Archaeology
Evans Culture
This entry covers the prehistoric Evans culture during the Middle Archaic Period, 6000–2000 BCE.
Archaeology
Archaeology Index
Archaeology
Pre-Clovis and Clovis Cultures
This entry covers the Pre-Clovis and Clovis cultures during the Early Paleoindian Period, 11500–9500 BCE, and Middle Paleoindian Period, 9500 BCE–8800 BCE.
Archaeology
Marie Thérèse Coincoin
Coincoin, a formerly enslaved woman freed in colonial Natchitoches, is an icon of American slavery and Louisiana’s Creole culture.
Archaeology
Los Adaes
The history of the fort, mission, and settlement of Los Adaes reflects both intercolonial rivalry and cooperation among the Spanish, French, and Native Americans who lived along the border of New Spain and French Louisiana.
Architecture
Architecture IndexArchitecture
Promised Land Plantation
Leander Perez purchased Promised Land in 1925 and occupied the plantation house until the early 1960s.
Architecture
Thomas Kelah Wharton
Louisiana artist and architect Thomas Wharton is best known for the writings and sketches he kept in a daybook.
Architecture
Henry Hobson Richardson
Louisiana-born architect H. H. Richardson is one of the most notables American architect of the late nineteenth century.
Architecture
Charles Colbert
Architect Charles Colbert's contributions to the shaping of mid-Twentieth Century architecture in southern Louisiana are profound.
Art
Art IndexArt
Boyd Cruise
Alvyk Boyd Cruise was a multitalented artist and historian in New Orleans during the mid-twentieth century.
Art
Bruce Brice
Bruce Brice's street murals in the Treme neighborhood of New Orleans helped him earn the first-ever artist's commission for the official poster of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.
Art
Louis Sahuc
Louis Sahuc came of age as a photographer in New Orleans in the 1970s as a member of a dynamic though informal group of photographers and designers who sought to find their calling in a field that was exploding with both artistic and commercial possibilities.
Art
Roy Ferdinand
Artist Roy Ferdinand chronicled the street life and characters from some of New Orleans' toughest neighborhoods with graphic, head-on representations of his subjects.
Business & Industry
Business & Industry IndexBusiness & Industry
Oil and Gas Industry in Louisiana
The oil and gas industry has been a dominant economic engine in Louisiana for well over a century.
Business & Industry
Francois Seignouret
Francois Seignouret, a financially successful businessman and investor, became known as one of the greatest cabinetmakers in New Orleans, though there is no evidence that he ever made furniture with his own hands.
Business & Industry
Samuel Zemurray
Samuel Zemurray was key to creating a global banana industry that generated great wealth, often at the expense of Latin American laborers, democracy, and economic development.
Business & Industry
Urban Slavery in Antebellum Louisiana
Enslaved people in Louisiana’s cities were engaged in virtually every labor role, from domestic service to dentistry.
Disasters
Disasters IndexDisasters
New Orleans Flood of 1849
The flood of 1849 was the worst in New Orleans history until Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005.
Disasters
Hurricane Gustav
Hurricane Gustav was the first major storm to test New Orleans’s rehabbed defenses after Hurricane Katrina.
Disasters
Belle Isle Salt Mine Collapse
Once one of the most productive salt mines in the country, the Belle Isle Salt Mine was the site of numerous deadly accidents.
Disasters
Hurricane Camille
Hurricane Camille struck coastal Mississippi in mid-August of 1969, marking the first designated Category 5 storm and one of Louisiana’s most storied tropical weather events.
Folklife
Folklife IndexFolklife
Louisiana Folktales
Louisiana’s folktales have been influenced by Indigenous peoples and the many cultural and ethnic groups that have immigrated to the state.
Folklife
Canray Fontenot
The music of Creole fiddler Canray Fontenot cuts across a variety of musical genres: Cajun, zydeco, and blues-waltzes, a unique style combining elements of blues and jazz.
Folklife
David Butler
Well known in for his audaciously decorated home and lawn, David Butler fashioned whimsical, brightly painted assemblages from salvaged roofing tin to become one of the twentieth century's most widely collected self-taught artists.
Folklife
All Saints Day
All Saints Day or All Hallows Day is a Catholic tradition honoring the saints and also deceased family members each November 1.
Foodways
Foodways IndexFoodways
Muffuletta Sandwich
The muffuletta–a mammoth sandwich of round sesame bread layered with Genoa salami, ham, mortadella, cheese, and olive salad–is a signature dish of New Orleans.
Foodways
Sagamité
Entry describes sagamité, a range of cornmeal-based soups, stews, and porridges with Native American origins that became a common component of French colonial cuisine.
Foodways
Avery Island
Located in Iberia Parish, Avery Island, the largest of five salt domes along the Louisiana coast, is the home of the McIlhenny Company, maker of Tabasco brand products for more than 140 years.
Foodways
Citrus Industry
Louisiana’s citrus industry traces its origins to the early 1700s, but the effects of climate change increasingly threaten its long-term viability.
Geography
Geography IndexGeography
Fontainebleau State Park
The Fontainebleau State Park bears the name of Bernard de Marigny's sugar plantation, which formerly occupied this site and was itself named after the estate of the French king Francois I.
Geography
Coastal Master Plan
In response to decades of warnings about land loss, Louisiana released its first Coastal Master Plan in 2007.
Geography
Mandeville
Mandeville was founded in 1834, occupying part of what was formerly the sugar plantation of Bernard de Marigny de Mandeville in Louisiana.
Geography
Red River Raft
The Great Raft was a thousand-year-old logjam in the Red River that prevented transportation downriver to New Orleans.
