greatest charms is the
beauty of its gardens, flowering trees and live
oaks. In 1981, Emory Smith donated fourteen
acres, an arboretum that he developed with his
wife, Annette, to the LSU School of Landscape
Architecture as an outdoor laboratory; Hilltop
Arboretum has become known for its
educational opportunities and annual Fall
Plantfest sale. In 1987, Baton Rouge Green
formed to plant and maintain trees and forests
and to educate the public about the urban
forest’s role in lowering air temperatures and in
keeping air and water clean. Since that time the
organization has planted more than thirty
thousand trees in East Baton Rouge Parish.
BREC opened the city’s first nature preserve, the
101-acre Bluebonnet Swamp Nature Center, in
May 1997. The pristine swampland was
acquired by the Nature Conservancy in the
1980s, with a portion turned over to BREC for a
visitors’ center.
In 1970, celebrated local landscape architect
Steele Burden began the Windrush Gardens on
Essen Lane. He, his brother Pike, and his sister
Ione donated the family land to LSU. His
artifact collection comprised the initial holdings
of the Rural Life Museum at the same location.
(The family also donated land from its
plantation, Windrush, for the Burden Research
Plantation and the Ollie Steele Burden Manor.)
Early 2005 was a time of optimism in the
growing capital city. The downtown area had
visibly improved. Citywide development
brought in a variety of new stores, and a
female governor and African American mayor
held office for the first time ever. The city
population stood around 225,000, with the
majority of residents between ages 25 and 34.
Baton Rouge took on a more cosmopolitan
profile as people from a variety of
backgrounds made it their home. The city still
grappled with issues of education, race
relations, traffic, police pay, crime, and
business development, but they suddenly
seemed very minor for a time after August 29,
when Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana.
✧
Above: Steele Burden painted this scene on a
door at the LSU Rural Life Museum on
Essen Lane.
COURTESY OF THE FOUNDATION FOR
HISTORICAL LOUISIANA.
Below: On March 29, 2005, the Mid City
Dance Project performed “The Fading Line:
A Commemoration of the 1953 Baton Rouge
Bus Boycott” at the Shaw Center’s Manship
Theater. Kristen Handy stands in front of
her brother, Jonathon Handy. Seated to their
right is Ashley Larche.
COURTESY OF JUDY GRIESEDIECK AND MID CITY
DANCE PROJECT.
CHAPTER V
67

HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
68

EPILOGUE
2005-2006
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the legacy of 2005, have forever changed Louisiana and the Gulf
Coast. While fortunate to have been spared a direct hit from the storms, Baton Rouge will never be
the same.
On Friday, August 26, tropical storm Katrina had already zipped west from the Atlantic through
the Florida panhandle, and its next turn was unclear. As the storm hovered over the Gulf of Mexico
and grew into a hurricane, most Louisianians still believed Katrina would take an easterly course,
as so many storms had before. Nevertheless, cautious residents booked hotel and motel rooms in
Baton Rouge, Lafayette, and Lake Charles, and points north.
Hurricane experts upgraded Hurricane Katrina to a category 3 storm on Saturday and announced
that it had turned toward New Orleans. New Orleanians who had cars filled up their gas tanks, and
many chose an evacuation route. Others, remembering traffic congestion and miserable nine-hour
trips to Baton Rouge in 2004, when Hurricane Ivan threatened to hit the city, concluded that staying
would be less of an inconvenience. Ivan, after all, had turned away at the last hour.
By Sunday Katrina was upgraded to a category 5 hurricane, the highest level on the hurricane
scale. The National Weather Service sent out a bulletin warning that, if the storm struck land at a
category 4 or 5, “Most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks, perhaps longer. . . . Water
shortages will make human suffering incredible by modern standards.” Other predictions were
similarly dire. Mayor Ray Nagin called for a rare mandatory evacuation of New Orleans.
Thousands of Louisianians left New Orleans and the surrounding areas. Many traveled to Baton
Rouge to stay in hotels and with friends and family. Few brought more than a day or two’s worth
of clothing, believing that, as in past evacuations, they would quickly return home after the storm
passed. But thousands of residents could not leave the city, and many who could refused to go, for
a variety of reasons. The Superdome, identified as a shelter for people with special needs, quickly
became the only viable shelter for some thirty thousand people. i
Katrina reached land early Monday morning on August 29. The enormous storm destroyed
many of the coastal towns in Mississippi and flooded downtown Mobile, Alabama. It quickly
swamped St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parishes. In New Orleans, the levees broke, flooding the
Ninth Ward and other neighborhoods.
Storm winds blew through neighborhoods in the state’s capital city by mid-morning, knocking
down trees and power lines, leaving them strewn dangerously on the roads. Falling trees and
branches punched holes in roofs; some buildings and vehicles sustained considerable damage. For
the most part, however, Baton Rougeans were unharmed. As the sky cleared later in the day,
residents ventured outside to clean up the debris cluttering their yards and streets.
Many residents of Baton Rouge lost electricity, however, and by the end of the day nearly one
hundred thousand households in the parish were without power. When they tuned to batterypowered
radios or other devices they heard about the chaos and horrors just seventy miles away.
Other residents received power back quickly, and those on the LSU grid who never lost electricity
at all were able to track the storm’s progress. No information was available about some towns and
parishes, and the uncertainty caused more worry. Mayor-President Kip Holden was right when he
commented on the power outages in the hot days of late August: “This is going to test the patience
of the residents of East Baton Rouge Parish; they can’t let it work on their nerves or cause them to
push the panic button.” ii
News reports were confusing and hard to fathom. A storm surge, combined with levee failures,
left 80 percent of the New Orleans metropolitan area under water. The destruction was
catastrophic and impossible to convey with mere words or photographs. True comprehension of
✧
In March 2005 the Shaw Center for the
Arts opened on Lafayette Street, across
North Boulevard from the Old State Capitol
and the site of the old Auto Hotel. The
sparkling channel-glass building houses
the LSU Museum of Art, the Manship
Theater, the Brunner Gallery for modern
art, classrooms, and Tsunami, a fifth-floor
restaurant overlooking the river.
COURTESY OF THE LSU OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY JIM ZIETZ.
EPILOGUE
69

✧
Hurricane Katrina knocked down trees and
power lines, often leaving dangerous live
wires on the ground and blocking roads like
Woodside Drive.
COURTESY OF SYLVIA FRANK RODRIGUE.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
70
the destruction is possible only through
firsthand observation.
The Advocate somehow managed to deliver
morning papers on time. Horrifying pictures
filled the pages. For many residents who
lacked power, those newspaper photographs
were the first images they saw. Meanwhile the
rest of the world witnessed the horror on
television and via the internet. New York City,
struck by terrorists on September 11, 2001,
reached out to Louisianians still reeling from
disaster with a full-page ad that simply read,
“NY ♥ New Orleans.”
Baton Rouge immediately became the
headquarters for hurricane relief and the
command center for federal, state, and local
rescue efforts. Donations poured in to the
American Red Cross and to such
organizations as the Baton Rouge Area
Foundation. Thousands of Baton Rougeans
volunteered to help in myriad ways: collecting
food, clothing, bedding, toiletries, and toys
for those in shelters at churches, schools, and
the River Center; giving up their space and
privacy by taking in family, friends, and even
strangers who needed shelter; and assisting at
animal shelters to care for the pets that
evacuees could not take with them. Boaters
and medical personnel headed down the
highway to help rescue efforts. Archivists and
preservationists rushed to help save New
Orleans buildings and the records of its
history. Pennington Biomedical Research
Center served as a distribution point for
medical supplies donated from around the
world. Baton Rouge embraced evacuees and
provided them with as much assistance as
possible. It was perhaps the city’s finest hour.
Nonetheless, many residents panicked when
faced with a sudden influx of New Orleanians.
They spread false rumors about dangerous New
Orleans gangs of looters roaming the malls and
downtown streets. Newly reopened government
buildings locked their doors and posted
guards, and many downtown workers left or
were sent home early. The panic became so
great that LSU’s chancellor, Sean O’Keefe, e-
mailed the entire university community to
report that there were “confirmed reports of
civil unrest” in Baton Rouge, urging caution. All
the fearmongering resulted in a lockdown for
evacuees at the River Center and a tremendous
loss in sales for local businesses and restaurants.
Police assured a nervous citizenry that the city
had not experienced any crime sprees, and
eventually calm prevailed.
The most difficult situation for Baton
Rougeans, at least at first, was learning to live
with the sheer numbers of people who now
shared their homes and their city. The storm
immediately resulted in an influx of hundreds
of thousands of people. Traffic and commute
times increased exponentially. Stores ran out of
necessary supplies. Gas stations ran out of fuel.

Residents saw other constant
reminders of the unprecedented
disaster. Military helicopters roared
loudly overhead several times a day.
Ambulances and other relief vehicles
drove through town from all around
the country. School enrollment
swelled for public schools, private
schools, and the universities, all of
which took in thousands of students.
An immediate boom in real estate
and demands for gasoline spurred greed, but
government officials promised to investigate
and prosecute price gougers. Relief for the
evacuees, slow in coming, turned into a
tremendous political fiasco at all levels of
government, causing frustration on top of
heartache for all that had been washed away
by Katrina.
When Hurricane Rita threatened in mid-
September, residents in western Louisiana
and eastern Texas readily evacuated, having
seen what happened to New Orleans and the
surrounding areas. Ironically many who had
evacuated to the Lake Charles vicinity from
New Orleans had to evacuate again. Baton
Rouge, still brimming with evacuees, could
not take in any more people. Residents
watched in fear and resignation as another
storm headed toward Louisiana. Rita stayed
longer in Baton Rouge than had Katrina,
dumping more than nine inches of rain in
about twenty-four hours, from midday of
September 23 to midday September 24. The
rain left more debris and damaged buildings
that had withstood Katrina’s winds. This
round of devastation was too much to bear,
particularly for those who lost their homes
and livelihood.
Months after the storm the story continues
to unfold. New Orleans is trying to rise out of
the ruins. After an initial influx of some two
hundred thousand people, the population in
Baton Rouge continued to fluctuate a year later.
Residents have become used to extra traffic and
plan accordingly. Politicians at all levels are
investigating response efforts and levee failures.
The Army Corps of Engineers is working to
rebuild the levees.
The state and the nation face difficult
challenges of what and how to rebuild, how
and where to house evacuees, and how to offer
hope for the future while so many are still in
mourning. Though the times will continue to
try both hearts and patience, Baton Rougeans
should be proud of their compassionate
response to the victims of the hurricanes of
2005. The second largest city in Louisiana
overnight became its largest. The future of
Baton Rouge and the state of Louisiana
depends on the choices its people make today.
✧
Above: Thousands of evacuees came to
Baton Rouge before and after the storm.
People in need of medical care stayed at the
Carl Maddox Field House and the Pete
Maravich Assembly Center at LSU, while
others bunked at local churches, schools,
and the River Center, shown here.
COURTESY OF THE LSU REVEILLE
Below: Countless Baton Rougeans
volunteered their time to assist both persons
and animals affected by Hurricane Katrina.
The LSU School of Veterinary Medicine, for
example, assisted other organizations in
running animal shelters for pets rescued
from the floodwaters at the AgCenter’s John
M. Parker Coliseum (shown here) and the
Lamar-Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales.
COURTESY OF THE LSU OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS
EPILOGUE
71

