Timeline of Louisiana
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40 Million The whale species
Basilosaurus (king lizard) isis was discovered in 1904. Paleontologists
found bones of this creature in the 1830s in Louisiana. Fossils were
found by U of Mich. paleontologist P.D. Gingerich in Egypt in 1989.
With tiny hind limbs too weak to support its body on land, Gingerich
believes it spent its entire life in the ocean. It reached about 40
feet.
(LSA., p. 36)(PacDis, Winter/’96, p.15,16)
3,400BC An earthen mound at what later was known as
Watson Brake, La. in the US was dated to this time.
(SFC, 9/19/97, p.A3)
1704 English forces attacked
Apalachee Indians in Florida driving them into slavery and exile. Some
800 Apalachee fled west to French-held Mobile.
(WSJ, 3/9/05, p.A1)
1713 Apr 11, The Peace of Utrecht
was signed, France ceded Maritime provinces to Britain. The French
colony of Acadia, now Nova Scotia, was ceded to Great Britain. The
Acadians had come from western France to fish and farm. Those who would
not swear allegiance to the crown were deported. Many of these
deportees went to the bayou country of Louisiana.
(WUD, 1994, p.7)(WSJ, 9/4/96, p.A12)(HN, 4/11/98)
1714 The Natchitoches settlement
was established in the Cane River area.
(SSFC, 7/7/02, p.C5)
1716 Jun 6, The 1st slaves arrived
in Louisiana.
(MC, 6/6/02)
1717 The 1st New Orleans levee, 3
feet tall, was built on the Mississippi River.
(WSJ, 8/31/05, p.B1)
1718 May 7, La Nouvelle-Orleans
(New Orleans) was founded by the French Mississippi Company, under the
direction of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, on land inhabited by
the Chitimacha. It was named for Philippe II, Duke of Orleans, the
Regent of France.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Orleans)
1718 Aug 25, Hundreds of French
colonists arrived in Louisiana, with some of them settling in
present-day New Orleans.
(AP, 8/25/97)
1718 Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur
de Bienville, French-Canadian explorer, founded New Orleans.
(Hem., 1/97, p.63)
1718 The "Casket Girls" of New
Orleans began to arrive from France with casket full of dowry articles
to marry settlers.
(SFC, 1/24/98, p.E5)
1729 Nov 28, Natchez Indians
massacred most of the 300 French settlers and soldiers at Fort Rosalie,
Louisiana.
(HN, 11/28/98)
1755 In Canada the Accadians of
Nova Scotia were uprooted by an English governor and forced to leave.
Some 10,000 people moved to destinations like Maine and Louisiana. The
Longfellow story "Evangeline" is based on this displacement.
(SFEC, 8/22/99, p.T8,9)
1758 Oct 10, Jean Pierre Chouteau,
French fur trader, early St. Louis settler and "father of Oklahoma" was
born in New Orleans.
(AP, 10/10/08)
1762 Nov 3, Spain acquired
Louisiana. [see Dec 3]
(MC, 11/3/01)
1762 Dec 3, France ceded to Spain
all lands west of the Mississippi- the territory known as Upper
Louisiana. [see Nov 3]
(CO, Grolier's, 11/10/95)(HN, 12/3/98)
1766 Mar 5, Spanish official Don
Antonio de Ulloa arrived in New Orleans to take possession of the
Louisiana Territory from the French.
(AP, 3/5/98)
1768 Oct 28, Germans and Acadians
joined French Creoles in their armed revolt against the Spanish
governor of New Orleans.
(HN, 10/28/98)
1778 Apr 1, Oliver Pollock,
a New Orleans businessman, created the "$" symbol.
(HN, 4/1/98)(OTD)
1778 King Carlos III of Spain sent
Spanish settlers from the Canary Islands to Louisiana. They settled in
St. Bernard Parish and became known as Islenos or Spanish Cajuns.
(SFC, 9/4/00, p.B2)
1781 The earliest reference to the
New Orleans Mardi Gras "Carnival" appears in a report to the Spanish
colonial governing body. The Perseverance Benevolent & Mutual Aid
Association became the first of hundreds of clubs and carnival
organizations formed in New Orleans.
(www.mardigrasneworleans.com/history.html)
1788 Mar 21, Almost the entire
city of New Orleans, Louisiana, was destroyed by fire. 856 buildings
were burned.
(HN, 3/21/99)(MC, 3/21/02)
1800 Oct. 1, Spain ceded Louisiana
to France in a secret treaty.
(AP, 10/1/97)
c1800 Caddo Lake arose when dead
trees in the Red River caused an overflow into the Cypress Valley. The
log jam was called the Great Red River Raft and continued to the 1870s
when the government cleared the blockage with explosives.
(NH, 5/01, p.35)
1802 Apr 19, Spain reopened the
New Orleans port to American merchants.
(HN, 4/19/97)
1802 Dec 20, The United States
bought the Louisiana territory from France. [see Jan 11, 1803]
(HN, 12/20/98)
1803 Jan 11, Monroe and Livingston
sailed for Paris to buy New Orleans; they ended up buying Louisiana.
[see Dec 20, 1802]
(MC, 1/11/02)
1803 Oct 31, Congress ratified the
purchase of the entire Louisiana area in North America, which added
territory to the United States for 13 subsequent states.
(HN, 10/31/98)
1803 Nov 30, Spain, in a ceremony
at New Orleans, completed the process of ceding Louisiana to France,
which had sold it to the United States.
(CO, Grolier’s, 11/10/95)(AP, 11/30/04)
1803 Dec 20, The Louisiana
Purchase was completed as the territory was formally transferred from
France to the United States during ceremonies in New Orleans. French
Prefect Pierre Clement Laussat, US Gov. William CC Claiborne and US
Gen. James Wilkinson signed 4 copies the treaty. The Louisiana Purchase
effectively doubled the size of the existing U.S. With 827,987 square
miles in the deal, that price translates to roughly $18 per square
mile- under 3 cents/acre.
(AP, 12/20/97)(SSFC, 12/21/03, p.A2)
1804 Nov 27, Pres. Jefferson
issued a nationwide proclamation to military and public officials
warning of a conspiracy to attack Spanish territory in Texas. He had
opened negotiations with Spain to purchase Texas territory west of New
Orleans. Jefferson had heard rumors that Aaron Burr had begun plotting
an invasion of Texas. Jefferson ordered Gen. James Wilkinson to move
federal troops into defensive positions between the Sabine River and
New Orleans. Wilkinson, unbeknownst to Jefferson, was a close
confidant of Burr and also worked as a spy in the employ of Spanish
officials in Mexico.
(ON, 12/08, p6)
1805 Jul 25, Aaron Burr visited
New Orleans with plans to establish a new country, with New Orleans as
the capital city.
(HN, 7/25/98)
1805 Mar 3, Louisiana-Missouri
Territory formed.
(SC, 3/3/02)
1805 Louisiana passed legislation
against sodomy. The law was upheld in 2002.
(SFC, 11/23/02, p.A5)
1811 Jan 8, Charles Deslondes led
several hundred poorly armed slaves towards New Orleans in the largest
slave rebellion in US history.
(AH, 2/06, p.14)
1811 Jan 10, An uprising of over
400 slaves was put down in New Orleans. Sixty-six blacks were killed
and their heads were strung up along the roads of the city.
(HN, 1/10/99)
1812 Apr 4, The territory of
Orleans became the 18th state and later became known as Louisiana.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1812 Apr 30, Louisiana became the
18th state.
(AP, 4/30/97)(HN, 4/30/98)
1814 Mar 27, General Jackson led
U.S. soldiers who killed 700 Creek Indians at Horseshoe Bend, La. [in
Northern Alabama] Jackson lost 49 men.
(SFEC, 2/16/97, BR p.4)(HN, 3/27/99)
1814 Dec 13, General Andrew
Jackson announced martial law in New Orleans, Louisiana, as British
troops disembark at Lake Borne, 40 miles east of the city.
(HN, 12/13/98)
1814 Dec 14, The steamboat
Enterprise, designed by keelboat captain Henry Miller Shreve, arrived
in New Orleans with guns and ammunition for Gen. Jackson. It was
immediately commandeered for military service.
(ON, 7/02, p.9)
1815 Jan 8, US forces led by Gen.
Andrew Jackson and French pirate Jean Lafitte led some 3,100
backwoodsmen to victory against 7,500 British veterans at Chalmette in
the Battle of New Orleans in the closing engagement of the War of 1812.
A British army marched on New Orleans without knowing that the War of
1812 had ended on Christmas Eve of 1814. A massacre ensued, as 2,044
British troops, including three generals, fell dead, wounded or missing
before General Andrew Jackson's well-prepared earthworks, compared with
only 71 American casualties. Among the British victims were Gen. Sir
Edward Pakenham and the Highlanders of the 93rd Regiment of Foot. In
2000 Robert V. Remini published "The Battle of New Orleans."
(AP, 1/8/98)(HN, 1/8/99)(WSJ, 1/26/00, p.A20)(AH,
2/05, p.16)
1816 Oct 7, The 1st double decked
steamboat, Washington, arrived in New Orleans.
(MC, 10/7/01)
1817 Mar 3, The first commercial
steamboat route from Louisville to New Orleans was opened.
(HN, 3/3/99)
1818 Feb 11, Sugar plantation
owner Levi Foster sold to his in-laws the slaves named Kit (28) for
$975 and Alick (9) for $400. In 2000 Gwendolyn Midlo Hall and LSU Press
published a CD-ROM database on Louisiana slave transactions: "Databases
for the Study of Afro-Louisiana History and Genealogy, 1699-1860:
Computerized Information from Original Manuscript Sources."
(SFEC, 7/30/00, p.)(www.afrigeneas.com)
1821 Feb 22, The Adams-Onis Treaty
became final, whereby Spain gave up all of Florida to the US. The
boundary between Mexico and the Louisiana Purchase was established and
the US renounced all claims to Texas.
(AH, 2/06, p.15)
1823 In New Orleans Louis Joseph
Dufilho Jr. established a pharmacy and was the first licensed
pharmacist in the US. The building later became The Pharmacy Museum.
(SFEM, 6/14/98, p.24)
1824 Jan 1, The Camp Street
Theatre opened as the first English-language playhouse in New Orleans.
(HN, 1/1/99)
1827 Feb 27, A Mardi Gras street
procession in New Orleans was initiated by students, who were home from
school in France. They formed a parade of masked marchers on Shrove
Tuesday, the day before the period of penance begins on Ash Wednesday.
(HN, 2/27/98)(HNQ, 2/9/99)
1827 John Davis opened the doors
of the first full-dress American gambling casino in New Orleans.
(HN, 3/19/98)
1827 The government hired Capt.
Henry Miller Shreve to remove a 100-mile "raft" of snags and trees that
prevented steamboats from entering the Red River. His workcamp later
became the city of Shreveport, La.