Government, Politics & Law
Government, Politics & Law IndexGovernment, Politics & Law
E. A. Burke
Edward Austin Burke, known as Major E. A. Burke, was a Louisiana politician during the Reconstruction era.
Government, Politics & Law
Alexandre Mouton
Alexandre Mouton, the first Democratic governor of Louisiana, served from 1843 to 1846.
Government, Politics & Law
Caddo Indian Treaty
The Caddo Indian Treaty of 1835 between the Caddo people of northwestern Louisiana and the US government resulted in a protected American boundary with Mexico, the relocation of the Caddo from Louisiana to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), and the establishment of present-day Shreveport.
Government, Politics & Law
Battle of Baton Rouge (1862)
Union and Confederate troops fought to secure the strategic town on the Mississippi River.
History
History IndexHistory
Arts and Crafts Club of New Orleans
Between 1922 and 1951, the Arts and Crafts Club of New Orleans worked to enrich and expand the city’s artistic heritage and served as one of its cultural centers.
History
Isaac Johnson
Beginning his term just after the passage of the Constitution of 1845, Governor Johnson was determined to uphold its somewhat controversial provisions including the elimination of property qualifications that limited the voting pool, and the creation of a public school system.
History
Slavery in French Colonial Louisiana
As early as 1699, when Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville first began to develop the French colony of Louisiana, he petitioned the king to allow a slaving expedition to the west coast of Africa to procure captive laborers.
History
New Orleans Tribune
America’s first Black daily newspaper, the New Orleans Tribune served as an organizing tool for Black activists as they campaigned for rights for men of African descent with an emphasis on building solidarity with the formerly enslaved.
Literature
Literature IndexLiterature
Victor Séjour
Victor Séjour’s 1837 story “Le Mulâtre” is considered the first work of published fiction by an African American writer.
Literature
New Orleans Women's Book Clubs
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, women’s book clubs became increasingly popular in New Orleans.
Literature
Anne Rice
Anne Rice, a New Orleans-born author, was well known for her historical novels and fictional vampires.
Literature
Kate Chopin
Kate Chopin, one of Louisiana's best known authors, wrote fiction about late nineteenth-century Cajun life.
Music
Music IndexMusic
Captain John Handy
Captain John Handy was an early New Orleans traditional jazz, blues, and rhythm and blues alto saxophone player.
Music
Amédé Ardoin
One of southern Louisiana's first great recording artists was Creole accordionist and singer Amédé Ardoin.
Music
Lil Wayne
Lil Wayne is one of the best-known rappers from New Orleans, having reached the status of a global celebrity.
Music
Emile Barnes
Emile Barnes was a ragtime, early jazz, and brass band clarinetist from New Orleans, perhaps best remembered for his distinctive, blues-inflected sound and performance style.
Peoples of Louisiana
Peoples of Louisiana IndexPeoples of Louisiana
Climate Migration
Climate migration occurs when people move away from home due to extreme environmental conditions worsened or caused by climate change, such as hurricanes, coastal erosion, sea level rise, flooding, and fires.
Peoples of Louisiana
Quapaw Tribe
The Quapaw Indians, whose four villages were located along the Arkansas River, were military allies and trade partners of colonial Louisianans.
Peoples of Louisiana
Cajuns
Cajuns are the descendants of Acadian exiles from what are now the maritime provinces of Canada–Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island–who migrated to southern Louisiana.
Peoples of Louisiana
Caddo Nation
Caddo people began to inhabit the Red River valley approximately 2,500 years ago.
Religion & Spirituality
Religion & Spirituality IndexReligion & Spirituality
Winnsboro Easter Rock
Held on the Saturday before Easter Sunday, this women-led vigil includes counterclockwise percussive foot movement and call-and-response singing.
Religion & Spirituality
St. Joseph Altars
Catholic Louisianans of Sicilian descent erect altars laden with fresh produce, baked goods, and other foods to honor Saint Joseph.
Religion & Spirituality
King Cake
A round, braided cake consumed during the Carnival season across Louisiana, especially in New Orleans.
Religion & Spirituality
Wesley Chapel
One of the first Black Protestant churches in Louisiana, Wesley Chapel played pivotal roles in social and political movements, from teaching freed Black women to read after the Civil War to engaging in the civil rights movement.
Science & Technology
Science & Technology IndexScience & Technology
Coastal Restoration
For a state experiencing land loss at an alarming rate, coastal restoration has become an urgent need.
Science & Technology
Flint-Goodridge Hospital
Flint-Goodridge Hospital opened in 1896 to serve New Orleans’s Black community and provide medical training for Black nurses and physicians at a time when other hospitals denied services to Black people.
Science & Technology
Sherwood “Woody” Gagliano
Woody Gagliano sounded the alarm on Louisiana’s coastal land loss crisis and worked with his colleagues for decades to remedy the problem.
Science & Technology
Cholera in Louisiana
During the nineteenth century, cholera epidemics caused tens of thousands of deaths throughout the state of Louisiana.
Sports & Recreation
Sports & Recreation IndexSports & Recreation
Buddy Friedrichs
New Orleans sailing champion Buddy Friedrichs won a gold medal in the 1968 Summer Olympics in the Dragon Class.
Sports & Recreation
J. D. Mooney
Jockey J. D. Mooney was the son of a riverboat captain and horse breeder from New Orleans.
Sports & Recreation
Karl Malone
Karl Malone teamed with guard John Stockton while with the National Basketball Association's Utah Jazz to form perhaps the greatest guard-forward combo in league history.
Sports & Recreation
Connie Ryan
Louisianan and major league baseball player Connie Ryan played for the New York Giants.