APPENDICES
Mayors of Baton Rouge
John R. Dufroq, 1850-1855
Joseph Monget, 1856-1857
Edward Cousinard, 1857-1859
James M. Elam, 1859-1860
B. F. Bryan, 1862-1865
Jordan Holt, 1865
James E. Elam, 1865-1869
O. P. Skolfield, 1869-1870
James E. Elam, 1870-1872
Henry Schorten, 1872
James E. Elam, 1872-1873
Henry Schoten, 1873-1876
Leon Jastremski, 1876-1882
J. C. Charlotte, 1882-1883
William S. Booth, 1883-1884
G. L. Vay, 1884-1888
B. F. Bryan, 1888-1890
G. L. Vay, 1890-1894
B. F. Bryan, 1894-1896
John J. Wax, 1896-1898
Robert A. Hart, 1898-1902
R. L. Pruyn, 1902-1903
Wade H. Bynum, 1903-1910
Jules Roux, 1910-1913
Alexander P. Grouchy, Jr., 1913-1922
Turner Bynum, 1922-1923
Wade H. Bynum, 1923-1940
Fred S. LeBlanc, 1941-1944
Powers Higginbotham, 1944-1952
Jesse L. Webb, Jr., 1953-1956
Mrs. Jesse L. Webb, Jr., 1956
John Christian, 1957-1964
Woodrow W. Dumas, 1965-1980
Pat Screen, 1981-1988
Thomas Ed McHugh, 1989-2000
Bobby Simpson, 2001-2004
Melvin L. “Kip” Holden, 2005-
Presidents of the Foundation for Historical Louisiana
Overton Perkins, 1963-1965
Evelyn Thom, 1965-1967
Magnolia Newsom, 1967-1968
Robert Heck, 1968-1972
JoAn Samuel, 1972-1974
Veda Norfolk, 1974-1976
Winifred Byrd, 1976-1977
Connie Ogden, 1977-1978
Wanda Barber, 1978-1979
Jean Kirby, 1979-1980
Kay Calcote, 1980-1981
Lucile Munson, 1981-1982
Marilyn Davis, 1982-1983
Gwen Cook, 1983-1984
Nathalie diBenedetto, 1984-1986
Charlotte Smith, 1986-1988
Robert Hodges, 1988-1990
Lorice Say, 1990-1992
Ira Paul Babin, 1992-1994
George Jenne, 1994-2000
John W. Wilbert, Jr., 2000-2004
Darryl Gissel, 2004-present
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
72

ENDNOTES
Introduction
i McWilliams, Fleur de Lys and Calumet, 25; Brasseaux, Comparative
View of French Louisiana, 52.
ii A. S. Le Page du Pratz, The History of Louisiana (London: T. Becket,
1774), 52, 217, as quoted in Meyers, History of Baton Rouge, 8.
iii de Charlevoix, History and General Description of New France, 41;
Lauvière, Histoire de la Louisiane Française, 265; Beer, “Early Census
Tables of Louisiana,” 223; Charles R. Maduell Jr. (comp. and trans.),
The Census Tables for the French Colony of Louisiana from 1699 through
1732 (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1972), 28, as
quoted in Meyers, History of Baton Rouge, 12-3.
iv Reuben Gold Thwaites (ed.), The Jesuit Relations and Allied
Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New
France, 1610-1791 (Cleveland: Burrows Brothers, 1896-1901), 67,
303, as quoted in Meyers, History of Baton Rouge, 16.
v Dunbar, Life, Letters, and Papers, 64, 69.
vi Sternberg, Along the River Road, 205-6.
vii Schafer, Slavery, the Civil Law, and the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 2.
viii Meyers, History of Baton Rouge, 35.
ix Wall, Louisiana, 79.
x See Bannon, Magnolia Mound.
xi Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 194, 199-201.
Chapter I
i Latrobe, First Steamboat Voyage on Western Waters, and Latrobe,
Rambler in North America.
ii Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 193-4.
iii New Orleans Daily Delta, September 7, 1859.
iv Carleton, River Capital, 61; Allen, “Social and Economic History of
Baton Rouge,” 37; Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 196, 198.
v Richter, “Slavery in Baton Rouge,” 141-2; Gleason, Baton Rouge, 59.
vi See Hard Labor.
vii Ibid., 194.
viii Sacher, Perfect War of Politics, 201; Baton Rouge Gazette, October 3,
1840, as quoted in Sacher, Perfect War of Politics, 101; Eliza Taylor
to Louisa Millard, July 7, 1844, Miles Taylor Papers, LLMVC, LSU
Libraries, as quoted in Sacher, Perfect War of Politics, 123.
ix Rodrigue, “Louisiana’s Capitols,” 12.
x Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 201-2; Davis, Louisiana, 194.
xi Carleton, River Capital, 53-4; Douglas, “Social History of Baton
Rouge,” 25-7; Zachary, “Living with the Enemy,” 3.
xii Bacot, Marie Adrien Persac, 54; Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 16;
Louisiana State School for the Deaf, One Hundred Years of
Educational Progress, 35.
xiii Carrigan, Saffron Scourge, 72, 73, 81.
xiv Zachary, “Living with the Enemy,” 2-3; Carleton, River Capital, 60;
Bannon, Magnolia Mound, 50.
xv Gazette and Comet, July 15, 1857.
xvi Gould, “Gender and Slave Labor in Antebellum New Orleans,” 344.
xvii Fleming, Louisiana State University, 106, 112, 114.
xviii Edward W. Bacon to his sister Kate, May 10, 1862, Edward Woolsey
Bacon Papers, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts.
xix U.S. Navy Department, Official Records, Ser. 1, Vol. 18, 473-6.
xx John Dougherty Papers, June 6, 15, 16, 1862, LLMVC, LSU
Libraries, as cited in Zachary, “Living with the Enemy,” 18.
xxi East, Civil War Diary of Sarah Morgan, 181-2.
xxii Winters, Civil War in Louisiana, 119.
xxiii U.S. War Department, Official Records, Ser. 1, Vol. 15, 553, 630-33.
xxiv Winters, Civil War in Louisiana, 242, 244; William H. Whitney
Letters, September 5, 1863, LLMVC, LSU Libraries, as cited in
Zachary, “Living with the Enemy,” 34; Hollandsworth, Louisiana
Native Guards, 43-46.
xxv Terry L. Seip, “Municipal Politics and the Negro: Baton Rouge,
1865-1880,” in Carleton, Readings in Louisiana Politics, 212.
xxvi Ibid.
xxvii Austerman, “Baton Rouge and the Black Regulars,” 277-86.
xxviii Foner, Freedom’s Lawmakers, 78-9, 127; Vincent, Black Legislators in
Louisiana, 52, 56; Seip, “Municipal Politics and the Negro,” 216-17;
Wetta, “Bulldozing the Scalawags,” 53.
xxix Foner, Freedom’s Lawmakers, 31-32, 127; Vincent, Black Legislators
in Louisiana, 56, 115.
xxx Macdonald, Louisiana’s Black Heritage, 150.
xxxi Seip, “Municipal Politics and the Negro,” 228.
xxxii Ibid., 229.
xxxiii Hogue, An Uncivil War; Taylor, Louisiana Reconstructed, 268.
xxxiv Vincent, Black Legislators in Louisiana, 114; Dawson, Army
Generals and Reconstruction, 107.
xxxv Seip, “Municipal Politics and the Negro,” 216-23.
xxxvi Ibid., 227.
xxxvii Ibid., 231.
Chapter II
i Wall, Louisiana, 244-5.
ii Ibid., 230.
iii Ibid., 230-2; Conrad, Dictionary of Louisiana Biography, Vol. 1, 429;
see also Hard Labor.
iv Wall, Louisiana, 225; Pinkowski, Pills, Pen and Politics, 87, 90; see
also undated biography, Logansport (LA) Inter-State Journal,
clipping, Leon Jastremski Papers, LLMVC, LSU Libraries.
v Twain, Life on the Mississippi, 222.
vi “Resolution of Citizens of Baton Rouge, May 16, 1879,” Leon
Jastremski Papers, LLMVC, LSU Libraries; T. Allain, letter to the
editor, Daily Capitolian-Advocate, May 19, 1882, as quoted in Hair,
Bourbonism and Agrarian Protest, 101.
vii Pinkowski, Pills, Pen and Politics, 85, 94, 95, 118; New Orleans Item,
May 4, 1895, Leon Jastremski Papers, LLMVC, LSU Libraries.
ENDNOTES
73

viii Blight, Race and Reunion, 95; Letter to the editor of the Capitolian-
Advocate, November 23, 1883, as quoted in
home.earthlink.net/~sdriskell/8th/br1999/br990306.htm.
ix Jewett, “Body Politic,” 39.
x Vincent, Southern University, 14.
xi Ibid., 15, 23.
xii Pfeifer, “Louisiana Lynchings, 1878-1946”; New Orleans Daily Picayune,
August 23, 1890, November 22, 1890; Wall, Louisiana, 258-60.
xiii Vincent, Southern University, 65-6, 70.
xiv Ibid., 68.
xv State-Times, February 14, 1914, as quoted in Vincent, Southern
University, 81.
xvi Vincent, “Booker T. Washington’s Tour of Louisiana,” 189-98.
xvii Vincent, Southern University, 94.
xviii Brothers of the Sacred Heart, Century of Service, 239-48.
xix Porter, “Negro Education in Louisiana,” 100; Kingsley, Buildings of
Louisiana, 206.
xx www.olemiss.edu; www.ua.edu; Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 41-3.
xxi Lindig, Path from the Parlor, 40-1.
xxii Ibid., 138; State-Times, September 11, 1914, as quoted in Lindig,
Path from the Parlor, 148.
xxiii Green, Southern Strategies, 139; State-Times, October 31, 1918.
xxiv Lindig, Path from the Parlor, 169.
xxv Advocate, November 8, 2004.
xxvi Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 194.
xxvii Bannon, Magnolia Mound, 83-5; National Register of Historic
Places, Hart House.
xxviii Wilds, Louisiana Yesterday and Today, 86; Weekly Advocate,
September 18, 1897.
xxix Weekly Advocate, September 18, 1897.
xxx Ibid., September 25, 1897.
xxxi Advocate, September 11, 1995; Advocate, September 27, 1999.
xxxii Weekly Advocate, May 16, 1897.
xxxiii Vincent, Southern University, 114; Blankenstein and Phillips, Rotary
in Baton Rouge, 21.
xxxiv Carleton, River Capital, 258.
xxxv Hidy and Hidy, Pioneering in Big Business, 402-3; Allen, Uneasy
Alchemy, 10-11; Baton Rouge Chamber of Commerce publication,
“Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the Greatest of Fresh Water Harbors,”
LLMVC, LSU Libraries.
xxxvi Wall, Louisiana, 244; Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 188-90.
xxxvii Jackson and Owens, “East Baton Rouge and Livingston Parishes.”
xxxviii Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 105.
xxxix “Ask the Advocate,” Advocate, March 27, 2003; “The BREC
Building,” Plan Baton Rouge, online at
www.planbr.org/plan/districts/oscd/oscd06.html.
xl Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 47, 50, 51.
xli Ibid., 53.
xlii Ibid., 58, 59; Blankenstein and Phillips, Rotary in Baton Rouge, 19.
xliii Pamphlet, “7th Port Pageant, Homecoming Celebration, April 15-
21, 1923, Baton Rouge,” LLMVC, LSU Libraries.
xliv Foster, “Baton Rouge May Alter its National Register-listed Golf
Course”; National Register of Historic Places.
xlv Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 204.
xlvi Blankenstein and Phillips, Rotary in Baton Rouge, 7.
xlvii Ibid., 20.
xlviii Ibid., 22; “Ask the Advocate,” Advocate, October 6, 2003.
xlix Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 197-8.
Chapter III
i Kane, Louisiana Hayride, 58; Hair, Kingfish and His Realm, 168.
ii Hair, Kingfish and His Realm, 169-70; Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana,
203; www.oldgovernorsmansion.org/History/index.htm.
iii Blankenstein and Phillips, Rotary in Baton Rouge, 25-6.
iv Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 195, 198-9; “Ask the Advocate,”
Advocate, March 27, 2003.
v Kane, Louisiana Hayride, 93.
vi Markowitz, Deceit and Denial, 18.
vii Kingsley, Buildings of Louisiana, 190-3.
viii Advocate, March 27, 2000.
ix Henry C. Dethloff, “Huey P. Long: Governor, 1928-1932” in
Dawson, Louisiana Governors, 227-33.
x Hair, Kingfish and His Realm, 193; Time, June 16, 1930.
xi Jeansonne, Messiah of the Masses, 144-5.
xii Williams, Huey Long, 782-5.
xiii Ibid., 788.
xiv Ibid., 790.
xv Jeansonne, Messiah of the Masses, 144-5; Hair, Kingfish and His
Realm, 298-300.
xvi Wall, Louisiana, 289.
xvii Curter, Parnassus on the Mississippi, 3-10.
xviii Ibid., 13; Kane, Louisiana Hayride, 18-23.
xix Cutrer, Parnassus on the Mississippi, 20-1; Ruffin, Under Stately
Oaks, 70.
xx Vincent, Southern University, 142.
xxi Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 81-2.
xxii “Baton Rouge, Louisiana: An Industrial, Educational, and
Agricultural Center,” pamphlet, Baton Rouge Chamber of
Commerce, ca. 1938-9, LLMVC, LSU Libraries.
xxiii “History of the Baton Rouge Business and Professional Women’s
Club,” LLMVC, LSU Libraries; The Register, September 24, 1949, p. 8.
xxiv Morning Advocate, April 20, 1969.
xxv Advocate, March 27, 2000.
xxvi Greater Baton Rouge Business Report, January 3, 2006.
xxvii Advocate, September 10, 1995.
xxviii Ibid., December 29, 1997;
http://www.soulofamerica.com/cityfldr2/baton14.html.
xxix Advocate, May 24, 1986.
Chapter IV
i Sanson, Louisiana During World War II, 55-6, 213, 214.
ii Ibid., 253-4.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
74