(ON, 7/02, p.11)
1829 May 8, Louis Moreau
Gottschalk (d.1869), American pianist, was born in New Orleans.
(HN,
5/8/02)(http://w3.rz-berlin.mpg.de/cmp/gottschalk.html)
1830 Jan 13, There was a great
fire in New Orleans. It was thought to be set by rebel slaves.
(MC, 1/13/02)
1834-1861 The Citizens Bank of Louisiana, a
predecessor of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., secured loans with
mortgages and thousands of slaves. Bernard de Marigny, plantation owner
and one of the richest men of the epoch, put 62 slaves into the banks
books as collateral for borrowed money to support his gambling habit.
(WSJ, 5/10/05, p.A1)
1835 Mar 3, Congress authorized a
US mint at New Orleans, LA.
(SC, 3/3/02)
1835 The St. Charles streetcar
began running under horse and mule power.
(SFEC, 3/26/00, p.T4)
1835-1868 Adah Isaacs Menken, a Jewish poet and
actress, was born near New Orleans and learned French, German, Spanish
and Hebrew in school. She shocked American and European audiences in
the 1860s for her bold acting style and became notorious for her role
in the play Mazeppa, where she appeared on stage barely clothed tied to
the back of a running horse. Around 1856 she published her first book
of poems and married Alexander Isaacs Menken, whose name she kept
through divorce and subsequent remarriages and liaisons. Called the
most perfectly developed woman in the world, she moved between Europe
and the United States as she performed. Adah Isaacs Menken died of
tuberculosis in Paris and was buried there in the Montparnasse Cemetery.
(HNPD, 11/16/98)
1841 Aug 21, John Hampson of New
Orleans patented the Venetian blind.
(SC, 8/21/02)
1845 Thomas K. Wharton, architect,
arrived in New Orleans. He soon became the superintendent of
construction for the Custom House on Canal St.
(SFEC, 10/31/99, p.T3)
1848 The Lazard brothers,
Alexandre Lazard, Simon Lazard, and Elie Lazard, moved to the United
States from Lorraine, France, and formed Lazard Freres & Co. as a
dry goods business in New Orleans, Louisiana, with a combined
contribution of $ 9,000. They moved to SF a year later with their
cousin, Alexander Weill.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazard)(SFC, 12/11/96,
p.D1)(WSJ, 6/7/99, p.C1)
1849 A US Swamp Land Act
authorized Louisiana to create a system of levee districts. The sale of
donated federal land financed levee construction and land reclamation.
(NH, 2/05, p.45)
1849 By this time Maunsel White, a
New Orleans plantation owner, was growing peppers that had originated
in Mexico’s state of Tabasco. He devised a sauce using the pepper.
(WSJ, 10/9/07, p.D11)
1852 A painting of "New Orleans
from the Lower Cotton Press" was made by J. Hill and B. Smith.
(SFEC, 10/31/99, p.T3)
1855 Mar 15, Louisiana established
the 1st health board to regulate quarantine.
(MC, 3/15/02)
1857 The Comus krewe was founded
in New Orleans.
(USAT, 3/7/00, p.5A)
1858 Mar 2, Frederick Cook, New
Orleans, patented a cotton-bale metallic tie.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1860 Nov, Abraham Lincoln won the
US presidential elections with a majority of the electoral votes in a
4-way race. Following his election South Carolina seceded from the
Union followed by Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and
Texas.
(WSJ, 9/19/97, p.A13)
1861 Jan 10, Ft. Jackson and Ft.
Philip were taken over by LA state troops.
(MC, 1/10/02)
1861 Jan 26, Louisiana became the
6th state to secede from the Union.
(AP, 1/26/98)(HN, 1/26/99)(MC, 1/26/02)
1861 Feb 4, Delegates from six
southern states met in Montgomery, Ala., to form the Confederate States
of America. They included Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia,
Louisiana and Texas. They elected Jefferson Davis as president of
Confederacy.
(AP, 2/4/97)(ON, 11/00, p.1)
1861 May 26, Union blockaded New
Orleans, LA., and Mobile, AL.
(MC, 5/26/02)
1861 Jul 14, Union troops tried to
force a crossing at Seneca Falls on the Potomac, northwest of
Washington but were repulsed by the Confederates. A company of the
Louisiana Tiger Rifles helped defend the line.
(HN, 7/14/99)
1861 Sep, Harry Macarthy delivered
a stirring performance of "The Bonnie Blue Flag" on a New Orleans
stage, causing a near riot. Born an Englishman, he became famous
throughout the Confederacy as an entertainer. Macarthy was a hit, and
for the rest of the war, he would do his best to keep his song and
himself popular, taking his show on the road all over the South and
providing diversion for thousands of civilians and soldiers. He lifted
the morale of war-weary Southerners and became the most popular
performer in his adopted country, the Confederate States of America.
(HNQ, 6/14/01)
1861 Oct 4, The Union ship USS
South Carolina captured two Confederate blockade runners outside of New
Orleans, La.
(HN, 10/4/98)
1861 Oct 12, The Confederate
ironclad Manassas attacked the northern ship Richmond on the
Mississippi River. The Manassas was the Confederacy‘s first operational
ironclad. Originally a New England tugboat called the Enoch Train, the
ship was refit with iron sheathing and an iron prow for ramming. The
underpowered ship was used in defense of New Orleans, finally being
dispatched by the Union warship Mississippi.
(AP, 10/12/97)(HNQ, 7/12/00)
1861 Café du Monde opened
in New Orleans. It later became famous for its powdered-sugar-covered
beignets.
(SFEC, 3/26/00, p.T5)
1862 Apr 18, Battle of Ft Jackson,
Ft St. Philip and New Orleans, LA.
(MC, 4/18/02)
1862 Apr 25, Admiral David
Farragut gained control of the Mississippi River at New Orleans,
Louisiana. A few days later federal troops occupied the city. This
stopped cotton sales by the Confederacy a revenue shortage that led to
printed money and hyperinflation. In 2000 Jack D. Coombe published
"Gunfire Around the Gulf," which recounts the Southern Civil War naval
campaign.
(WSJ, 1/26/00, p.A20)(WSJ, 11/21/08,
p.W6)(www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=1105)
1862 Apr 29, Forts Philip and
Jackson surrendered to Union forces under Admiral Farragut outside New
Orleans.
(AP, 4/29/98)(HN, 4/29/98)
1862 May 12, Federal troops
occupied Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
(MC, 5/12/02)
1862 May 15, General Benjamin F.
("Beast") Butler decreed "Woman Order," that all captured women in New
Orleans were to be his whores.
(MC, 5/15/02)
1862 Aug 5, Battle of Baton Rouge,
LA.
(MC, 8/5/02)
1862 Sep, The troops of the 1st
Louisiana Native Guards were free black men who lived in New Orleans.
When President Abraham Lincoln issued his preliminary Emancipation
Proclamation he invited black men in Confederate territory to join the
Union army. Union Major General Benjamin Butler immediately mustered
the 1st Louisiana Native Guards into Federal service, making them the
Union’s first black soldiers. They had volunteered for state service in
the Civil War, and served as a home guard unit. When New Orleans fell
to Union forces in April 1862, the black troops remained in the city
and offered their services to Butler.
(HNQ, 2/21/02)
1862 Oct 27, A Confederate force
was routed at the Battle of Labadieville, near Bayou Lafourche in
Louisiana. John Howard Payne's haunting 'Home, Sweet Home' was the
Civil War soldier's favorite song.
(HN, 10/27/98)
1862 Nov 3, There was a battle
between gunboats at Bayou Teche, Louisiana.
(MC, 11/3/01)
1862 Dec 15, In New Orleans, Union
Major General Benjamin F. Butler turned his command over to Nathaniel
Banks. The citizens of New Orleans held farewell parties for Butler,
"The Beast," but only after he had already left. General Butler was
given the unusual nickname "Spoons" due to his apparent penchant for
stealing the silver while occupying New Orleans. He was also called
"Beast" for alleged insults to the women in the town. Both the names
were coined by Confederates.
(HN, 12/15/98)(HNQ, 3/9/02)
1862 Louisiana experienced severe
flooding.
(NH, 2/05, p.45)
1863 Apr 12-14, Gunboat battle at
Bayou Teche, Louisiana.
(MC, 4/12/02)
1863 Apr 13, Battle of Irish Bend,
LA (Ft. Bisland). (MC, 4/13/02)
1863 May 14, Union General
Nathanial Banks took his army out of Alexandria, Louisiana, and headed
towards Port Hudson along the Mississippi River. The fort was
considered the second most important strategic location on the river,
after Vicksburg.
(HN, 5/14/99)
1863 May 21, The siege on Port
Hudson, Louisiana began.
(HN, 5/21/98)
1863 May 27, Siege of Port Hudson,
LA. [see May 21]
(MC, 5/27/02)
1863 Jun 21, In the second day of
fighting, Confederate cavalry failed to dislodge a Union force at the
Battle of LaFourche Crossing in Louisiana.
(HN, 6/21/00)
1863 Jun 23, Confederate forces
overwhelmed a Union garrison at the Battle of Brasher City in
Louisiana.
(HN, 6/23/99)
1863 Jul 3, Battle of
Donaldsonville, LA.
(MC, 7/3/02)
1863 Jul 8, Discouraged by the
surrender of Vicksburg, Mississippi, Confederates in Port Hudson,
Louisiana, surrendered to Union forces.
(HN, 7/8/98)
1864 Mar 10, Red River campaign
took place in LA. [see Mar 15]
(MC, 3/10/02)
1864 Mar 15, Red River Campaign
began as the Union forces reached Alexandria, La.
(HN, 3/15/98)
1864 Mar 21, Battle at Henderson's
Hill (Bayou Rapids), Louisiana.
(MC, 3/21/02)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Crump's
Hill (Piney Woods), Louisiana.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1864 Apr 8, In the Battle of
Mansfield, Louisiana, Federals were routed by Confederate Gen. Richard
Taylor. Keatchi girl’s school was taken over as a hospital for the
injured soldiers.
(HN, 4/8/98)(SSFC, 7/7/02, p.C5)
1864 Apr 9, The Battle of Pleasant
Hill, LA, left 2,870 casualties.
(MC, 4/9/02)
1864 Apr 12, Battle of Blair's
Landing in LA.
(MC, 4/12/02)
1864 Apr 23, Battle of Cane River,
LA (Red River Expedition, Monett's Ferry).
(MC, 4/23/02)
1864 Apr 25, After facing defeat
in the Red River Campaign, Union General Nathaniel Bank returned to
Alexandria, Louisiana.
(HN, 4/25/99)
1864 Apr 30, Work began on the
Dams along the Red River which would allow Union General Nathaniel
Banks’ troops to sail over the rapids above Alexandria, Louisiana.