iii Sanson, Louisiana During World War II, 246-7.
iv Ibid., 255, 258.
v Carleton, River Capital, 186.
vi New Orleans Times Picayune, December 23, 1941, as quoted in
Sanson, Louisiana During World War II, 264; Sanson, Louisiana
During World War II, 269-71.
vii Morning Advocate, May 9, 1945; Sanson, Louisiana During World
War II, 281.
viii Wall, Louisiana, 324-5.
ix Ibid., 326, 340-1.
x Ibid., 338-40.
xi “Our City-Parish Government: A Thumbnail Sketch, 1978.”
xii Fuselier, “Baton Rouge Little Theater.”
xiii Advocate, November 25, 2002.
xiv State-Times, June 26, 1951; Morning Advocate, June 24, 1951.
xv “This is a Roundhouse,” Fortune (July 1958), 101-4.
xvi Personal communication, Pam Bordelon, editor, InRegister
magazine, December 21, 2005.
xvii Ruffin, Under Stately Oaks, 82-98.
xviii Tureaud, oral history interview, 1993.
xix www.lsu.edu/campus/locations/ASSM.html;
www.hoophall.com/halloffamers/Maravich.htm.
xx Price, “Baton Rouge Bus Boycott”; Fairclough, Race and
Democracy, 158-9; Advocate, April 4, 2005.
xxi Price, “Baton Rouge Bus Boycott”; Fairclough, Race and
Democracy, 160, 161, 216.
xxii Adam Nossiter, Associated Press, in Atlanta Journal-Constitution,
August 12, 2003.
xxiii Vincent, Southern University, 165.
xxiv Johns and Moore, “It Happened in Baton Rouge”; Fairclough,
Race and Democracy, 267-8; Frankin, “Patterns of Student
Activism”; Advocate, May 15, 2004; Dyer, “A Delayed Victory.”
xxv State-Times, July 23, 1963; CNN.com, January 16, 2005; USA
Today, January 17, 2005; Madden, “Remembering the Struggle,”
16-17; www.brgov.com/dept/mlk/; All Things Considered, National
Public Radio, January 17, 2005; CNN.com, January 16, 2005;
USA Today, January 17, 2005.
xxvi Advocate, May 16, 2004; Fairclough, Race and Democracy, 332;
State-Times, July 24, 1963; Advocate, July 22, 1965.
xxvii Fairclough, Race and Democracy, 335, 412-14; Minchin, Color of
Work, 97; Hill, Deacons for Defense, 251-53.
xxviii State-Times, July 31, August 7, 1969; Morning Advocate, August 1,
1969; New York Times, January 11, 1972; Fairclough, Race and
Democracy, 422-23.
xxix State-Times, August 7, 1969; Morning Advocate, August 9, 1969.
xxx Advocate, January 1, 2000.
xxxi State-Times, January 11, 1972; New Orleans Times Picayune,
January 11, 1972; New York Times, January 11, 1972.
xxxii State-Times, January 16, 1972; New York Times, January 11, 1972.
xxxiii State-Times, January 16, 1972; New Orleans Times Picayune, January
11, 1972; New York Times, January 11, 1972; Advocate, January 4,
1992, March 10, 1994, December 29, 1997, January 5, 2002.
xxxiv State-Times, January 26, 1972; New York Times, January 11, 1972.
xxxv Guste, “Report of the Attorney General’s Special Commission of
Inquiry on the Southern University Tragedy of November 16,
1972,” 22-3.
xxxvi State-Times, May 2, May 3, 1970.
xxxvii Morning Advocate, July 5, 1970.
xxxviii “Top Weather Events of the 20th Century within the NWSFO
New Orleans/Baton Rouge Service Area” online at
www.srh.noaa.gov/lix/html/top10.htm.
xxxix www.brzoo.org.
xl Economic and Industrial Research, “Economic and Demographic
Analysis,” 79-87.
Chapter V
i Wall, Louisiana, 380.
ii King, “Self-Guided Tour of Baton Rouge,” 18.
iii Peter Elkind, “The Big Easy’s Bad Bet,” Fortune Magazine,
December 8, 1997.
iv Dawson, Louisiana Governors, 270-6; Advocate, November 7,
1998, May 14, 2000.
v Advocate, January 2, 2005.
vi Advocate, May 12, 14, 2000.
vii Atlanta Journal-Constitution, August 12, 2003;
www.privateschoolreview.com/county_private_schools/stateid/LA/
county/22033.
viii Advocate, June 28, 2005.
ix LSU Track and Field Media Guide, 2005, p. 77.
x Advocate, April 7, 9, 16, 17, 1983, March 8, 1998.
xi Ibid., December 24, 1999, January 1, 2000.
xii Ibid., January 1, 2000.
xiii Ibid., July 20, 1995.
xiv Ibid., March 27, 2000.
xv Alexander Garvin, “A Mighty Turnout in Baton Rouge,” Planning
Magazine, October 1, 1998.
xvi Morning Advocate, August 4, 1974.
xvii Advocate, November 22, 2004.
Epilogue
i National Weather Service weather message, August 28, 2005,
10:11 a.m., CDT.
ii Advocate, August 30, 2005.
ENDNOTES
75

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Websites
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Price, Mary. “Baton Rouge Bus Boycott,” available online at http://www.lib.lsu.edu/special/exhibits/boycott/background.html.
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Oral Histories
John C. Rodrigue, “Louisiana’s Capitols: A Historical Retrospective” (speech).
Tureaud, Alexander Pierre, Jr. Oral History Interview, 1993. T. Harry Williams Center for Oral History, Louisiana State University.
✧
In 1952 Governor Robert F. Kennon’s wife,
Eugenia Kennon (center), posed in front of
the Governor’s Mansion with her friends.
Mary Evelyn Dickerson Parker (left) would
later be the state treasurer of Louisiana.
Sarah A. Kors stood on the right.
COURTESY OF THE REGISTER RECORDS, LLMVC,
LSU LIBRARIES.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
79

✧
Louisianan Ben Earl Looney (1904-1981),
the organizer and head of the first Art
Department at LSU, is best known for his
watercolors of Louisiana scenes. Looney
painted Downtown Baton Rouge in 1920.
COURTESY OF THE LSU MUSEUM OF ART.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
Historic profiles of people, businesses,
and organizations that have
contributed to the development and
economic base of Baton Rouge
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
80

Kean’s The Cleaner .......................................................................82
The Baton Rouge Clinic, AMC.........................................................86
Foundation for Historical Louisiana ................................................89
Argosy Casino ..............................................................................90
Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center..................................92
Southern University and Agricultural and Mechanical College System ...94
Baton Rouge Machine Works, Inc.....................................................96
The Dunham School ......................................................................98
Guaranty Corporation .................................................................100
Regal Nails................................................................................102
Taylor, Porter, Brooks & Phillips, LLP ............................................104
Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers .....................................................106
G. N. Gonzales, LLC ...................................................................108
Baton Rouge Area Convention and Visitors Bureau ...........................110
C & C Millworks and
Richard Cappo Construction ....................................................112
The Shaw Group .........................................................................114
Lee Michaels Fine Jewelry ............................................................116
C. J. Brown Realtors ...................................................................118
Gerard Furniture & Gallery .........................................................120
McGlynn, Glisson & Koch ............................................................122
Circa 1857, Art & Architecture/McGlynn Corp Revelopment ..............123
Agway Systems, Inc.....................................................................124
Blue Flash Express, LLC ..............................................................125
Our Lady of the Lake College .......................................................126
Calandro’s Supermarket ...............................................................127
Rabenhorst Funeral Home ............................................................128
Louisiana Companies...................................................................129
Amedisys Home Health Care .........................................................130
Louisiana Workers’ Compensation Corporation ................................131
Louisiana Mud Painting Gallery....................................................132
Baton Rouge General Medical Center .............................................133
YMCA of Baton Rouge..................................................................134
Wilbert Funeral Home .................................................................135
Medical Management Options, Inc. ................................................136
Hannis T. Bourgeois, LLP .............................................................137
Burns & Co., Inc./REALTORS .......................................................138
Woman’s Hospital .......................................................................139
Courtyard Marriott Acadian Centre ...............................................140
Fireside Antiques ........................................................................141
Clear Channel Radio - Baton Rouge ...............................................142
SHARING THE HERITAGE
81