(HN, 4/30/98)
1864 May 1-8, Battle at
Alexandria, Louisiana (Red River Campaign).
(MC, 5/1/02)
1864 May 18, Battle of Yellow
Bayou, LA (Bayou de Glaize, Old Oaks).
(SC, 5/18/02)
1865 May 26, Arrangements were
made in New Orleans for the surrender of Confederate forces west of the
Mississippi. The last Confederate Army surrendered in Shreveport, La.
(AP, 5/26/97)(HN, 5/26/99)
1865 Louisiana again experienced
severe flooding.
(NH, 2/05, p.45)
1866 Apr 2, Pres. ended war in
Ala, Ark, Fla, Ga, Miss, La, NC, SC, Ten & Va.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1867 Dec 23, Entrepreneur Madam
C.J. Walker (d.1919), the first black American woman millionaire, was
born Sarah Breedlove to former slaves on a Louisiana cotton plantation.
In 1906 she married Charles Joseph Walker, who became her business
partner. Madam Walker had developed her own line of hair care products
for black women. Business boomed and Madam Walker became well known to
black and white Americans as she traveled the country to market her
products, speak at conventions and donate to organizations like the
NAACP and the YMCA. Her company made economic independence a reality
for the many black women she hired. When Madam C.J. Walker died she
left thousands of dollars to schools, orphanages, the Tuskegee
Institute, retirement homes and other organizations.
(HNPD, 12/23/98)(SFEC, 2/7/99, Par p.7)
1867 Louisiana again experienced
severe flooding.
(NH, 2/05, p.45)
1868 Jun 25, Florida, Alabama,
Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina were re-admitted
to the Union.
(AP, 6/25/97)
1868 Jul 13, Henry Clay Warmoth
(1842-1931) began serving as the 23rd governor of Louisiana and
continued to 1872.
(www.helium.com/items/1728455-the-origins-of-mardi-gras-in-louisiana)
1868 Sep 22, Race riots took place
in New Orleans, La.
(MC, 9/22/01)
1868 Sep 28, In the Opelousas
Massacre at St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, 200 blacks were killed.
(MC, 9/28/01)
1868 Oct 26, Whites killed several
blacks in St. Bernard Parish, La.
(MC, 10/26/01)
1868 Louisiana began to lease out
convicts as laborers for revenue. The system lasted to 1928. The number
of convicts leased out over the 60-year period was later estimated to
be over 100,000.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1869 About this time Edmund
McIlhenny, banker, traveled to New Orleans and acquired some pepper
seeds from a man on the street, which he grew and used to develop
a hot sauce that he called Tabasco, after peppers from Mexico’s
state of Tabasco. In 2007 Jeffrey Rothfeder authored McIlhenny’s Gold:
How a Louisiana Family Built the Tabasco Empire.”
(SFC, 4/5/99, p.A3)(WSJ, 10/9/07, p.D11)
1872 Dec 9, P.B.S. Pinchback
became the first African American Governor of Louisiana. [see Dec 11]
(HN, 12/9/98)
1872 Dec 11, America's first black
governor took office as Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback became acting
governor of Louisiana. [see Dec 9]
(AP, 12/11/97)
1872 A group of New Orleans
businessmen invented a King of Carnival -- Rex -- to parade in the
first daytime parade. They introduced the Mardi Gras colors of purple,
green and gold; the Mardi Gras song, and the Mardi Gras flag.
(www.mardigrasneworleans.com/history.html)
1872 Edgar Degas, French painter,
journeyed to New Orleans where his mother was born. He made 22
paintings there. His time in New Orleans is covered in the 1997 book
"Degas in New Orleans: Encounters in the Creole World of Kate Chopin
and George Washington Cable" by Christopher Benfey.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, BR p.9)(SFC, 3/5/99, p.W12)
1873 Jan 13, William Pitt Kellogg
(1830-1918), American politician and carpetbagger, began serving as the
governor of Louisiana and continued to 1877. He was the state's
last Republican governor until the inauguration of David C. Treen in
1980.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_P._Kellogg)
1873 Apr 13, In the Colfax
Massacre in Grant Parish, Louisiana, some 105 blacks were killed on
Easter Sunday. Many bodies, hidden or dumped into the Red River; were
recovered and found to have been mutilated. In the end, only nine men
were arrested, and they were charged with the murder of only one man.
Among those arrested was William J. Cruikshank. In 2007 Lalita Tademy
authored her novel “Red River” based on the massacre.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colfax_Massacre)(http://tinyurl.com/2dyfuj)
1873 Edgar Degas painted "Cotton
Merchants in New Orleans."
(SFEC, 1/4/98, BR p.9)
1875 Jun 12, In Louisiana work
began on a new shipping channel at the mouth of the Mississippi River.
American civil engineer James Buchanan Eads (1820-1887) led the project.
(ON, 10/09,
p.7)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Buchanan_Eads)
1875 In Louisiana the “Mardi Gras
Act” established Mardi Gras as an official and legal state holiday.
(www.tamug.edu/nautilus/archive/2009/TAMUG77554Vol16Issue1.pdf)
1876 Nov 7, The presidential vote
between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel Tilden was
very close and the Florida result looked like it would determine the
national outcome. In 1974 Prof. Jerrell Shofner authored "Nor Is It
Over," a study of the 1876 election. In 2003 Roy Morris Jr. authored
"Fraud of the Century." Louisiana was stolen for Hayes. 13,000 Tilden
votes were discounted in Louisiana by a bribe-taking election board.
(WSJ, 12/11/00, p.A18)(WSJ, 2/3/03, p.D6)
1876 May 2, American civil
engineer James Buchanan Eads hired the luxury steamer Grand Republic
for her maiden voyage to carry investors and the press from New Orleans
to the jetties at the mouth of the Mississippi to show off his work.
The jetties were completed in 1880 and New Orleans went from being the
nation’s 9th largest port to the 2nd largest.
(ON, 10/09, p.8)
1877 Apr 24, Federal troops were
ordered out of New Orleans, ending the North's post-Civil War rule in
the South.
(AP, 4/24/00)
1877 Apr 27, President Hayes
removed Federal troops from LA. Reconstruction ended. [see Apr 24]
(MC, 4/27/02)
1878 Jul 12, A Yellow Fever
epidemic began in New Orleans. It killed 4,500.
(MC, 7/12/02)
1879 Aug 30, John Bell Hood
(b.1831), former confederate general, died of yellow fever in a New
Orleans epidemic.
(AH, 10/02,
p.46)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bell_Hood)
1879 Edgar Degas, while in New
Orleans, painted "Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando."
(SFEC, 1/4/98, BR p.9)
1879 The US Congress made the US
Army Corps of Engineers the leader of a new agency, The Mississippi
River Commission, charged with controlling the Mississippi River.
(NH, 2/05, p.45)
1882 The Proteus krewe was founded
in New Orleans.
(USAT, 3/7/00, p.5A)
1885 Sep 20, Ferdinand Lamenthe
(Jelly Roll Morton), jazz pianist, composer and singer, was born in New
Orleans. He was one of the first to orchestrate jazz music and disputed
W.C. Handy's claim to be the originator of jazz and blues. He became
famous at an early age for his classically informed improvisational
piano playing often in brothels and other nontraditional settings. With
his Red Hot Peppers in the 1920s, he pioneered the early jazz practice
of reorchestrating and improvising upon well-known standards. He also
wrote many enduring jazz tunes including the ‘London Rag’ and the
‘Jelly Roll Blues’.
(HN, 9/20/98)(MC, 9/20/01)
1885 Jan 29, Leadbelly
(d.1949), [Huddie William Ledbetter], blues singer, was born on the
Jeter Plantation near Mooringsport, Louisiana.
(http://leadbelly.lanl.gov/leadbelly.html)
1888 Jan 20, Leadbelly, blues 12
string guitarist (Rock Island Line), was born in Louisiana.
(MC, 1/20/02)
1889 Dec 6, Jefferson Davis, the
first and only president of the Confederate States of America, died in
New Orleans. In 2001 William J. Cooper Jr. authored "Jefferson Davis,
American."
(AP, 12/6/97)(SSFC, 1/28/01, Par p.12)
1890 May 12, Louisiana legalized
prize fighting.
(SC, internet, 5/12/97)
1890 The Louisiana state
Legislature passed the Louisiana Separate Car Act, which called for
railroad companies to provide equal but separate accommodations for
white and colored races.
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.A-6)(ON, 11/03, p.5)
1890-1899 In Louisiana the Orleans Levee District was
founded in the 1890s.
(WSJ, 8/31/05, p.B1)
1891 Mar 14, A mob in New Orleans
broke open a jail after a court dismissed charges against 19 Italian
men indicted for the murder of police chief David C. Hemmessey. 11 of
19 defendants were hanged. The book "Vendetta" by Richard Gambino, and
the movie of the same name, covered the event.
(SSFC, 2/1/04, p.M3)
1891 Argentine ants were 1st
noticed New Orleans. By 1908 they were seen in California.
(SFC, 4/25/01, p.A1)
1891-1903 In Barbour County nearly 700 convicted men
were leased as laborers to private companies such as Tennessee Coal or
Sloss-Sheffield Steel & Iron mostly for $6 per month.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1892 Jun 7, Homer Plessy was
arrested in New Orleans for violating the Separate Car Act. His case
went all the way to the US Supreme Court, which upheld the law on May
18, 1896.
(ON, 11/03, p.5)
1892 Sep 7, In New Orleans the 1st
heavyweight-title boxing match, fought with gloves under the rules of
the Marquis of Queensbury [Queensberry], aka John S. Douglas, ended
when James J. Corbett (1866-1933) knocked out John L. Sullivan
(1858-1918) in the 21st round. In 1891 Corbett had fought Peter
Jackson to a draw after 61 rounds. Corbett lost his title to Robert
Fitzsimmons in 1897.
(AH, 2/06,
p.29)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_L._Sullivan)(SFEC, 3/7/99, Z1
p.8)
1893 Aug 30, Huey P. Long,
Louisiana politician who served as governor and U.S. senator, known as
"The Kingfish," was born.
(HN, 8/30/98)
1893 The St. Charles streetcar was
electrified.
(SFEC, 3/26/00, p.T4)
1894 Louisiana extended the
Separate Car Act to include train station waiting rooms. The
Legislature in this year also passed a law prohibiting interracial
marriage.
(ON, 11/03, p.5)
1895 Feb 15, 23 cm (9") of snow
fell on New Orleans.
(440 Int’l., 2/15/99)
1896 May 16, The US Supreme Court
upheld the State of Louisiana Separate Car Act in Plessy vs. Ferguson.