KEAN’S
THE CLEANER
✧
Southern Steam Laundry used horse-drawn
wagons to pick up and deliver laundry.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
82
Since its founding more than one hundred
years ago, the name Kean’s The Cleaner has
come to be synonymous with creating the
look of success for its customers. But had
students at Louisiana State University dressed
as casually as they do today, one of Baton
Rouge’s most successful businesses might
never have come to pass.
Kean’s The Cleaner began in 1900 when
brothers John Selby and Frank H. Kean began
laundering collars for LSU students in a
small building on Government Street. From
that beginning, this customer-focused dry
cleaning enterprise has grown to its present
twenty outlets and 180 employees.
Its latest significant milestone happened
in 2003 when its ownership passed from
the founding Kean family to another Baton
Rouge family, the Rockenbaughs, who are
restoring the luster by rededicating the
business to its traditional emphasis on quality
and customer service.
When it was established in 1900, the
business was known as Southern Steam
Laundry. The Keans not only laundered
clothes, they picked them up and delivered
them via horse-drawn wagons.
In 1906 the brothers Kean moved to Third
Street, one of the city’s major thoroughfares
at the time, and changed the name to Kean
Bros. Through the years, the business operated
several services under names like Kean
Brothers, Kean’s Inc., Red Stick, Tidy Didy
Diaper Service, Kean’s Hospital Laundry,
Loupe’s Cleaners, and Apparelmaster, although
all operated under the Kean partnership.
In 1924 a fire destroyed the Third
Street plant, forcing a move to the corner
of Dufrocq (now North Nineteenth) and
Convention Streets. By 1935, Kean had
added dry cleaning to its services and horsedrawn
wagons gave way to electric trucks.
Frank‘s son, Wilbur, and nephew, Preston
Gordon, started a linen supply business called
Red Stick (the English translation of Baton
Rouge). The name let the people of Baton
Rouge know their business was a local one
and not one from New Orleans. The Keans
demonstrated their devotion to their
employees by funding a full retirement plan
for workers.
By the 1940s, Wilbur, Frank and Tom
Kean had become involved in the Kean family
business. John S. Kean, Jr., standardized Red
Stick’s prices to make the company a
formidable competitor in the Baton Rouge
market. Kean’s became one of the nation’s first
Sanitone licensees and the new Kean’s
slogan—“Spots Don’t Come Back”—hit the
streets with much success.
Kean’s continued to grow in the 1950s. The
company was allowed to purchase gasolinedriven
vehicles, which had been in short
supply in the war years, meaning the electric
trucks that had been part of the Keans’
business were soon a thing of the past. John S.
Kean, Jr., with help from Robert McVea,
Valarie Barouse, Shirley LeBlanc, Randy
Steward and several others, started another
business in the form of Red Stick Uniform
Rental Service, providing the company with
another avenue for diversification.
A third generation of Kean joined the
company through the likes of Frank Kean III,
John Kean III and W. Amiss Kean. They

worked hard to continue the Kean family
tradition of excellence.
By the 1970s, Kean’s had several call
offices and package plants operating in
Baton Rouge, Gonzales, and Plaquemine.
Services included such things as Scotchguard
and Furrier Method Fur Cleaning. The
company joined Varsity International
Conference of Cleaners, an invitation-only
group made up of the world’s finest and most
innovative minds in the fabricare industry.
Frank Kean III and Wayne Price started Kean’s
Apparelmaster Service to service the rental
career apparel needs of the Greater Baton
Rouge area.
The company’s growth made it into the
dominant regional player in both the retail
and commercial cleaning services, providing
services to all of South Louisiana, covering an
area from Lake Charles to New Orleans as
well as Shreveport.
In August 1986, CINTAS purchased
the commercial cleaning services side of
the partnership, while Frank III kept the
twenty-eight retail stores, routes and package
plants under his ownership. Just as from the
beginning, the retail service, which is today’s
Kean’s The Cleaner, remained headquartered
and concentrated in Baton Rouge.
In April 2003, Frank III had put in forty
years “living and breathing” the business begun
by his grandfather. Though the eldest male of
the Kean family had traditionally run the
company, there was no family member in the
next generation ready and eager to take over
for him as he neared retirement age. Therefore,
he recruited a young man named Gerard G.
“Rock” Rockenbaugh, Jr., whom he’d met
through an investment club, to purchase an
interest in the company with an eye toward one
day managing it. Rockenbaugh, a certified
public accountant, became the managing
partner, sharing responsibilities with Kean, for
well over a year. In that time, Rockenbaugh’s
leadership style, enthusiasm and commitment
to the business convinced Kean that he’d found
the right man to take it over. Not only did he
find the right man, Kean realized, but also he
had found the right family to take it over now
that he was ready to retire.
Within three years of that first investment in
Kean’s, Rockenbaugh was poised to become the
new owner. But just as the founders of Kean’s
did, Rockenbaugh was making it a family
business. He and his wife, Missy, and their two
sons, Stephen and Gregory, have worked
behind the counters of every Kean’s location to
get to know the business and its customers.
✧
By 1935, Kean discontinued the horsedrawn
wagons for new electric trucks.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
83

“A great family-owned business is staying
family owned,” Kean said at the time. “Rock
and his family have the energy and dedication
to be the hands-on kind of owners that it
takes to run a business this size that depends
on customer service and quality.”
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
84

A native of Kenner, Louisiana, Rockenbaugh
has lived in Baton Rouge for the past eighteen
years. He has spent most of his professional
career in accounting and finance for several
industries in Louisiana, including construction,
manufacturing, sales and healthcare. Prior to
his association with Kean’s, he spent six years as
chief financial officer of a consortium of
companies with a primary focus on healthcare.
“My wife and I are very visible and
involved in all aspects of the business, but
especially out front where customers and
employees can see us and talk to us,”
Rockenbaugh said. He said he and his family
are committed to supporting community
causes and organizations in the Baton Rouge
area. Rockenbaugh plans to have Kean’s
expand that support. “It’s one of the reasons
our family wanted to be associated with
Kean’s, and we will definitely keep that
tradition going.”
Kean’s is well-known for supporting causes
such as the annual Coats For Kids drive, used
school uniforms collections, the LSU Library’s
used book collection, Baton Rouge Green and
many more worthy causes.
The Rockenbaugh family is committed
to operating Kean’s in the tradition founded
by the Kean family. Rockenbaugh has
already implemented a five-year strategic
plan to reinvigorate the company and to
increase services offered to the community.
The company’s greatest asset, Rockenbaugh
believes, is the expertise of his staff, especially
long-time specialists who have the knowledge
and skill that customers rely upon for every
type of cleaning challenge.
It is a critical and unique element that
separates Kean’s from its competitors, he says.
Among its services that customers can only get
at Kean’s are: same-day service guaranteed or
it’s free, drive-through service, Saturday hours,
locker availability twenty-four hours a day and
night deposit.
Under Rockenbaugh’s leadership, Kean’s
has a forty-five percent or greater market
share in the greater Baton Rouge service area.
In addition to basic dry cleaning, the
company also offers smoke removal, adjust-adrape
drapery cleaning, wedding dress
preservation and renovation as well as Hand
Custom dry cleaning services from one of its
two main plant type shops. Ten plants and
stores have in-car service.
The success of Kean’s has been spectacular
by any measure. The company’s founders and
subsequent generations deserve much credit
for the company’s success. But the real credit
goes to its quality minded employees and the
continued support of Baton Rouge retail and
commercial customers.
Working together, Kean’s The Cleaners will
continue to meet the fabric care needs of Baton
Rouge area residents for decades to come.
For more information or locations of Kean’s
The Cleaner, please visit www.keans.com.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
85

THE BATON
ROUGE CLINIC,
AMC
✧
Above: Urologist Mortimer J. Silvey,
1946-1977.
Below: Surgeon Joseph Sabatier, 1946-1967.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
86
Group medical practices are common in
today’s modern world. It hasn’t always been
that way. What today seems like an obvious
way to improve patient services was a fairly
new phenomenon in 1946 when four young
physicians joined together with a vision of
providing comprehensive medical services for
the entire family.
The four founders—Dr. Joseph Sabatier
(surgery), Dr. Cheney Joseph (internal
medicine), Dr. Gerard Joseph (ear, nose and
throat) and Dr. Mortimer Silvey (urology)—
were drawn together through their training
at Tulane University School of Medicine
and, later, residencies at Charity Hospital
in Louisiana and at Fort Polk during World
War II.
They first discussed the advantages of a
group practice that would operate like the
cooperative efforts they had witnessed
throughout their medical training and army
careers. They hired an attorney to set up a
simple partnership agreement, a corporation
for the practice of medicine and another for
the ownership of property. Each doctor
contributed $4,000 toward the purchase of
fixtures and equipment and in 1946, The
Baton Rouge Clinic was born.
The clinic’s first location was at 2221 Plank
Road above the Pig & Whistle Restaurant, a
location that Dr. Sabatier jokingly referred to
as “a very dignified place.” They purchased
much of the original equipment from army
surplus, including the first X-ray machine
purchased for $7,500.
The clinic quickly outgrew its first facility
and in 1948, relocated to 204 Madison
Avenue. Dr. Melvin Schudmak (obstetrics and
gynecology), Dr. Charles Mosley (surgery)
and Dr. Charles Prosser (internal medicine)
joined the clinic at its Madison Avenue
location, completing the nucleus of the clinic’s
first era.
The clinic offered several innovative
services, including a “Clinic Check,” a
complete physical examination that allowed a
patient to be checked by all the clinic’s
doctors, including X-rays and lab work, for
the discounted price of $50. House calls
played an important role in the practice of
medicine in the clinic’s early days. Clinic
doctors took turns visiting patients at home
and a “wrecking crew” was available to help
clinic doctors with a particular problem at any
time of the day.
Success brought the need for a larger and
more centrally located facility. In December of
1950, the clinic again relocated to 134 North
19 th Street. The clinic’s physicians also
appointed their first administrator, George
Brown, in 1951. In the following years Dr. J.P.
Griffon (obstetrics and gynecology), Dr. Roger
Reynolds (internal medicine), Dr. Bruce Baer
(gastroenterology), Dr. Douglas Gordon
(endocrinology), and Dr. David Kahn

(hematology and oncology) were added to the
clinic’s medical staff.
Dr. Gordon, who had trained in a group
environment in New Orleans, said he was not
really interested in a clinic group at first, but
changed his mind after realizing the working
relationship and tireless commitment of the
clinic doctors. “Here you had a group of
people working together in multi-specialties
literally sharing all aspects of patient care,” he
said. “It was a wonderful working relationship
because everyone encouraged and inspired
everyone else.”
The decades between 1960 and 2000
proved to be a period of rapid growth
for the clinic. In the 1960s, the clinic added
an in-house lab and X-ray department so
patients could have the convenience of
on-site testing. The practice moved to
8415 Goodwood Boulevard in 1975 and
eventually added an additional 16,000
square feet. In 1988, Brown retired and
Edgar H. Silvey, whose father, Dr. Mortimer
Silvey, who was a founder of the clinic,
became the clinic’s second chief executive
officer/administrator.
In 1999, after more physicians joined the
clinic in rapid succession, the clinic moved to
its current 300,000-square-foot location at
7373 Perkins Road. Growth continued at the
clinic and additional space has been added to
accommodate, among other things, an MRI
machine, Infusion Center, Cardiovascular
Disease Prevention Center, Pediatric
Psychology Program, Pediatric Obesity
Program and many new physicians.
Today, the clinic is home to over eighty-five
practicing physicians, a radiology department
and a full-service lab. The medical specialties
have grown to include the following: allergy
and immunology; audiology; coumadin
clinic; dermatology; dietary; ear, nose and
throat; endocrinology; gastroenterology;
industrial and occupational medicine;
internal medicine; neurology; pediatrics;
pediatric neurology; pulmonology and critical
care; radiology; rheumatology; general
surgery; urology; and vascular surgery.
In addition to its physician services, The
Baton Rouge Clinic offers advanced diagnostic
procedures and treatment, including
neurophysiology and cardiology testing
(treadmill and echocardiography), vascular
ultrasound and pulmonary function testing. It
also offers an in-house comprehensive
medical lab certified by Medicare, and an inhouse
state-of-the-art Infusion Clinic.
The clinic’s radiology department, under
the direction of staff radiologists, performs
all routine and many specialized
X-rays, including MRI, MRA and CT scans,
ultrasounds and mammograms using
✧
Above: Baton Rouge Clinic, Perkins Road.
Below: Baton Rouge Clinic, Goodwood.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
87

✧
Above: Internal medicine Dr. Cheney
Joseph, 1946-1958.
Below George Brown, clinic’s first
administrator, 1951-1988.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
88
state-of-the-art mammographic equipment
certified by the FDA and accredited by ACR.
The clinic staff also performs DEXA
bone scans in its radiology department,
which is interpreted by clinic endocrinologists
and rheumatologists. Registered radiologic
technologists perform all exams, and minor
surgery procedures are performed in the office
on an outpatient basis, including laser
procedures for dermatology. Other services
include support personnel trained in health
education, nutrition and patient counseling;
twenty-four-hour physician on-call service;
and a knowledgeable staff to handle your
billing and insurance questions.
The Baton Rouge Clinic has risen to
unforeseen heights since its inception in
1946. Many of the original business
philosophies, however, still play an important
role in the clinic’s operation, including a
modified version of the Tuesday night
meeting to discuss a variety of clinic topics. It
is near impossible for eighty-five physicians to
meet on any given night, but the spirit of the
Tuesday night meeting lives on through
communication and a constant sharing of the
clinic’s goals and philosophies.
Today’s clinic doctors carry on the tradition
of community service and participation in all
aspects of Baton Rouge life. Many serve on
boards of various hospitals, financial
institutions, religious and nonprofit
organizations. They also coach youth teams,
serve as youth group leaders and volunteer as
teachers. Some lead Bible study groups and at
least one performs in a band in his spare time.
“In this day and age, you can’t simply
practice medicine,” said CEO Silvey. “You
have to impact the community and in our
sixty years of service we feel we’ve touched
the lives of thousands of residents in Baton
Rouge and neighboring cities.
“We have no intention of stopping now,”
he continued. “You’ll see and hear from us
quite a bit during our sixty-year celebration
[in 2006] and after that we will go back
to doing what we do best: delivering the
best medical care with the best facilities
in the most caring and compassionate
manner possible.
“The clinic’s main goal during this
celebration will be to thank the community,”
Silvey said. “Since 1946, forethought,
planning and a dedication to service have
helped to establish our reputation for
providing quality care. More than 250,000
patients throughout the southeast region rely
on The Baton Rouge Clinic for their
healthcare needs.”
The clinic’s story and that of the southeast
region are one in the same. The future of
The Baton Rouge Clinic will be one of
continued growth and innovation as it
continues to deliver the best possible
healthcare to future generations.

In 2006 the National Trust for Historic
Preservation named the Foundation for
Historical Louisiana a local partner, a distinguished
title that represents the strongest and
most effective heritage organizations in America.
This partnership would not be acknowledged
today without the hard work of Baton
Rouge’s farsighted, preservation leaders over
forty-three years ago.
In the original 1963 Articles of Incorporation,
the stated purposes for the new organization still
ring true and are benchmarks well over forty
years later for Foundation members, its Board of
Directors, and professional staff.
The Foundation remains steadfast in this
early mission: to preserve the cultural and
architectural heritage of Louisiana, especially
the capital city of Baton Rouge.
The Foundation salutes the first local leaders
who had the vision and the fortitude to join in
the preservation movement that was taking hold
across America: Edward Overton Perkins, Mrs.
Homer D. Spaht, Mrs. Roger M. Fritchie, Mrs.
James H. Hynes, Mrs. Louis W. Babin, Mrs. G. C.
Reeves, Mrs. Frank M. Womack, Mrs. L. Heidel
Brown, Mrs. V. R. Perkins, Mrs. G. T. Owen, Jr.,
and Mrs. E. Leland Richardson. Many more
would follow.
Over the years, two unique landmarks have
been home for the Foundation: The Bailey House
at 900 North Boulevard, from 1965 until 1998,
and The Old Governor’s Mansion at 502 North
Boulevard, from 1998 to the present. Fairfax
Foster Bailey was the first great philanthropist for
FOUNDATION FOR HISTORICAL LOUISIANA
the organization. The Foundation will forever be
indebted to Mrs. Bailey and her children. In turn,
the Foundation wishes to acknowledge the
enlightened leaders, both elected and appointed,
who are colleagues and stewards with the
Foundation on behalf of the landmark Mansion
known as “Louisiana’s White House.” In addition
to being our headquarters, this National Register
of Historic Places landmark is a historic house
museum and a venue for special events, both
public and private.
Today, a listing of Foundation activities and
projects includes the saving of Magnolia Mound
Plantation with the Baton Rouge Recreation and
Parks Commission; ongoing preservation
advocacy, including protecting the Hotel
Heidelberg and Kress and Welsh & Levy
buildings, Heritage Lectures, Preservation
Salons, Lagniappe Tours, The Shop at the Top,
the Mansion Docent Program, Magnolia’s
Memories, membership on the Louisiana State
Museum, and Baton Rouge Convention and
Visitors Bureau boards; a seat on the East Baton
Rouge Parish Historic Preservation Commission;
stewardship of Historic Magnolia and Highland
Cemeteries; the Battle of Baton Rouge
commemorative ceremony; annual preservation
awards; A. Hays Town Plaque Program; historic
house markers; a yearly Old Governor’s Mansion
Gala; heritage-related printed materials; and a
Foundation newsletter.
The Foundation for Historical Louisiana
invites persons with commitment, vision, and a
passion for preservation to become members
and involved with the noble and rewarding
business of “Making the past known and useful
to the present.”
✧
Above: The Old Governor’s Mansion at 502
North Boulevard in Baton Rouge was built
as "Louisiana’s White House" by Governor
Huey P. Long in 1930. This National
Register of Historic Places landmark is an
historic house museum, setting for special
events, and headquarters of the Foundation
for Historical Louisiana, www.fhl.org.
Below: Overton Perkins, first president of
the Baton Rouge Foundation for Historical
Louisiana, presented First Lady Marjorie
McKeithen with tickets and pilgrimage
brochures to the Foundation’s second tour of
homes in 1965.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
89

ARGOSY
CASINO
Located on the Mississippi River in
the downtown historic district, Argosy
Casino – Baton Rouge is a riverboat casino
offering gaming, hotel accommodations,
entertainment, food and fun. With free casino
admission, free parking and valet service,
complimentary cocktails, friendly waitresses
and helpful dealers, Argosy always provides
the customer with a thoroughly enjoyable
experience in Baton Rouge.
Argosy Casino is a subsidiary of Argosy
Gaming Company, a prominent owner and
operator of riverboat casinos, hotels, and
related entertainment facilities in the Midwest
and South. In 2002 the American Gaming
Association recognized Argosy Gaming’s board
with the “Top Performing Board of Directors”
award for the second consecutive year.
The casino evolved from efforts by the City
of Baton Rouge and East Baton Rouge Parish to
revitalize the downtown riverfront, including
Catfish Town, the Baton Rouge River Center
(formerly the Centroplex Convention Center),
and various museums, art galleries and
historic buildings. In 1994, Argosy entered
into an agreement with Jazz Enterprises, Inc.,
(the owner of long-term leases and property
on the riverfront), Baton Rouge, and East
Baton Rouge Parish to operate the casino. Two
years later, Argosy acquired Jazz Enterprises.
A major objective of Baton Rouge and East
Baton Rouge Parish was to construct a fullservice
convention center and hotel. After an
exhaustive search for viable partners, Argosy
committed to funding 100 percent of the $22
million cost. The Sheraton Baton Rouge
Convention Center Hotel opened in 2001.
Argosy, together with its subsidiaries Jazz
Enterprises and Catfish Queen Partnership in
Commendum, invested more than $175
million in downtown Baton Rouge. Argosy
has grown from a riverboat casino that
produced gross revenues of almost $53
million in 1995 (its first full year of operation)
to a first-rate casino, hotel and banquet
facility that reported gross revenues of more
than $97 million in 2004.
Voted “Attraction of the Year” and “Hotel of
the Year” by the Baton Rouge Area Hospitality
Sales Association in 2003, Argosy provides
excellent facilities and services to customers.
With 900 employees, the organization is a
major contributor to the Baton Rouge
economy. The three-deck riverboat casino
features more than 29,000 square feet of
gaming area. This includes more than eight
hundred slot machines, video poker, keno
machines and table games that include
blackjack, Caribbean Stud Poker, minibaccarat,
roulette, craps and Let-it-Ride and a
live poker room. The Sheraton Convention
Center Hotel and Argosy Atrium is adjacent to
the casino complex. The three-hundredroom,
full-service hotel provides exceptional
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
90

accommodations, and Argosy Atrium is fully
equipped for conventions, meetings and
special events.
Live entertainment and a variety of dining
opportunities add to the enjoyment of Argosy’s
patrons. Local jazz musicians perform every
Thursday and Friday evening in the Atrium
Lounge and again at Argosy’s Sunday jazz
brunch, where customers enjoy champagne,
breakfast selections, pasta, seafood and other
dishes, including delicious desserts. Argosy
Atrium Buffet features breakfast, lunch and
dinner buffets, as well as an a la carte breakfast
menu. The Friday night seafood buffet is held
in the garden area of the Argosy Atrium, and
selections include seafood gumbo, shrimp,
snow crab, catfish and crawfish. Butler’s
Pantry Deli is located on the first deck of the
casino and offers “po-boys” and soups from
Louisiana’s world-renowned Chef John Folse.
The deli is open twenty-four hours a day,
seven days a week. For casual dining, Shucks
on the Levee features a menu of seafood
appetizers and entrees, steaks and desserts,
with a large selection of beer, wine and
cocktails. The Atrium Lounge is located in the
Argosy Atrium, and is open daily for
breakfast, lunch and dinner with a menu that
includes soups, salads, sandwiches, roasted
chicken and rib-eye steaks. Breakfast is served
daily until 11:30 a.m.
Argosy Casino is active in a number of
civic organizations, including the Baton
Rouge Chamber of Commerce, Downtown
Development District, Downtown Merchants
Association, Baton Rouge Area Convention
and Visitors Bureau, Hotel/Motel Association,
the Louisiana Restaurant Association and
Baton Rouge Technology Council. In order to
give back to the community, Argosy
contributes to the United Way, USS KID
Fourth of July Celebration, MDA Telethon,
Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Treatment Center,
Battered Women Chef’s Showcase, Susan G.
Komen Breast Cancer Foundation Race for the
Cure and other worthy causes.
Argosy recently opened a live poker room
and plans to add more slot and table
games. The company continues to update
technological offerings through “ticket in—
ticket out” kiosks, player tracking systems,
promotional systems and self-comping
kiosks. Argosy recently opened a 120-seat
seafood restaurant and a coffee shop. With its
forward-looking vision and attention to
customer comfort and convenience, Argosy
Casino is set to remain a vital component of
the Baton Rouge scene for years to come.
Argosy Casino is located at 103 France
Street in Baton Rouge and on the Internet
at www.argosy.com.
✧
Above: Argosy Casino Riverboat Casino.
Below: Sheraton Rouge Convention Center
Hotel opened in 2001.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
91