The Plessy v. Ferguson decision allowed that as long as accommodation
existed, segregation did not constitute discrimination, establishing
the doctrine of "separate but equal." The ruling that was overturned in
the 1954 Brown case, which involved elementary education. The Court
ruled unanimously that segregation in public education was a denial of
the equal protection of the laws. [see May 18]
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.A-6)(HNQ, 1/26/99)
1896 May 18, The US Supreme Court
ruled 7 to 1 to give states the authority to segregate people according
to race. [see May 16]
(AP, 5/18/03)(ON, 11/03, p.6)
1897 Tennessee Coal paid the state
$18.50 per month for a first-class state convict.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1898 May 12, Louisiana adopted a
new constitution with a "grandfather clause" designed to eliminate
black voters.
(SC, internet, 5/12/97)
1898 Buddy Bolden, cornetist and
New Orleans brass band leader, was an early practitioner of what would
be recognized today as jazz. Bolden's 1898 brass band, Kid Ory's Creole
Band, played their early version of jazz while marching in parades, at
funerals, weddings and dances. Blues, ragtime and brass band music were
blending at the end of the 19th century into what would be known as
jazz. New Orleans was one of the key cities for the development of this
music.
(HNQ, 5/12/98)
1899 In New Orleans Oysters
Rockefeller was invented at Antoine’s restaurant.
(SFEM, 6/14/98, p.8)
1900 Jun 27, Otto E. Passman
(Rep-D-La, 1947-77), was born.
(SC, 6/27/02)
1900 Aug 4, Louis "Satchmo"
Armstrong, (Daniel Louis Armstrong, d.1971) jazz trumpet player, was
born in New Orleans. He developed a vocal style called "scat singing";
was a band leader, film star and worldwide celebrity; his career
spanned five decades. His autobiography “Satchmo” was published in
1954. "I got a simple rule about everybody. If you don't treat me
right, shame on you." Laurence Bergreen in 1997 wrote a biography
titled: "Louis Armstrong: An Extravagant Life."
(SFEC, 6/29/97, BR p.4)(AP,
12/1/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Armstrong)
1900 George Lewis (d.1968),
clarinetist, was born in New Orleans.
(WSJ, 5/15/01, p.A24)
1901 State rules were adopted that
held a "first class" prisoner liable for loading 4 tons of coal a day
to avoid being whipped. A "4th class" prisoner was required to load 1
ton.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1901-1915 In New Orleans the "Blue Book" was a
directory of some 2,000 prostitutes working in Storyville. It was
printed annually and carried ads.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, Z1 p.8)
1905 Galatoire’s restaurant opened
under Jean Galatoire in the French Quarter of New Orleans.
(SFC, 7/15/02, p.F10)
1906 The Louisiana McIlhenny
family were awarded a trademark for the word Tabasco, which was also
the name of their popular pepper sauce.
(WSJ, 10/9/07, p.D11)
1906 The New Orleans City Park
opened a new carousel.
(SSFC, 7/24/05, p.F9)
1908 Sep 7, Michael E.
DeBakey, heart surgery pioneer, was born in Lake Charles, La.
(www.fact-index.com)
1909 Feb 23, Shrove Tuesday. The
Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Society, the 1st African-American Mardi
Gras organization, first marched in the New Orleans Mardi Gras parade.
Members had marched in the Mardi Gras as early as 1901, but their first
appearance as Zulus came in 1909, with William Story as King.
(www.mardigras.org/Calc.html)(http://tinyurl.com/ylqbwbj)
1910 Dec 31, John B. Moisant and
Arch Hoxsey, two of America's foremost aviators died in separate plane
crashes. Moisant died in a plane crash in New Orleans.
(HN, 12/31/98)(HN, 7/31/01)
1910 About this time jazz bands
began playing in the gambling houses and brothels of the notorious New
Orleans Storyville section. Jazz musicians from New Orleans began
calling gigs to NYC "The Big Apple" vs. road gigs elsewhere, which paid
"little apples."
(HNQ, 5/12/98)(SFEC, 9/3/00, Z1 p.2)
1911 Dec 31, Tennessee Coal’s
convict lease contract with the state expired.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1912 Sep, An explosion at Pratt
Consolidated mining company killed nearly 130 leased prison convicts
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1913 An investigation was
conducted into the alleged corruption of Alabama’s convict-leasing
program.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1914 Nov 2, Ray Walston, actor (My
Favorite Martian, Damn Yankees, Picket Fences), was born in New
Orleans, La.
(MC, 11/2/01)
1915 Sep 22, Xavier University,
the first African-American Catholic college, opened in New Orleans,
Louisiana.
(HN, 9/22/98)
1917 The state charged companies
$93.12 per month for the lease of a first-class convict.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1918 Nov 3, Russell Long (d.2003),
U.S. senator from Louisiana, was born.
(HN, 11/3/98)(SFC, 5/10/03, p.A13)
1922 Nov 7, Al Hirt, jazz
trumpeter, was born in New Orleans, La.
(MC, 11/7/01)
1922 W.H. Oates, Louisiana prison
inspector, wrote: "Our jails are money-making machines."
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1924 Sep 30, Truman Capote, author
and playwright whose works include "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and "In
Cold Blood," was born in New Orleans, La.
(HN, 9/30/98)(MC, 9/30/01)
1926 May 6, Marguerite Piazza,
operatic soprano (Young Broadway), was born in New Orleans, LA.
(MC, 5/6/02)
1926 Sloss-Sheffield, a mining
concern, stopped leasing convicts. In 1952 the company was merged into
US Pipe & Foundry, which was acquired in 1969 by Jim Walter Corp.
of Florida, later renamed Walter Industries.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1927 Mar 6, Norman Treigle,
bass-baritone (Mefistofele), was born in New Orleans, Louisiana.
(MC, 3/6/02)
1927 May 6, The was a major flood
along the Mississippi that killed 247 people and displaced thousands.
The levee system broke in 145 places and caused 27,000 square miles of
flooding in Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and
Tennessee. Officials dynamited a levee to spare New Orleans from
flooding. In 1997 the book "Rising Tide" by John M. Barry described the
catastrophe. It was also the subject of the Randy Newman song
"Louisiana 1927."
(WSJ, 2/6/97, p.A12)(SFC, 11/28/03, p.C7)(SSFC,
9/4/05, p.A7)(WSJ, 11/2/05, p.A2)
1927 Aug 7, Edwin Edwards,
governor of Louisiana, was born.
(HN, 8/7/98)
1927 Aug 30, Geoffrey Beene, dress
designer (8 Coty Awards), was born in Louisiana.
(MC, 8/30/01)
1928 Feb 26, Antonie "Fats" Domino
was born in New Orleans. He was an American Rock n' Roll singer famous
by his songs "Blueberry Hill" and "Ain't that a Shame."
(HN, 2/26/99)(SC, 2/26/02)
1928 Louisiana ended its state
revenue producing forced labor program.
(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10)
1929 A group of state legislators
began talks to impeach Gov. Huey P. Long after he tried to impose a
5-cents-a-barrel tax on oil refined in Louisiana. Charges against Long
included arranged murder, bribery, carrying a concealed weapon and
demolishing the governor's mansion without authorization.
(SFC, 6/18/99, p.D7)
1930 Dec 29, Fred P. Newton
completed the longest swim ever (1826 miles), when he swam the
Mississippi River from Ford Dam, Minn, to New Orleans.
(MC, 12/29/01)
1930s Percy Viosca Jr., a
Louisiana naturalist, railed against the US Corps of Engineers for
their plans to straitjacket the Mississippi River with levees.
(SFC, 11/28/03, p.C7)
1934 May 23, Bonnie Parker (23)
and Clyde Barrow (24) were shot some 4 dozen times early in the morning
in a police ambush by Texas Rangers as they were driving a stolen Ford
Deluxe along a road in Bienville Parish, near Sailes, La. This ended
the most spectacular manhunt seen in America up to that time. The pair
had spent the previous 2 years killing and robbing banks in the
Midwest. Bonnie Parker was 19 and Clyde Barrow was 21 when they met in
Dallas in 1930. By the time the Barrow gang's crime spree ended four
years later, Bonnie, Clyde, Clyde's brother Buck and Buck's wife had
terrorized the Southwest and Midwest and were believed to have
committed 13 murders. In 1997 Clyde’s bullet-ridden shirt was auctioned
off to a Nevada casino for $85,000. His largest theft was estimated at
$4,000. In 1979 Ted Hinton and Larry Grove authored "Ambush: The Real
Story of Bonnie and Clyde." In 2009 Jeff Guinn authored “Go Down
Together: the True Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde.”
(SFC, 4/3/97, p.A13)(SFC, 4/15/97, p.A13)(AP,
5/23/97)(HN, 5/23/02)(ON, 7/02, p.3)(WSJ, 3/10/09, p.A13)
1935 Jun 12, Senator Huey Long of
Louisiana spoke continually for 15 hours in Senate's longest speech on
record (150,000 words).
(MC, 6/12/02)
1935 Sep 8, Sen. Huey P. Long,
"The Kingfish" of Louisiana politics, was shot and mortally wounded in
Baton Rouge allegedly by Dr. Carl Austin Weiss, Jr.; he died two days
later ending what might have been a prominent national career. It was
suspected that Dr. Weiss was acting in revenge against Long's public
slandering of his father. The 1996 documentary film "Huey Long" by Ken
Burns was about the Louisiana politician who wanted to redistribute
wealth and make every man a king.
(TMC, 1994, p.1935)(AP, 9/8/97)(SFEC, 3/8/98, DB
p.47)(HN, 9/8/98)
1935 Sep 8, Carl Austin Weiss,
murderer of Sen Huey Long, was shot down.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1935 Sep 10, Sen. Huey P. Long,
"The Kingfish" of Louisiana politics, died from a gunshot wound
inflicted Sep 8 by Dr. Carl Austin Weiss Jr. In 2006 Richard D. White
authored “Kingfish: The Reign of Huey P. Long.”
(AP, 9/8/97)(Econ, 4/22/06, p.80)
1935 Fishermen formed the Seafood
Workers Association and went on strike. The following year they held a
Labor Day celebration which evolved to become the annual Louisiana
Shrimp and Petroleum Festival.
(WSJ, 8/24/99, p.A16)
1936 Apr 21, James Clayton Dobson,
Christian conservative leader, was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. He
became an American psychologist and chairman of the board of Focus on
the Family, a nonprofit organization founded in 1977 and based in
Colorado Springs, Colorado. In 2007 his radio show pulled in 6 million
listeners a week.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Dobson)(Econ,
3/3/07, p.40)
1937 Enriquez Alferez (d.1999 at
98), Mexican artist, created his "Fountain of the Four Winds" for the
New Orleans Lakefront Airport. One of the 4 figures of the sculpture
was a well-endowed nude male.