OUR LADY OF
THE LAKE
REGIONAL
MEDICAL
CENTER
✧
The Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady
standing in front of the original Our Lady
of the Lake Sanitarium. Photo taken in
the 1920s.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
92
For over eighty years, Our Lady of the
Lake Regional Medical Center (OLOL) has
provided care to the greater Baton Rouge
community. Inspired by the vision of St.
Francis of Assisi and in the tradition of the
Roman Catholic Church, the hospital’s
mission is to extend the healing ministry of
Jesus Christ to God’s people, especially those
most in need. Our Lady of the Lake’s strong
sense of mission and purpose sets it apart
from other hospital organizations earning it a
reputation for excellence, safety and quality.
OLOL’s well established healthcare ministry is
referred to by many as the Spirit of Healing.
Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical
Center, together with its affiliated facilities
provides care to a twelve-parish area centered
in Baton Rouge, caring for more than 600,000
outpatients and in-patients each year. The
nonprofit hospital is sponsored by the
Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady, North
American Province and is a member of the
Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health
System Inc. Its sister hospitals are St.
Elizabeth Hospital in Gonzales, Our Lady of
Lourdes Regional Medical Center in Lafayette,
St. Francis Medical Center and St. Francis
North both in Monroe, Louisiana.
“The Lake” as the hospital is colloquially
known grew from its modest beginnings
in 1923 to its present operations as the
largest private hospital in the state. In
1923, Mother Marie de Bethanie Crowley
was named as the administrator of the
hospital and Our Lady of the Lake Sanitarium
opened with one hundred beds, six surgical
suites and a nursing school. The first class of
student nurses, nine young women and one
Franciscan Sister, graduated in 1926.
Originally located on the banks of the
Capitol Lake near downtown, the hospital
outgrew its first location despite several
additions to the original building. In 1978,
Our Lady of the Lake relocated to its
new six-story site on Essen Lane and opened
with 460 beds, ultra-modern surgical suites
and the latest medical equipment. The city
of Baton Rouge has continued to grow
around this hub of medical activity making
this once “country” location the core of a
thriving community.
The Lake has now grown to more than 700
licensed beds, a medical staff nearing 1000
physicians and one of the largest employers in
the area with over 4000 team members. The
Lake is recognized as a regional leader in
cardiology, oncology, pediatric services,
orthopedics and more. For the past eight
decades, OLOL has charted its course for
success by constantly accessing changing
community needs and planning strategic
steps for growth.
Currently, Our Lady of the Lake is moving
forward with its Vision 2020 plan, a $200
million major investment in the hospital’s
current campus. Plans call for over 200 newly
renovated and larger patient rooms in the main
hospital, newly renovated and larger intensive
care units, updated and expanded operating
rooms, new state-of-the-art imaging technology,
a new Heart Center and a new Children’s
Hospital with expanded pediatric services.
Our Lady of the Lake has a strong working
relationship with Cerner Corporation, one of
the leading companies for clinical information
systems technology. Cerner has sought out the
expertise of numerous OLOL clinicians and
leaders to develop its cutting edge products.
Cerner offers the most advanced systems
for computerized charting, tasks, alerts,
diagnostic results and acuity, which allows
caregivers to balance the nursing workload
and provide the timeliest, most accurate care.
Today the hospital is an alpha site for many of
the technologies now enjoyed by other
healthcare organizations across the country. In

fact, OLOL hosts visitors from around the
world to view these systems in action.
Through its partnership with Cerner,
OLOL is the first hospital in the world
using an integrated radiology information
system (RIS) and picture archiving
communications system (PACS) to achieve
a completely film-less environment. This
unified architecture enables clinicians to
view a patient’s entire medical history, as
well as any diagnostic images on a
single application. As a result, mismatching
of images and patient information is
virtually eliminated.
Our Lady of the Lake has been the proud
recipient of National Research Corporation’s
(NRC) Consumer Choice Award for eight
consecutive years. This award identifies
hospitals, which healthcare consumers have
chosen as having both the highest quality and
image in 180 markets throughout the United
States. Winners are determined by consumer
perceptions on multiple quality and image
ratings collected in the National Research
Corporation’s annual NRC Healthcare Market
Guide study.
Our Lady of the Lake has also been
recognized twice by Solucient as a Top 100
Hospital for Cardiology from among all
hospitals across the country, naming the
hospital to the elite group of highest quality
programs. OLOL has added leading edge
diagnostic and interventional technology that
defines the hospital’s leadership for cardiac
services. The team of dedicated physicians
and medical professionals work daily in
partnership to assure the finest care.
In addition, OLOL has also been named a
Solucient Top 100 Hospital for Performance
Improvement Leaders, a category that rates
outstanding operational improvement over
the last five years in the areas of quality,
efficiency, finance and our ability to adapt to
change. Our Lady of the Lake was the only
hospital in Louisiana named to this list and, in
fact, was one of only twenty overall in the
category of large community hospitals.
Our Lady of the Lake is a special place
not only because of its rich history and
tradition, but also because OLOL and its
team members are committed to providing the
finest healthcare to the greater Baton Rouge
community. As a result, the hospital and its
team members have developed a reputation for
excellence in patient safety and satisfaction that
are an integral part of the hospital’s mission.
✧
Above: OLOL uses advanced imaging
technology.
Below: OLOL today.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
93

SOUTHERN
UNIVERSITY
AND
AGRICULTURAL
AND
MECHANICAL
COLLEGE
SYSTEM
✧
Above: Southern University student life.
Below: SU students working in a Chemistry
laboratory in the early 1940s.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
94
Southern University and Agricultural and
Mechanical College came into existence as
the result of efforts by several delegates to
the 1879 Louisiana State Constitutional
Convention. P.B.S. Pinchback, T. T. Allain,
T. B. Stamps, and Henry Demas fought for
creation of the university for the education of
persons of color in New Orleans.
Legislative Act 87, approved in April 1880,
provided for the establishment of a facility
of “arts and letters” competent in “every
branch of liberal education” and to “graduate
students and grant degrees pertaining to
arts and letters…on persons competent
and deserving.”
Southern University opened with twelve
students, five faculty members, one building
and a $10,000 appropriation. With the
passage of the 1890 Morrill Act, the university
was reorganized to receive land-grant funds.
In 1912, Legislative Act 118 authorized
the closing of Southern University in
New Orleans, the sale of its property, and
the reestablishment of the university on a
new site.
In 1914 the new Southern University
opened in Scotlandville, a small community
near Baton Rouge. Southern University in
New Orleans and Southern University in
Shreveport were authorized by legislation in
1956 and 1964 respectively. In later years,
Southern University Law Center and
Southern University Agricultural Research
and Extension Center were created.
Southern University has grown to become
the only historically black land-grant
university system in the United States. Its
mission is to prepare students to compete
globally in their respective professions and
to engage in advanced study in graduate
and professional schools. The university is
committed to a broad program of research
and creative work to stimulate the faculty
and students in a quest for knowledge
and to aid society in resolving its
scientific, technological, socioeconomic and
cultural problems.
The university seeks to enhance student
diversity by emphasizing educational access
for students without regard to gender, ethnic
background, religion, geographical or
national origin, age, or physical challenges.
The university is committed to providing a
safe environment conducive to learning, while
operating in accordance with the highest
standards of management and efficiency.
The institutions in the Southern University
System offer 152 degree programs ranging
from certificates to doctorates, and the
university is a rising star in graduatelevel
and undergraduate-level education.
In the combined disciplines of engineering,
technology, computer science and
mathematics, the university graduates more
African Americans than any other university

in the nation. Nine U.S. military generals are
Southern University graduates.
The Louisiana State Constitution
created the Board of Supervisors for
the Southern University and Agricultural
and Mechanical College System in 1974. The
board is vested with the responsibility
for the management and supervision of
the institutions of higher education,
statewide agricultural programs and other
programs that make up the Southern
University System. The first official meeting
of the Board of Supervisors was held in May
1975 on the Southern University campus in
Baton Rouge.
On May 20, 1999, the portion of
the Southern University at Baton Rouge
campus that borders the Mississippi River
was designated a National Historic District
by the National Register of Historic Places
in Washington, D.C. The 10.5-acre
district includes Riverside Hall, three
ROTC buildings, the Martin L. Harvey
Auditorium, the Old President’s Home and
the Clark gravesites, all located on G. Leon
Netterville Drive.
This site was home to a former plantation.
When the university moved to Baton Rouge
in 1914, there were twelve dilapidated
plantation cabins, a barn, a tool house
and one habitable building on the site,
possibly an overseer’s house built in 1870. It
now serves as the university’s Archives
Building. This structure served many
functions, including a home for the
president, conference center, president’s
office, girls dormitory, dining hall, hospital
and social center and meeting place for the
University Council.
Plans for the center are to create a cultural
and interpretive complex where visitors can
enhance their knowledge of Southern
University’s rich heritage and African and
African American culture.
During its long history, more than 100,000
students have completed their postsecondary
educations at the university. The Southern
University and A&M College System is a
national treasure and a significant contributor
to the cultural, economic, social and political
life of Louisiana and the nation.
The faculty at Southern University are
distinguishing themselves in teaching and
research in every discipline. The administrators
and staff are growing as managers of efficiency,
and students are facing the challenges of
academic rigor and succeeding in becoming
stars in their chosen professions.
The university has grown from its humble
beginnings of twelve students, five faculty
members, one building and a $10,000
appropriation to an operating budget of more
than $200 million, 15,000-plus students from
41 states and 57 nations, 5 campuses, more
than 2,450 faculty and staff and a physical
plant of more than 130 buildings worth more
than $375 million.
The Southern University and Agricultural
and Mechanical System looks forward to
continuing the long-held tradition of promoting
excellence in its academic institutions and
among its faculty and instilling those same
virtues in its students for generations to come.
✧
Above: A classroom from the mid-1950s.
Below: Football players under the direction
of Coach A.W. Mumford
SHARING THE HERITAGE
95

BATON ROUGE
MACHINE
WORKS, INC.
✧
Above: The three founders of Baton Rouge
Machineworks, Inc. (from left to right): Pete
Rounsaville, Walter J. Rivette, and Donald
Dowty, 1961.
Below: Quality Machine Works, Inc., 1961.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
96
Baton Rouge Machine Works, Inc.
(BRMW) is the result of the progression of
talents, dedication and determination, which
began forty-five years ago when Walter
Rivette and Donald Dowty made the decision
to form Quality Machine Works, Inc. The
partners served in the Navy during World
War II and served in their apprenticeships at
Delgado Trade School and Praegar Gear
Company. They later moved to Baton Rouge
and worked at the Standard Oil Refinery. In
the late 1950s, they worked second jobs
where they met another machinist, Pete
Rounsaville, at Clanton’s Machine Shop in
North Baton Rouge. In August 1961 the three
men agreed on a plan to begin their own
company. This was no small decision as the
men were all married with young children.
Soon thereafter, each man borrowed
$10,000 from Louisiana National Bank and
placed a second mortgage on their homes in
order to secure their loans. The newly formed
company was named Quality Machine Works,
Inc. (QMW) because they wanted the name to
reflect their unwritten mission statement and
to set higher standards. To reduce the
overhead expenses, everyone worked and this
included the wives who assumed the
responsibilities of accounting, purchasing and
other inner-office duties. The fledgling
operation set up shop at 4743 Airline
Highway between Scallan’s Meat Market and
the old Gibson’s Shopping Center.
Initially, QMW supplemented Esso and
Kaiser Aluminum with their machine and
equipment repairs. Times were difficult in the
1960s due to the fact that the big companies
had the newest machinery and employed the
best craftsmen. As a result, the men at
QMW often endured eighty-hour workweeks
in order to timely complete projects.
Throughout the years the company continued
to grow and acquired Clanton’s Machine Shop
on Plank Road in 1970.
They worked hard, demanded the best
from their employees and kept spirits high
with their antics. Always the pranksters, the
three maintained their sense of humor. Many
jokes and pranks were played on
unsuspecting employees and visitors alike.
In the early seventies, the partners decided
to separate the businesses. Dowty took
possession of the former Clanton shop on
Plank Road and Rivette took possession of
QMW located on Airline Highway.
As a result of Rivette’s sudden and tragic
death, his oldest son, Glenn, assumed
managerial responsibility. In early 1975, he
joined with his brother-in-law, David
Cancienne, to run the business for the next
several years. Together with the help of
many loyal customers and employees the
business grew but was constrained by its size
and location.
In 1978, Johnny Bowen was hired as a
partner and the first order of business was to
relocate its facility. Property was acquired on
Ronaldson Road and a new building was erected
on a four-acre tract of land located across from
the Stupp Corporation. After this expansion, in
just three years, company sales quadrupled.

By 1981 oil and gas exploration was
at its peak and the business was booming. It
was during this period that the family
business, QMW, was sold to the Union Pump
Company located in Battle Creek, Michigan.
The following year, Rivette and Bowen
formed BRMW to continue manufacturing
proprietary equipment designed by Walter
Rivette. After the eighteen-month no-compete
period following the sale to Union Pump,
Rivette and Bowen made a decision to
continue in the machinery business. BRMW
began manufacturing oilfield tools and
repairing blow out preventors.
The oil and gas industry went into a
recession and a decision was made to sell
the hollow spindle lathes and acquire
Holley Industrial, a company started by
John Holley to service the paper industry. In
1984, BRMW prospered and built a new
facility on land purchased from Walter
Rivette’s widow, Flora Rivette.
With the entry into the paper industry and
increased workload, the existing machine
shop soon became overcrowded. As a result, a
larger roll shop facility, adjacent to the
machine shop, was built in 1987. The new
shop was equipped with two thirty-ton
overhead cranes to handle the ever-increasing
roll work for paper mill customers. The same
year Jody Doiron was hired as the field service
manager to oversee machining projects too
large to be moved. The company had
designed and built specialized machinery to
repair heavy industrial equipment on-site and
had developed a solid reputation for quality
work with the ability to complete projects in a
timely manner. Today, the field services
department has evolved into a major division
of the company and has customers
throughout the United States and Canada.
During the late 1990s, Rivette, Bowen and
Stan Holley joined together to build a new
facility, Holley Machinery Services (HMS),
located in Prattville, Alabama. HMS is a sister
company of BRMW and employs twelve with
annual sales of $2 million.
As with the rest of the industry, BRMW
continues to modernize and convert
its machinery to computerized numerically
controlled (CNC) equipment. CNC lathes,
machining centers, vertical and horizontal
boring mills set the pace in the
production and new standards in precision
machine manufacturing.
Today, BRMW’s annual revenue is over $10
million with seventy employees serving 150
customers in twenty states and five countries.
Machinery and equipment designed and built
by BRMW is used in specialty processes in many
industries and countries throughout the world.
Walter Rivette would be amazed if he were
able to see the progression of the machine
industry and the growth of the seeds he
planted in 1961. He would be proud of all the
men he trained and touched during his life.
✧
Above: Johnny Bowen (left) and Glenn
Rivette (right) with a machining turbine
case, 1981.
Below: Baton Rouge Machine Works, Inc.’s
eighty-thousand-square-foot
manufacturing facility.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
97

THE DUNHAM
SCHOOL
The Dunham School, like many
worthwhile endeavors, owes its existence to a
small group of people who wanted to make a
difference in their lives and the lives of others.
In The Dunham School’s case, it was a group
of five Baton Rouge families who, in 1979,
sought to educate their children in a strong
academic program that was distinctly
Christian. After months of research and
prayer, these families established the Baton
Rouge Christian Education Foundation in
November 1980. They chose the name, The
Chapel School, from the belief that the center
of a Christian school should be the chapel.
Today, this independent, interdenominational
school provides students with the
opportunity for college preparatory education
set in the framework of Christian education
and example. This coed Christian day school
serves more than 650 students in prekindergarten
through twelfth grade.
It all began with eighty-nine students. On
September 1, 1981, The Chapel School opened
in its temporary location at The Chapel on the
Campus at Louisiana State University, enrolling
students in grades kindergarten through fifth.
One of the country’s leading educators, W.
Terry Harrison, was appointed headmaster.
Under his capable leadership, the vision of the
founding families came to life. A year later, the
foundation purchased a facility on Lanier Drive
in North Baton Rouge, which previously had
housed the Hardwicke-McMasters School.
Anticipation grew as parents pitched in to
prepare the building for occupancy. The
Chapel School opened its doors for classes at
the new location in August 1982.
By the 1985-1986 school year, enrollment
had climbed to 289 students; the school
had outgrown its space. Board members
prayed round the clock for the school’s clear
direction and needs. God answered their
prayers with a loud “Yes!” In February 1986
the school purchased the twenty-three acre
property on Roy Emerson Drive occupied by
Trafton Academy.
The Chapel Schools/Trafton Academy
opened in the fall of 1986. New Headmaster
Rob Gustafson worked tirelessly to blend
The Chapel School and Trafton families
without compromising the original mission.
The strong educational and spiritual
leadership provided by Gustafson, further
defined and modeled the original mission
and vision of the founding families. During
his tenure, following a name change
study, the school’s official name was
changed to The Chapel Trafton School
in 1988. The school’s third headmaster,
J. Robert Mayfield, began his tenure in June
1989. Classes began that fall with an
enrollment of 354; yet the school still
struggled to meet operational needs and
reduce accumulated debt.
In early 1990, the, Board entered into
negotiations to reduce the balance of the
property debt. In meeting after meeting, God
moved to help those involved come to
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
98

agreement on an acceptable amount. During this
time, Mayfield approached longtime supporter,
Katharine O. Dunham, for her help. Dunham
generously agreed to a substantial donation;
however the sum fell short of the amount
needed. Families at the school responded,
contributing the remaining balance—plus
$26.31 donated by students including one
lower school student who emptied his piggy
bank to “save the school.” His touching gesture
is representative of the sacrifices families
willingly made to sustain the school.
In 1995 the Board voted to honor Dunham
for her generosity and on July 1, 1996,
officially changed the school’s name to The
Dunham School. James Adare, the School’s
fourth headmaster arrived in 1997. Under his
leadership, the school created a more
challenging educational environment,
initiating a stronger writing program and
changes in foreign language and math
programs. The introduction of the Harkness
method of instruction, the Advisory Prefect
Programs have all contributed to The
Dunham School’s strong academic program
and distinct approach to teaching.
After setting the bar for academic excellence
at a higher level, Adare left the school in 2003.
Dr. Melanie Ezell served as Interim Head of
School for the next three years. In 2005, The
Dunham School was recognized as a Blue
Ribbon School of Excellence by the U.S.
Department of Education, one of only four
kindergarten through twelfth grade private
schools in the nation.
What is distinctive about the college
preparatory education that Dunham offers? It
begins with Dunham’s desire to excellently
educate the whole child: academically,
physically, socially, and spiritually. An
education of the mind and the heart for
Christ.” The key to this distinctive approach
is the Dunham faculty who serve as role
models in every area as men and women
mature in their professional growth and
Christian faith. Further, it is the personalized
and individual approach to education with
high expectations of personal accountability,
responsibility, and commitment to the
spiritual growth of its students that sets The
Dunham School apart.
For twenty-five years, The Dunham School
has been a living testament to God’s continued
faithfulness and provision. On June 1, 2006, a
new era of leadership began with the arrival of
Robert “Bobby” Welch as the school’s fifth
headmaster. Dunham now stands poised to
move forward in faith to meet the
opportunities and challenges that lie ahead in
the next twenty-five years.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
99

GUARANTY CORPORATION
For almost eighty years, Guaranty
Corporation has remained true to the
ideals established by its founder in providing
services to the people of Southeast
Louisiana and the nation. A Baton Rougebased
holding company that dates back
to 1926, Guaranty Corporation holdings
include Guaranty Income Life Insurance
Company, Guaranty Income Mortgage
Company, Guaranty Senior Living Facilities
and Guaranty Broadcasting Corporation.
Throughout its history, Guaranty has
taken pride in the loyalty of customers,
employees, and radio listeners in accounting
for its success. The company has provided
life insurance for several generations of
families. Current employees have worked
an average of 15 to 20 years for the company.
And loyal listeners to Guaranty’s local radio
station have made it possible for the company
to dominate in their markets.
George A. Foster, Sr., founded Guaranty
Bond and Finance Company, later renamed
Guaranty Corporation, with a $100,000 capital
investment. The son of a cotton farmer, Foster,
Sr. grew up in Grant Parish in Central
Louisiana. He attended Mount Lebanon
College where he studied business for three
years. As a young man, Foster sold fire
insurance policies to supplement his income
and later founded both fire and life insurance
companies in New Orleans. In 1926, he moved
his business to Baton Rouge.
From 1926 to 1961, with Foster, Sr. as
chairman of the board, the company grew
along with the City of Baton Rouge. Initially,
the company occupied offices in the Louisiana
National Bank building on Third Street. In the
early 1950s, Guaranty moved its headquarters
to its present site on the corner of East
Boulevard and Government Street, originally
the site of Baton Rouge General Hospital.
Guaranty Income Life Insurance (GILICO)
is the largest subsidiary of the corporation.
A central component of Guaranty from its
inception, GILICO has a record of solid
performance throughout its history. GILICO
reported $415 million in assets in 2003 and
was licensed in 31 states. Independent agents
write universal life insurance policies, longterm
care insurance policies and annuities.
Guaranty has grown through acquisitions
of other insurance companies over the
years, companies such as General Life
Insurance of Missouri, Petroleum Life
Insurance of Beaumont and Houston
American Life Insurance.
The stated mission of Guaranty Income
Life is to develop, distribute and support
life insurance products and annuities in
the most effective manner in order to
build value for policyholders, employees,
shareholders and associates. The success
of the company is based on high ethical
standards, efficient and friendly service,
sound investments and innovative products.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
100