(SFC, 9/14/99, p.A23)
1937 Nutria rodents were
introduced to Louisiana from Argentina. They propagated rapidly and by
1997 were threatening acres of fragile wetlands due to their feeding on
plant roots. The McIlhenny family, makers of Tabasco Sauce, imported 13
nutria from Argentina to study their fur-bearing potential. The animals
escaped 3 years later during a flood and began to proliferate.
(SFC,12/26/97, p.A5)
1941 Oct 4, Anne Rice, novelist,
was born in New Orleans, La. Her books included "Interview with a
Vampire."
(HN, 10/4/00)(MC, 10/4/01)
1942 May 12, A Nazi U-boat sank an
American cargo ship at mouth of Mississippi River.
(MC, 5/12/02)
1944-1948 Jimmy Davis (d.2000) was elected to his 1st
term as governor. Davis was a singer and had made a hit with "You Are
My Sunshine" in 1939.
(SFC, 11/6/00, p.A23)
1947 Feb 20, A chemical mixing
error caused an explosion that destroyed 42 blocks in LA.
(MC, 2/20/02)
1947 The film "New Orleans"
starred Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, the Woody Herman band and
other jazz stars. It was directed by Arthur Lubin.
(SFC, 2/18/02, p.403)
1947 The first offshore oil rig
out of sight of land was set up by Kerr-McGee, Phillips Petroleum and
Stanolind Oil & Gas 10 miles off the Louisiana coast.
(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.R4)
1949 May 26, Hank Williams Jr,
country singer (Honky Tonk), was born in Shreveport, La.
(MC, 5/26/02)
1953 Rev. T.J. Jemison organized a
bus boycott in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. It was the 1st of its kind a
became a model for the 1955 Martin Luther King rebellion in Montgomery,
Ala.
(NW, 6/9/03, p/14)
1956 Jun 11, Ray Nagin, later
mayor of New Orleans, was born in New Orleans.
(WSJ, 1/10/06, p.A4)
1956 Aug 30, In Louisiana the
2-lane Lake Pontchartrain causeway opened. A 2nd span was added in 1969.
(HC, 6/14/05)
1956 Louisiana built its 1st
man-made river diversion to flush out salt water destroying oyster
reefs in the eastern estuaries. The Bayou Lamoque river diversion was a
success.
(SFC, 11/28/03, p.C7)
1957 Feb 14, The “Southern
Leadership Conference” was formed in New Orleans, Louisiana. Officers
were elected which included: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as President,
Dr. Ralph David Abernathy as Financial Secretary-Treasurer, Rev. C. K.
Steele of Tallahassee, Florida as Vice President, Rev. T. J. Jemison of
Baton Rouge, Louisiana as Secretary, and Attorney I. M. Augustine of
New Orleans, Louisiana as General Counsel. In August the name was
changed to "Southern Christian Leadership Conference" at its first
convention in Montgomery, Alabama.
(http://sclcnational.org/net/content/item.aspx?s=25461.0.12.2607)
1957 Jun 26, Hurricane Audrey hit
Louisiana earlier than expected. It left at least 390 people dead with
192 missing in Louisiana and Texas.
(SFC, 6/26/09, p.D10)
1957 Jun 27, More than 500 people
were killed after Hurricane Audrey slammed through coastal Louisiana
and Texas.
(AP, 6/27/97)
1959 May 25, US Supreme Court
ruled that Louisiana’s prohibition of black-white boxing was
unconstitutional.
(SC, 5/25/02)
1960 Nov 14, New Orleans
integrated two all white schools. Ruby Bridges, a 6-year-old black
girl, entered a previously all-white school flanked by 4 federal
marshals before a phalanx of angry racists. A 1998 Disney movie "Ruby
Bridges" portrayed the event, which was captured by Norman Rockwell in
his painting: "The Problem We all Live With."
(WSJ, 1/8/98, p.A7)(HN, 11/14/98)
1960 Nov 16, After the integration
of two all white schools, 2,000 rioted in the streets of New Orleans.
(HN, 11/16/98)
1960-1964 Jimmy Davis (d.2000) was elected to his 2nd
term as governor.
(SFC, 11/6/00, p.A23)
1961 Feb 16, Wilbert Ridieu (19)
robbed the Lake Charles, La., Gulf National Bank. He walked out with
$14,000 and 3 hostages, 2 of whom he shot and left for dead. Rideau
stabbed to death Julia Ferguson on a rural Louisiana road following the
bank robbery. He confessed and was sentenced to death 3 times. Rideau
escaped death in the 1970s when the death penalty was outlawed. In 2003
his case was still in court. While in prison Rideau became a
self-educated writer and elevated the prison magazine, the Angolite, to
national acclaim. In 2005 Rideau was set free for time served after a
racially mixed jury found him guilty of manslaughter.
(NW, 1/13/03, p.52)(AP, 1/16/05)(SFC, 1/17/05, p.A5)
1961 Oct 18, Wynton Marsalis, jazz
and classical trumpeter (Grammy 1983), was born in New Orleans, La.
(MC, 10/18/01)
1961 Ernie K-Doe (d.2001 at 65,
born as Ernest Kador in New Orleans), rhythm-and-blues singer, made a
hit with the song "Mother-in-Law."
(SFC, 7/10/01, p.A15)
1961 Preservation Hall opened in
New Orleans.
(SFEC, 3/26/00, p.T5)
1962 Apr 20, New Orleans Citizens
Committee gave a free one-way ride to blacks to move North.
(HN, 4/20/98)
1962 Robert Smith, a disk jockey
in Shreveport, La., took on the name "Wolfman Jack."
(SFC, 12/30/99, p.E3)
1964 The state prison at Angola
began its Angola rodeo program for inmates.
(SFC, 10/22/01, p.C1)
1965 Aug 27-1965 Sep 13, Hurricane
Betsy killed 75 in Louisiana & Florida. Betsy left New Orleans
under 7 feet of water.
(www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/Storm_pages/betsy1965/)(WSJ,
8/31/05, p.B1)
1965 Ruth Fertel (d.2002 at 75)
bought the Chris Steak House in New Orleans and proceeded to expand it
into the worldwide Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse chain.
(SFC, 4/20/02, p.A23)
1967 Jun 29, Jayne Mansfield
(b.1933), stage and film actress, was beheaded in a car crash in
Louisiana. Her 3 children survived in the back seat of the 1966 Buick
Electra. Daughter Mariska Hargitay was 3 and began a film career at 19.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayne_Mansfield)(SFEC,
7/13/97, Par p.18)(SFEC, 4/5/98, p.A22)
1969 May 10, In Louisiana the 2nd
Lake Pontchartrain causeway opened. The 1st span was completed in 1956.
(www.southeastroads.com/lpc.html)
1969 Aug 17, Hurricane Camille hit
the Gulf Coast at Pass Christian, Miss., leaving 256 people killed in
Louisiana and Mississippi. Damage was later estimated at $3.8 billion.
(AP, 8/17/97)(SFEC, 6/6/99, p.A17)(AP, 8/30/05)
1970 Aug 3, Hurricane "Celia"
became the most expensive Gulf storm in history.
(SC, 8/3/02)
1970 Sep 24, Moon Landrieu
(b.1930) began serving as the mayor of New Orleans and continued to
1978. From 1979-1981 he served as the US Secretary of Housing and Urban
Development under Pres. Jimmy Carter.
(Econ, 2/13/10,
p.34)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_Landrieu)
1971 Feb 21, A series of tornadoes
cut through the lower Mississippi River Valley. The two-day outbreak,
which produced 19 tornadoes, killed 123 people across 3 states,
including 11 in Louisiana, 110 in Mississippi, and 2 in North Carolina.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_Valley_tornado_outbreak_of_February_1971)
1971 Aug 11, Construction began on
the Louisiana Superdome. It opened on August 3, 1975.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_Superdome)
1972 Oct 16, A light plane
carrying House Democratic leader Hale Boggs (b.1914) of Louisiana and
three other men were reported missing in Alaska. The plane was never
found.
(http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=b000594)
1972 John Breaux was elected to
the US Congress as a Representative (D) from Louisiana.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A8)
1972-1988 Sherman Bernard served as the insurance
commissioner. In 1993 he pleaded guilty in federal court to taking
$80,000 in bribes to license financially shaky insurance companies.
(WSJ, 11/19/99, p.A1)
1972-1989 Edwin W. Edwards served as governor.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A15)
1973 Sep 20, Jim Croce (b.1943),
American singer-songwriter, died in an airplane crash near
Natchitoches, La., just as he was beginning to capitalize on his
success. Maury Muehleisen and four others also died as their plane
crashed into a tree while taking off for a concert in Sherman, Texas.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Croce)(AP, 9/20/98)
1973 Oil was discovered off the
coast of Louisiana at the underwater site called Eugene Island 330. By
1989 production slowed to 4,000 barrels from a peak of 15,000 and then
suddenly increased and in 1999 produced 13,000 barrels a day.
Geologists were unable to account for the source of the oil.
(WSJ, 4/16/99, p.A1)
1974 Gov. Edwin Edwards signed a
bill exempting Louisiana brewers from their 1st $150,000 in taxes.
(WSJ, 12/1/03, p.A11)
1975 Jun 1, The Rolling Stones
opened their North American Tour in Baton Rouge, Louisiana with Ron
Wood (b.1947) replacing Mick Taylor (b.1949) as the lead guitarist.
Other cities they played in included, Kansas City, Milwaukee, St. Paul,
Cleveland, Buffalo, Toronto, New York, Philadelphia, Memphis, Dallas,
Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, and
Jacksonville.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_in_music)
1975 Aug 3, The Louisiana
Superdome was dedicated.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_Superdome)
1975-1981 Stanford Opotowsky (d. 1997 at 73) served
as director of news coverage for ABC TV. He was the author of several
books that included: "TV: The Big Picture," "The Longs of Louisiana,"
"The Kennedy Government," and "Men Behind Bars."
(SFC, 10/3/97, p.B13)
1976 Oct 20, 76 people died when
the Norwegian tanker Frosta collided with the ferryboat George Prince
on the Mississippi River north of New Orleans.
(AP, 10/20/06)
1976 Louisiana passed a law that
required schools to allow a brief time in "silent meditation." In 1992
the wording was changed to "silent prayer or meditation." In 1999 the
word "silent" was deleted. In 2001 a federal appeals court struck the
law down.
(SFC, 12/12/01, p.A7)
1977 Nov 12, New Orleans elected
its first black mayor, Ernest "Dutch" Morial, the winner of a runoff.
(AP, 11/12/07)
1977 Dec 22, Three dozen people
were killed when a 250-foot-high grain elevator at the Continental
Grain Co. plant in Westwego, La., exploded.
(AP, 12/22/97)
1980 Jan 30, Professor Longhair
(61), legendary New Orleans Blues musician, died. He was born as Henry
Roeland Byrd in 1918.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professor_Longhair)
1981 John Kennedy Toole was
awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his book "A Confederacy of Dunces."
Toole had committed suicide 12 years earlier. His mother got Walker
Percy to read the novel and Percy got the Louisiana State Univ. Press
to publish it.
(WSJ, 9/30/99, p.A1)
1981 Clyde Charles was convicted
for the rape of a woman in Grand Caillou. He served 18 years of a life
sentenced when in 1999 DNA evidence proved his innocence.
(SFC, 12/18/99, p.C3)
1981 Michael Anthony Williams (16)
was convicted of raping his female math tutor. He spent 24 years in
Angola state penitentiary. In 2005 DNA evidence exonerated him.
(SFC, 5/9/05, p.A1)(WSJ, 10/30/07, p.A1)
1981 George Brown, director of
Beer League of Louisiana, was sentenced to 6 months in jail in Texas
for failing to pay taxes on alleged bribes.
(WSJ, 12/1/03, p.A11)
1982 Mar 29, In New Orleans
Michael Jordan’s 16-foot jump shot with 15 seconds remaining gave North
Carolina a thrilling 63-62 victory over Georgetown and the NCAA
basketball championship before 61,612 at the Superdome tonight. Six
players in that game: Floyd, Ewing, Anthony Jones, Michael Jordan,
James Worty and Sam Perkins, became NBA first-round draft choices.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_NCAA_Men's_Division_I_Basketball_Tournament)
1982 Jul 9, A Pan Am Boeing 727
crashed in Kenner, La., killing all 145 people aboard and eight people
on the ground.
(AP, 7/9/07)
1984 Jul 30, The British tanker
Alvenus spilled 2.8 million gallons of oil at Cameron, La.
(http://ceprofs.tamu.edu/rhann/links/case.asp)
1984 Louisiana held a World
Exposition. Low attendance was blamed on the rain.
(SFEC, 12/15/96, p.A20) (SFC, 8/26/97, p.A4)
1984 Delores Dye was murdered in a
New Orleans supermarket parking lot. Curtis Kyles was tried 5 times for
her murder and walked free in 1997. In 2005 Jed Horned authored “Desire
Street: A True Story of Death and Deliverance in New Orleans.”
(SSFC, 2/27/05, p.B4)
1984-1988 Edwin W. Edwards served as governor.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A15)
1986 Feb 19, Barry Seal (b.1939),
gunrunner, drug trafficker, and covert CIA operative extraordinaire,
was murdered in a hail of bullets by Medellin cartel hit men outside a
Salvation Army shelter in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He had testified in
federal court in Las Vegas, Fort Lauderdale, and Miami for the US
government against leaders of the Medellin drug cartel.
(www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/crimesOfMena.html)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Seal)
1986 John Breaux was elected to
the US Congress as a Senator (D) from Louisiana.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A8)
1987 Jun 19, The U.S. Supreme
Court struck down a Louisiana law requiring any public school teaching
the theory of evolution to also teach creationism science as well.
(DT internet 6/19/97)
1987 Nov 21, An eight-day siege
began at a detention center in Oakdale, La., as Cuban detainees,
alarmed over the possibility of being returned to Cuba, seized the
facility and took hostages.
(AP, 11/21/97)
1987 Nov 26, Cuban detainees
concerned about the possibility of being sent back to Cuba continued to
hold hostages at a prison in Atlanta and a detention center in Oakdale,
La.
(AP, 11/26/97)
1987 Nov 29, Cuban detainees
released 26 hostages that they'd been holding for more than a week at
the Federal Detention Center in Oakdale, La.
(AP, 11/29/97)
1987 William and Callie Frost were
murdered. Albert Burrell and Michael Graham were convicted and
scheduled for execution. In 2000 DNA evidence supported their innocence
and they were freed after 14 years in Angola prison.
(SFC, 1/3/01, p.A4)
1987 Clifton Chenier, Zydeco
accordionist, died. In c1999 Michael Tisserand published "The Kingdom
of Zydeco" and Rick Olivier and Ben Sandmel published the photo
documentary "Zydeco!"
(WSJ, 4/19/99, p.A20)
1988 Feb 21, TV evangelist Jimmy
Swaggart tearfully confessed to his congregation in Baton Rouge, La.,
that he was guilty of an unspecified sin, and said he was leaving the
pulpit temporarily. Reports linked Swaggart to an admitted prostitute,
Debra Murphree.
(AP, 2/21/98)
1988 May 4, A spectacular
explosion occurred at the Shell oil refinery in Norco, La., on the
Mississippi river just north of New Orleans. 8 people were killed and
over 40 injured.
(http://www.shellfacts.com/Chatterjee_review.html)
1988 Aug 13, Vice President George
Bush contemplated a list of potential running mates as Republicans
gathered in New Orleans for their party's national convention.
(AP, 8/13/98)
1988 Aug 14, President Reagan
arrived in New Orleans on the eve of the Republican national convention
that would nominate his vice president, George Bush, to be its choice
to succeed him.
(AP, 8/14/98)
1988 Aug 15, President Reagan
bade a sentimental farewell on the first night of the Republican
national convention in New Orleans, and praised the man destined to
succeed him, Vice President George Bush.
(AP, 8/15/98)
1988 Aug 18, Indiana Sen. Dan
Quayle was nominated to be George Bush's running mate during the
Republican convention in New Orleans; meanwhile, questions were being
raised about Quayle's service in the Indiana National Guard during the
Vietnam War.
(AP, 8/18/98)
1988 Sep 15, Thousands of coastal
residents from Mexico to Louisiana were fleeing to higher ground, a day
after Hurricane Gilbert pounded the Yucatan Peninsula.
(AP, 9/15/98)
1988-1991 Doug Green served as the insurance
commissioner. In 1991 he was convicted in federal court for hiding that
fact that his $2 million election campaign was funded by an auto
insurer that later collapsed due to fraud.
(WSJ, 11/19/99, p.A1)
1989 Jan 21, Former Ku Klux Klan
leader David Duke led a field of seven candidates in an open primary to
advance to a runoff election for a Louisiana state House seat.
(AP, 1/1/99)
1989 The Louisiana legislature
established the Louisiana Wetlands Conservation Authority.
(NH, 2/05, p.46)
1990 Apr 16, The Supreme Court
rejected appeals by Dalton Prejean, a nearly retarded man condemned to
die for the 1977 murder of a Louisiana state trooper Prejean was
executed the following month.
(AP, 4/16/00)
1990 May 10, Walker Percy
(b.1916), Mississippi-raised physician, novelist (Lancelot), died of
cancer in Covington, Louisiana. His book "The Moviegoer" was the 1962
winner of the National Book Award." His last book, The Thanatos
Syndrome, appeared in 1987.
(www.olemiss.edu/depts/english/ms-writers/dir/percy_walker/)(WSJ,
3/26/03, p.D8)
1990 Jul 27, Louisiana Governor
Buddy Roemer vetoed a tough abortion bill passed by his state’s
legislature.
(AP, 7/27/00)
1990 Nov 6, William Jefferson
became the 1st African American to be elected to Congress from
Louisiana since Reconstruction. In 2005 he was under FBI investigation
for corruption.
(SFC, 8/4/05, p.A3)
1991 Jun 18, The Louisiana
Legislature enacted a strict anti-abortion law, overriding a veto by
Governor Buddy Roemer.
(AP, 6/18/01)
1991 Oct 19, In Louisiana former
Gov. Edwin Edwards and former Ku Klux Klansman David Duke won runoff
slots in the state's gubernatorial primary.
(AP, 10/19/01)
1991 Nov 16, Former Louisiana Gov.
Edwin Edwards won a landslide victory in his bid to return to office,
defeating state representative David Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan leader.
(AP, 11/16/01)
1991 The Louisiana legislature
approved most of the state’s gambling on the basis of added jobs and
tax money.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A14)
1992 Aug 24, Hurricane Andrew
smashed into Florida, causing record damage; 55 deaths in Florida,
Louisiana and the Bahamas were blamed on the storm.
(AP, 8/24/97)
1992 Aug 25, Hurricane Andrew
thrashed the Louisiana coast.
(AP, 8/25/97)
1992 Oct 21, Jim Garrison,
Louisiana DA who investigated the JFK assassination, died at 70.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Garrison)
1992 Dec, In Louisiana the Orleans
Parish School Board adopted a policy that prohibits school names
honoring former slave owners or others who did not respect equal
opportunity for all.
(SFC,11/12/97, p.A3)
1992 New Orleans banned racial
discrimination by the Mardi Gras "krewes," organizations that sponsored
floats during Carnival.
(USAT, 3/7/00, p.5A)
1992-1996 Edwin W. Edwards served as governor.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A15)
1993 May 23, A jury in Baton
Rouge, La., acquitted Rodney Peairs of manslaughter in the shooting
death of Yoshi Hattori, a Japanese exchange student he'd mistaken for
an intruder. Peairs was later found liable in a civil suit brought by
Hattori's parents.
(AP, 5/23/08)
1994 Clyde McCaskill (26), a
witness to a murder case, was shot to death in New Orleans. Witnesses
went mute.
(SSFC, 3/23/03, p.A3)
1995 Mar, Patsy Byers was shot and
seriously wounded by Sarah Edmonson and Benjamin Darrus. The two had
just killed a Mississippi man and later asserted that the film Natural
Born Killers inspired their actions.
(SFC, 3/9/99, p.A3)
1995 Mike Foster was elected
governor.
(SFEC, 10/24/99, p.A7)
1995 Harrah's opened a New Orleans
riverfront casino with developer Christopher B. Hemmeter (d.2003). It
closed in bankruptcy after 6-months.
(SSFC, 11/30/03, p.A29)
1996 Feb 6, Patrick Buchanan won
the Louisiana Republican caucus, upsetting Phil Gramm.
(AP, 2/6/01)
1996 Jul 28, President Clinton,
addressing a veterans convention in New Orleans, called on Congress to
pass expanded anti-terrorism measures.
(AP, 7/28/97)
1996 Laws legalizing video poker
were repealed in 33 of the state’s 64 parishes.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A1)
1996 Troy Domino was released from
Orleans Parish Prison and began painting scenes from public-housing
projects.
(WSJ, 8/31/01, p.B1)
1996-1997 Oysters from Tomales Bay, Ca., were removed
from market shelves May 15, 1998, due to an unknown agent causing
illness. The symptoms were similar to the Norwalk virus that caused
illnesses around New Orleans during the winter of 1996-1997, that was
traced to human sewage.
(SFEC, 5/31/98, p.A7)
1997 Mar 12, Edward DeBartolo Jr.
handed over $400,000 to former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards at the SF
Airport in order to clinch a riverboat gambling license.