In 1961, when George Foster, Jr. assumed
chairmanship of Guaranty Corporation,
the company embarked on an ambitious
growth and diversification phase. Guaranty
now owns a number of radio stations,
both FM and AM/FM in Louisiana and is
one of the top three radio broadcasting
groups in the Baton Rouge metropolitan
area. The company has a long history
of successful broadcasting ventures dating
back to the early 1960s when it purchased
WAFB-TV, which was later sold. In 1968,
Guaranty obtained the license for WAFB-
FM, broadcasting the popular music of
the day. Now called WDGL-FM Eagle
98.1, the station’s current format consists
of classic rock dating from the 1960s.
The station maintains high ratings and
is one of Baton Rouge’s top revenueproducing
radio stations. Guaranty also
operates 107.3, Country Legends and
WYPY, 100.7 Young Country, as the country
music format is experiencing resurgence
in popularity.
Guaranty Corporation has had considerable
success investing in real estate and its
development over the past decades. Holdings
in Southeast Louisiana include office
condominiums, recreational condominiums,
shopping centers and office buildings. One of
its newer investments targets the growing
retirement market with senior living
communities and other retirement facilities in
Baton Rouge and northwest Arkansas.
Guaranty Corporation’s image has long
been one of stability and consistency.
Guaranty is very much a family-owned
and-operated entity, with three generations
of the Foster family active in the business
at various times.
Four of Foster, Jr.’s, six children, as
well as other family members, have
worked in the company. Nevertheless,
an important element of the company’s
success is based on the acceptance of
change. The company has always maintained
state-of-the-art, in-house computer facilities,
for example, and continues to adopt the
latest technology in its operations. The
company has also diversified to meet
the perceived needs of its customers and
of the general population.
This combination of stability and
adaptability to change is likely to result in
the continuation of Guaranty Corporation’s
success in future years. For more information
on Guaranty Corporation, visit Guaranty on
the Internet at www.gilico.com.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
101

REGAL NAILS
✧
Above: Quy “Charlie” Ton.
COURTESY OF DAVID WOOD
Right: Front row (left to right)-Sheila Ton,
Lila Ton; Back row (left to right)-Charlie
Ton, Phuong Le.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
102
Quy “Charlie” Ton did not want to leave
Vietnam the day he climbed into a boat with
sixty-seven other Vietnamese citizens and set
sail across the South China Sea. He did it
because his mother insisted there was no
future for him in their Communist country
and pushed him to follow the lead of an older
brother who had already left the country.
The wooden boat cruised three thousand
miles before fishermen spotted them and
guided the boat to the Philippines. A Catholic
charity took Ton in and nine months later he
received permission to immigrate to the
United States. He moved to New Orleans to
live with his brother and another relative. He
graduated high school and enrolled in
Louisiana State University as a chemical
engineering major.
A friend and fellow student convinced him
to switch his major to business because he
would make more money as a business owner
than he would working for someone else.
He began his business career importing
nail supplies, in part, because his wife owned
a nail salon and her customers wanted quality
nail care products without having to pay
exorbitant prices. He named the company
Alfalfa Nails Supply after the flowers loved by
the bees he tended as a work/study student
at LSU. He began by selling to local nail
salon owners and expanded throughout the
United States.
Today, Alfalfa Nails Supply has more than
ten thousand salon customers. Ton has
developed many lines of nail products
including well-known brands like Regal
lacquers, ANS, QT, Lexi, Sheila, and Lila. He
engineered, developed and now produces
Diane, Lexi, and HT-135 PS brand pedicure
spas and designs, and builds much of the
furniture used in his second business venture.
That business venture—Regal Nails—took
root in 1997 while shopping in Wal-Mart with
his wife. He noticed that Wal-Mart had a hair
salon on site and yet it had no nail salons.
Based on that observation, Ton developed the
concept that became Regal Nails salons. Regal
Nails was actually started by Bo Huynh, who
began with one salon in 1996.
Huynh tried to expand the concept into a
shopping mall and found it too complicated.
He realized he needed a partner to make it
work and eventually met up with Ton. Ton
developed a system to handle the acquisition
of sites, build-outs, decorating, furnishing
and installing everything needed to run a
franchise. He took over responsibility for the
overall administration, development, growth,
planning and quality control.
Ton met with Wal-Mart officials to
convince them to lease space to Regal Nails.
Wal-Mart turned him down at first because
they did not think the concept would work.
Ton refused to give up. He kept after Wal-
Mart officials until they agreed to let him open
a test store in Shreveport, Louisiana.
The first Regal Nails opened on October
29, 1997. The salon proved so successful that
Wal-Mart agreed to let him open other salons
inside their stores. He began selling franchises
to Vietnamese immigrants and within seven
years Ton had sold more than 700 franchises
with plans to reach 1,000 soon. Franchises
are located inside Wal-Mart Supercenters, K-
Mart, Meijer and Publix Food Stores. They are
growing at a rate of a hundred per year. Ton is

also opening company owned salons because
revenues he receives from a company owned
salon are ten times those of a franchised salon.
Ton’s next business venture had nothing to
do with nail care. It evolved, rather, from his
love of coffee and saltwater fish. Charlie’s
Coffee Shops are a marriage of the two loves.
He owns several stand-alone stores featuring
wraparound fish tanks. Both children and
adults enjoy Charlie’s Coffee Shops. Children
enjoy petting the life fish while they are
enjoying their drinks, and students come to
study and take advantage of free Internet
access. Ton opened his first coffee shop in
September 2003 and hopes to grow the
concept through Wal-Mart stores.
Ton has won numerous awards for such a
young man. They include “Young Alumnus of
the Year” from the LSU Alumni Association
Hall of Distinction; “Top Forty Under Forty”
from the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report
and “Young Businessperson of the Year” from
the Baton Rouge Business Awards & Hall of
Fame. He also serves on the Baton Rouge
Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors.
Gross revenues for Alfalfa Nails Supply is
around $10 million per year. Ton employs 50
people in the nail division and more than 50
in the coffee shops. He owns six warehouses
on an industrial street in Baton Rouge and the
Regal Nail franchises are growing in number
and value per unit.
Ton would be the first to admit that
making money is fun. The real joy for him
and other successful business owners,
however, comes not from padding their bank
accounts. It comes, instead, from taking an
idea, turning it into a successful business
venture and growing that venture until it
reaches its maximum potential.
And Ton has certainly done that.
✧
Top: Front cover of Greater Baton Rouge
Business Report.
Below: Charlie Ton and Mayor Kip
Holoden.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
103

TAYLOR,
PORTER,
BROOKS &
PHILLIPS, LLP
✧
Right: James R. Fuller, Laurance W. Brooks
and Charles W. Phillips circa 1938.
Below: Benjamin B. Taylor in his first law
office in 1912.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
104
Baton Rouge was a bustling river town of
15,000 when Benjamin B. Taylor and Charles
V. Porter formed a law partnership in
1912. The two men shared an unrelenting
commitment to excellence in every aspect of
the practice of law and together they laid the
foundation for a legacy of excellence that
persists to this day.
Taylor, Porter, Brooks & Phillips, one of the
oldest, largest and most respected law firms
in Louisiana, enjoys a reputation as a highly
trusted and capable provider of comprehensive
legal services. This reputation is reflected in
the many longstanding relationships with a
wide array of clients ranging from local,
regional, national and international interests.
We represent a variety of clients, including
established public and private companies,
banks, insurance companies, governmental
agencies, partnerships, individuals, estates and
not-for-profit organizations.
Laurance W. Brooks became a partner in
the firm in the 1920s when the firm expanded
its client list and relocated its offices from the
Reymond Building on Third Street to larger
offices in the new Louisiana National Bank
building, also on Third Street. The firm,
which had already secured clients like
Louisiana National Bank, the Baton Rouge
Water Company and the Baton Rouge
Transportation Company, added the Baton
Rouge Electric Company to its list of clients.
The firm’s tradition of community
leadership and involvement began very early.
A notable example was the work of Taylor in
joining with a small group of community
leaders in signing a $50,000 note to purchase
land for Louisiana State University. The
university moved to the site in 1925 and has
remained there since.
In the 1930s, Congress passed the National
Labor Relations Act, creating a new practice
area for the firm. Charles W. Phillips joined
the firm in 1938 as a labor law specialist
and litigator. A year later, newspapers
documented scandals at LSU, and Taylor was
appointed to represent the university. That
began a relationship between the firm and
the university that continues to this day.
The war effort of the 1940s brought
new industry to the area. Allied Chemical
Corporation and Permanente Metals Corporation
(now known as Kaiser Aluminum and Chemical
Company) became clients. The firm developed
a large insurance and employer-defense
practice throughout Louisiana that continues
to the present.
The firm’s practice expanded as the
region’s population and economic base grew.
Throughout the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, the
firm played a large role in helping existing
and new industry conduct business in the
state. New challenges for the firm included
administrative and regulatory law, business

and corporate law, taxation, mineral law,
products liability and workers’ compensation.
The recession of the 1980s spurred
continued growth at the firm in the corporate,
banking, bankruptcy and taxation law arenas.
In the mid 1980s, construction began on a
companion building adjacent to the one
where the firm had relocated on Florida
Street. In 1988, with forty-six attorneys on
staff, the firm expanded its offices by
occupying space in both buildings connected
by a skywalk.
The 1990s brought the successful
resolution of Louisiana higher education
desegregation litigation. The firm represented
LSU’s Board of Supervisors throughout
the twenty-year process by protecting its
institutions from misguided remedies and
advocating its goal for a resolution that
improved the opportunity for and quality of
public higher education in Louisiana.
The firm seized the opportunity to
represent the gaming industry when it came
to the state in the 1990s. That expertise led to
a role as special counsel to the state to protect
Louisiana’s interest in the complicated legal
and financial issues created by the bankruptcy
of the land-based casino in New Orleans.
As in other states, class action and other
major litigation threatened business and
industry in Louisiana and Taylor, Porter,
Brooks & Phillips expertly defended many
clients exposed in such potentially dangerous
litigation. In 1999, some of the state’s leading
authorities on environmental law joined the
firm. Their expertise in regulatory and toxic
tort issues has proven invaluable to clients
who must be responsive to the concerns of
regulators and the growing sensitivities of the
general public.
As the twenty-first century began, Baton
Rouge had grown to more than 600,000
people. The firm had grown fifty percent in
the previous decade alone thanks in large part
to its dedicated team of attorneys and support
staff. The firm has embraced technology that
allows it to communicate advice and react to
issues faster than ever.
The combination of distinguished
academic credentials, professional training,
the highest ethical standards and, most
importantly, the demonstrated ability of the
firm’s attorneys has enabled Taylor, Porter,
Brooks & Phillips to meet our clients needs,
including those involving unique and
complex legal issues.
As a full-service law firm, Taylor, Porter’s
capabilities cover the spectrum of civil law,
including state and federal trial and appellate
practice. We remain committed to excellence
and quality representation, whether they
are litigating multimillion-dollar cases for
major corporations or handling matters for
individuals and small businesses.
Qualities like excellence, value, teamwork
and personal service were the cornerstones of
the firm when it was formed in 1912, and they
will continue to be the principles that direct
our growth into the twenty-first century.
✧
Above: Taylor Porter attorneys confer on
a case.
SHARING THE HERITAGE
105

RAISING
CANE’S
CHICKEN
FINGERS
✧
Above: Todd Graves with his companion
Raising Cane.
Below: Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers has
more than 50 locations in 11 states.
HISTORIC BATON ROUGE
106
Some people just don’t know when they’re
licked. They keep picking themselves up and
taking another swing just to be knocked down
again. They lie there for a while thinking, “Next
time will be different,” and they get up and go
at it again.
But even the most stubborn eventually
give up.
Fortunately for the business world and
lovers of chicken finger meals, Todd Graves is
not among them. Most people would have
given up on opening a restaurant like his when
confronted with a steady stream of naysayers
who said someone without restaurant
experience could not possibly make a living at