(SFC, 3/28/00, p.A3)(SFC, 4/12/00, p.A5)
1997 Mar 13, Eddie DeBartolo,
owner of the SF 49ers, was awarded a Louisiana Casino license one day
after paying former Gov. Edwin Edwards $400,000 in cash.
(SFC, 4/12/00, p.A5)
1997 Apr, In New Orleans a toddler
died in a hot van while his baby sitter played video poker for hours in
a cafe.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A14)
1997 May 15, Hayes Williams (49)
was released after 30 years from the State Penitentiary at Angola after
new evidence confirmed his innocence in the 1967 murder of a white
service station owner. He had filed a lawsuit against the state
(Williams vs. Governor John McKeithen) that led to a 25-year overhaul
of Louisiana’s prison system along with federal oversight.
(SFC, 12/1/97, p.A3)
1997 May 16, Some 2,500 barrels of
oil leaked near a coastal marsh in Louisiana at lake Barre in
Terrebonne Parish.
(SFC, 5/20/97, p.A3)
1997 Aug 15, A self-defense law,
passed in June, that permits motorists to use deadly force in a
car-jacking incident took effect.
(SFC, 8/14/97, p.A3)
1997 Aug 15, Beginning today
couples seeking marriage in Louisiana were given the choice between a
traditional or a covenant marriage. The covenant marriage, designed to
make divorce much more difficult, required counseling and a 2-year
cooling off period.
(SFC, 8/15/97, p.A6)(Econ, 2/12/05, p.31)
1997 Jun 19, In New Orleans 2 men,
identified as the "Assault Poetry Unit," delivered unmarked boxes of
manifestos, poems and innocuous objects to 14 prominent people. The
targets feared for bombs and the 2 men were arrested for terrorizing.
(SFC, 8/18/97, p.A3)
1997 Sep 30, The Flamingo
riverboat casino closed. It was the last riverboat casino in downtown
New Orleans and the 4th to open and close in the last 4 years. One
floating casino was left on Lake Pontchartrain.
(SFC, 10/4/97, p.A4)
1997 Nov 17, From LaPlace, La. it
was reported that Daniel Bank, a mechanic, was arrested and charged on
3 counts of murder. He was said to have confessed to 6 murders
committed to feed a gambling habit from Oct 1966 to Jun 1997.
(SFC,11/17/97, p.A7)
1997 Dec 3, It was reported that
former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards, Edward J. DeBartolo, owner of the
SF 49ers, and three others were about to be indicted for alleged fraud.
(SFC, 12/3/97, p.A1)
1998 Sep 11, Tropical Storm
Frances hit the middle of the Texas coast. In Louisiana one person was
killed and 6 were injured. In Houston the streets were flooded.
(SFC, 9/11/98, p.A3)
1998 Sep 15-Oct 1, Hurricane
Georges caused 602 deaths in the Caribbean and four in the United
States. The storm hit the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico,
Antigua, Guadeloupe, St. Kitts and Nevis, Anguilla and British and U.S.
Virgin Islands before striking Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and
Florida.
(AP, 9/11/04)(www.wunderground.com)
1998 Sep 24, Eddie DeBartolo,
co-owner of the SF 49ers, struck a deal with federal prosecutors to
keep out of jail. He will pay a fine and testify against former
Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards.
(SFC, 9/25/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 6, Eddie DeBartolo Jr.
pleaded guilty in federal court in Louisiana for failing to report that
former governor Edwin Edwards extorted $400,000 from him for a casino
license. He agreed to pay $1 million in penalties, serve 2 years of
probation and testify in future trials against Edwards.
(SFC, 10/7/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 9, Ricky Shetler, a
Louisiana casino consultant, pleaded guilty in federal court to
conspiring to funnel $500,000 in cash and material goods to former Gov.
Edwin Edwards and his son Stephen beginning in 1993.
(SFC, 10/10/98, p.A7)
1998 Oct 24, A natural gas well
exploded in Bryceland and killed 7 workers.
(SFC, 10/26/98, p.A4)
1998 Oct 26, Nutrient pollution
known as eutrophication, the overabundance of nitrogen and phosphorus,
was noted on the Chesapeake Bay and estuaries around the world. A 7,000
sq. mile dead zone was reported to spread every summer across the Gulf
of Mexico from the mouth of the Mississippi. In 2007 Louisiana crabbers
complained of buckets of dead crabs and the condition in the Gulf of
Mexico was expected to get worse due to rising demand for ethanol and
increased corn production in Corn Belt states, which called for more
nitrogen use.
(SFC, 10/25/98, p.A3)(SFC, 12/20/07, p.A26)
1998 Nov 6, Former Gov. Edwin
Edwards (71) was charged in a 34-count federal indictment for trying to
steer gambling licenses to associates in exchange for payoffs after he
left office in 1996.
(SFC, 11/7/98, p.A3)
1998 Dec 31, A truck loaded with
fireworks exploded prior to a New Years Eve show. 2 technicians were
killed.
(SFC, 1/2/99, p.A12)
1999 Feb 25, Republican
Representative Bob Livingston gave his valedictory speech on the House
floor. He resigned the House following a 21 year legislative career
after admitting to an extra-marital affair.
(SFC, 2/25/99, p.A7)
1999 Apr 22, A 14-year-old boy
opened fire at a middle school in Scotlandville, a suburb of Baton
Rouge, and a 14-yar-old girl was hit in the cheek.
(SFC, 4/23/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 27, Al Hirt, "The King of
the Trumpet," died in New Orleans at age 76.
(SFC, 4/27/99, p.C4)
1999 May 9, In Louisiana a bus,
bound for a gambling excursion, crashed on I-610 in New Orleans and 23
people were killed.
(SFC, 5/10/99, p.A1)(WSJ, 5/10/99, p.A1)
1999 Jul 6, In Louisiana Gov. Mike
Foster signed a polite-student law that required students to address
teachers with appropriate titles.
(SFC, 7/7/99, p.A3)
1999 Oct 23, In Louisiana Gov.
Mike Foster was elected to a 2nd term. His grandfather served as
governor at the turn of the 19th century.
(SFEC, 10/24/99, p.A7)\
1999 Oct 28, A new $970 million
Harrah's casino opened in New Orleans with no hotel and just one
250-seat eatery. Some of the costs included funds for a failed
temporary operation. A $100 million annual tax payment to the state was
part of the operating deal. Bankruptcy threatened operations one year
later.
(WSJ, 10/28/99, p.B1)(SFC, 12/7/00, p.B12)
1999 Dec 13, In Louisiana 8 Cuban
nationals at the St. Matin Parish jail in St. Martinville took as
hostage Warden Todd Louvierre, 2 deputies, and 5 inmates. They demanded
either freedom or deportation. 2 Cubans surrendered on Dec 17 and freed
3 female hostages. An agreement was reached Dec 18 for the Cubans to
return to Cuba.
(SFC, 12/15/99, p.A3)(SFC, 12/18/99, p.A3)(SFEC,
12/19/99, p.A18)
2000 May 9, Former Gov. Edwin
Edwards and his son Stephen were convicted of fraud and racketeering
for extorting money from businessmen applying for riverboat casino
licenses.
(SFC, 5/10/00, p.A3)
2000 Jun 6, In New Orleans the
National D-Day Museum opened on the 56th anniversary of the Allied
landing to liberate Europe from Nazi terror.
(SFC, 6/7/00, p.A3)
2000 Nov 5, Jimmie Davis, former
2-term governor, died at about age 101.
(SFC, 11/6/00, p.A23)
2001 Jan 8, Former Gov. Edwin
Edwards was sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined $250,000 for
extortion. His son, Stephen, was sentenced to 7 years and fined $60,000.
(SFC, 1/9/01, p.A3)
2001 Mar, The state legislature
agreed to cut Harrah’s taxes in half and New Orleans agreed to drop
fees by $5 million in order to keep the casino open and save 2,800 jobs.
(SSFC, 5/27/01, p.A19)
2001 May 5, Boozoo Chavis (70),
Zydeco accordionist, died in Lake Charles, La. He recorded one of the
1st Zydeco hits "Paper In My Shoe in 1954."
(SFC, 5/7/01, p.C5)
2001 Jun 10, Tropical storm
Allison hung over Texas and Louisiana and killed at least 16 people.
Pres. Bush declared 28 counties disaster areas due to flooding.
(SSFC, 6/10/01, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/11/01, p.A1)
2001 Sep 5, Justin Wilson, Cajun
humorist and chef, died at age 87. He authored 5 cookbooks and released
27 albums of short stories and an album of Christmas songs.
(SFC, 9/7/01, p.D5)
2001 Sep, Derrick Todd Lee began a
series of murders in Louisiana that continued to Mar, 2003. He was
arrested in 2003 and linked to the murder of 6 women.
(USAT, 1/16/04, p.1D)
2001 Dec 11, A federal appeals
court struck a law that allowed vocal classroom prayer. Louisiana had
passed a 1976 law that required schools to allow a brief time in
"silent meditation." In 1992 the wording was changed to "silent prayer
or meditation." In 1999 the word "silent" was deleted.
(SFC, 12/12/01, p.A7)
2001 Tyler Bridges authored ""Bad
Bet on the Bayou: The Rise of Gambling in Louisiana and the Fall of
Governor Edwin Edwards."
(WSJ, 6/1/01, p.W12)
2002 Feb 2, New Orleans voters
approved a $1 per hour increase in the minimum wage above the $5.15
federal standard in a referendum that went to court for resolution.
(SSFC, 2/17/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar 2, Ray Nagin, a VP for
Cox Communications, won mayoral elections in New Orleans over Police
Superintendent Richard Pennington (58-42%).
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A10)
2002 Apr 6, Some 90,000 gallons of
oil from a ruptured pipeline spilled into the coastal area of Little
Lake.
(SSFC, 4/7/02, p.A15)
2002 May 10, NBA owners approved
the Hornets' move to New Orleans, ending the team's 14-year era in
Charlotte.
(AP, 5/10/03)
2002 May 25, Vinicia Smith (16)
was killed by a group of children and teenagers in front of her home in
New Orleans. 2 young girls were booked on 2nd-degree murder charges.
(SSFC, 5/26/02, p.A9)
2002 Aug 2, In Louisiana Gov. Mike
Foster declared a state of emergency after West Nile virus killed 4
residents and infected another 58.
(SFC, 8/3/02, p.A3)
2002 Sep 3, Louisiana State Univ.
fired Dr. Steven J. Hatfill after the Justice Dept. said the school
could not use him on grants funded by the agency. The firing came
following FBI investigations of Hatfill and naming him as a "person of
interest."
(SFC, 9/5/02, p.A6)(WSJ, 9/4/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 23, Hong Im Ballenger, a
beauty shop manager in Baton Rouge, La., was shot to death. Her murder
was later attributed to John Allen Muhammed, the Washington area sniper.
(SFC, 11/1/02, p.A3)
2002 Nov 20, Louisiana began
offering a $4-a-tail bounty on the swamp-dwelling nutria rodent, due to
wetlands damage from devoured plants.
(SFC, 11/20/02, p.A2)
2002 Nov 20, A Louisiana Circuit
Court of Appeals ruled that the state’s 197-year-old sodomy law does
not discriminate against gays and lesbians.
(SFC, 11/23/02, p.A5)
2002 Dec 7, Louisiana Democratic
Sen. Mary Landrieu beat Republican Suzanne Terrell in a runoff 52-48%,
despite a recent visit by Pres. Bush.
(WSJ, 12/4/02, p.A1)(AP, 12/8/02)
2002 Nearly half of Louisiana's
875 traffic deaths this year were alcohol-related.
(WSJ, 12/1/03, p.A11)
2003 Apr 14, In New Orleans a
gunman with an AK-47 shot a killed one boy (15) at the John McDonough
High School. 3 teenage girls were wounded. 4 suspects were arrested in
the gang-related shooting.
(SFC, 4/15/03, p.A4)
2003 May 9, Russell Long (b.1918),
U.S. senator from Louisiana, died. He was 1st elected to the senate in
1948 and served for over 32 years.
(HN, 11/3/98)(SFC, 5/10/03, p.A13)
2003 May 26, FBI and state police
issued fugitive and murder warrants for Derrick Todd Lee, a prime
suspect in the killings of 5 women in south Louisiana.
(SFC, 5/27/03, p.A3)(AP, 5/28/03)
2003 May 27, Derrick Todd Lee, a
suspected serial killer of women in Louisiana, was arrested in Atlanta.
(AP, 5/27/04)
2003 Oct 13, In Louisiana a bus
crash on I-20 killed 8 members of a Texas church group after the driver
fell asleep.
(WSJ, 10/14/03, p.A1)
2003 Nov 15, In Louisiana
Democratic Lt. Gov. Kathleen Blanco (60) defeated conservative
Indian-American Bobby Jindal with 52 percent of the vote in a runoff
election.
(AP, 11/16/03)
2003 Dec 15, Senator John Breaux
(59) of Louisiana announced that he would not seek re-election in 2004.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A8)
2003 Mike Tidwell authored "Bayou
Farewell: The Rich Life and Tragic Death of Louisiana’s Cajun Coast."
(SSFC, 3/30/03, p.M4)
2003 Bob Odom, Louisiana’s
agricultural commissioner, backed a new $45 million sugar processing
mill for the state’s south-west sugar farmers. Operations were planned
to begin in the fall of 2005.
(Econ, 3/26/05, p.34)
2004 Feb 21, The Mississippi was
closed near New Orleans following a ship collision that left 5 crewmen
lost.
(WSJ, 2/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, The annual
environmental Goldman Prizes were awarded in SF. Winners included
Margie Richard of the US for her work following chemical leaks in
Norco, Louisiana.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.B5)
2004 Aug 6, Louisiana’s Democrat
Rep. Rodney Alexander (57) switched party affiliations and filed as a
Republican 30 minutes before a deadline.
(SFC, 8/13/04, p.A4)
2004 Sep 16, Hurricane Ivan
slammed ashore in Alabama with winds of 130 mph, packing deadly
tornadoes and a powerful punch of waves and rain that threatened to
swamp communities from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle. At least 23
people were killed.
(AP, 9/16/04)(SFC, 9/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 17, The violent remains
of Hurricane Ivan pounded a large swath of the eastern United States,
drenching an area from Georgia to Ohio. Ivan left 70 dead in the
Caribbean and 40 dead in the US including 4 in Alabama, 16 in Florida,
4 in Georgia, 4 in Louisiana, 3 in Mississippi, and 8 in North Carolina.
(AP, 9/17/04)(SFC, 9/18/04, p.A16)
2004 Sep 18, Louisiana voters
overwhelmingly approved a state constitutional amendment banning
same-sex marriages and civil unions.
(AP, 9/19/04)
2004 Oct 5, A Louisiana state
judge threw out the new constitutional amendment banning gay marriage
because it also banned civil unions.
(SFC, 10/6/04, p.A3)
2004 Oct 12, A jury in Baton
Rouge, La., took 80 minutes to find suspected serial killer Derrick
Todd Lee guilty of first-degree murder in the death of 22-year-old
Charlotte Murray Pace. Lee was later sentenced to death for Pace's
killing.
(AP, 10/12/05)
2004 Oct, New Orleans began
installing surveillance cameras, initially in drug-dealing hot spots.
By March 2005 about 240 of the proposed 1,000 cameras were in operation.
(AP, 3/8/05)
2004 Dec 4, In Congressional
runoff races Republican Charles Boustany won the 7th District and
Democrat Charles Melancon won the 3rd.
(SSFC, 12/5/04, p.A2)
2005 Jul 15, It was reported that
an estimated 100,000 gamecock breeders operated in the US, where
cockfights were only legal in Louisiana and New Mexico. Breeders
prepared the birds with injections of testosterone and methamphetamines.
(WSJ, 7/15/05, p.A1)
2005 Jul 30, Rep. William
Jefferson, D-La., received $100,000 at the Ritz-Carlton in Arlington,
Virginia, to use for bribing Abubakar Atiku, vice-president of Nigeria.
Vernon Jackson, a Kentucky businessman, later admitted to paying over
$400,000 in bribes to secure deals for his telecommunications company
in Nigeria and other African countries. Documents released in 2005 said
an FBI informant recorded a video of the transaction.
(SFC, 5/22/06, p.A3)
2005 Aug 27, Coastal residents
jammed freeways and gas stations as they rushed to get out of the way
of Hurricane Katrina, which was headed toward New Orleans.
(AP, 8/27/06)
2005 Aug 28, In Louisiana Mayor
Ray Nagin ordered an immediate evacuation for all of New Orleans, a
city sitting below sea level with 485,000 inhabitants, as Hurricane
Katrina bore down with wind revved up to nearly 175 mph and a threat of
a massive storm surge.
(AP, 8/28/05)
2005 Aug 29, Hurricane Katrina hit
the Gulf Coast near Buras, La., as a Category 3 storm. Katrina ripped
two holes in the curved roof of the Louisiana Superdome, letting in
rain as thousands of storm refugees huddled inside. In Mississippi many
of the 13 floating casinos in Biloxi and Gulfport smashed historic
homes and buildings. The Grand Casino Biloxi destroyed the historic
Hotel Tivoli. Storm surges and winds from Katrina unleashed at least 40
oil spills and some 193,000 barrels of oil and other petrochemicals
were driven across fragile marshy ecosystems southeast of New Orleans.
The death toll from Katrina eventually reached at least 1,600. An
estimated 300 Louisiana residents died out of state; some 230 people
perished in Mississippi. Property damage estimates were in the hundreds
of billions of dollars.
(SFC, 9/6/05, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/23/05, p.A1)(WSJ,
3/21/06, p.A1)(AP, 8/29/06)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.36)
2005 Aug 30, The death toll in
Mississippi from Hurricane Katrina passed 100. Flooding reached 11 feet
in Mobile, Ala. Breaches in at least 2 levees from Lake Pontchartrain
put parts of New Orleans under 20 feet of water. Mayor Ray Nagin
estimated that 80% of New Orleans was flooded. Tourists snapped
pictures of looters in the French Quarter.
(AP, 8/30/05)(SFC, 8/31/05, p.A10)
2005 Aug 31, The Bush
administration said it will release oil from federal petroleum reserves
to help refiners affected by Hurricane Katrina. New Orleans Mayor Ray
Nagin said there was a significant number of dead bodies in the water''
following Hurricane Katrina; Nagin ordered virtually the entire police
force to abandon search-and-rescue efforts and instead stop thieves who
were becoming increasingly hostile. President Bush pledged to do all in
our power'' to save lives and provide sustenance but cautioned that
recovery of the Gulf Coast would take years.
(AP, 8/31/05)(AP, 8/31/06)
2005 Aug 31, At least 25,000 of
Hurricane Katrina's refugees, a majority of them at the New Orleans
Superdome, began traveling in a bus convoy to Houston and will be
sheltered at the 40-year-old Astrodome, which hasn't been used for
professional sporting events in years. New Orleans Mayor Nagin called
for a total evacuation. He said hundreds were dead and ordered police
to stop looters.
(AP, 8/31/05)(SFC, 9/1/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 1, New Orleans Mayor Ray
Nagin issued "a desperate SOS" as anger mounted across the ruined city,
with thousands of Hurricane Katrina victims increasingly hungry,
desperate and tired of waiting for buses to take them out. New Orleans
descended into anarchy, as corpses lay abandoned in street medians,
fights and fires broke out and storm survivors battled for seats on the
buses that would carry them away from the chaos. Fights and trash fires
broke out at the hot and stinking Superdome and anger and unrest
mounted across New Orleans, as National Guardsmen in armored vehicles
poured in to help restore order across the increasingly lawless and
desperate city.
(AP, 9/1/05)(AP, 9/1/06)
2005 Sep 2, Pres. Bush made a tour
of damages from Hurricane Katrina in Alabama, Mississippi and New
Orleans. He acknowledged that current relief results were not
acceptable. A National Guard convoy packed with food, water and
medicine rolled into New Orleans to bring relief suffering multitudes
and put down the looting and violence. Scorched by criticism about
sluggish federal help, President Bush acknowledged the government's
failure to stop lawlessness and help desperate people during a daylong
tour of the Gulf Coast. During a live TV benefit concert, rapper Kanye
West went off-script to sharply criticize Bush.
(SFC, 9/3/05, p.A1)(AP, 9/2/05)(AP, 9/2/06)
2005 Sep 2, FEMA signed a 6-month
contract with Carnival Cruise Lines for 3 ships to help in relief
operations from Hurricane Katrina at a cost of $236 million.
(SFC, 9/28/05, p.A12)
2005 Sep 3, President Bush ordered
more than 7,000 active duty forces to the Gulf Coast as his
administration intensified efforts to rescue survivors and send aid to
the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast in the face of criticism it did not
act quickly enough.
(AP, 9/3/05)
2005 Sep 3, The Gulf emirate of
Qatar announced it will donate 100 million dollars to relief efforts
for the US victims of Hurricane Katrina. The funds included a $17.5
million grant to Xavier University in New Orleans, which serves mostly
black Americans.
(AFP, 9/3/05)(Econ, 9/9/06, p.48)
2005 Sep 4, US Health and Human
Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said the death toll from Hurricane
Katrina and its aftermath is in the thousands.
(AP, 9/4/05)
2005 Sep 4, In New Orleans police
killed at least 4 people, who allegedly shot at contractors. The
official Louisiana state death toll due to Hurricane Katrina stood at
59 but the number was expected to rise to thousands. In 2008 federal
officials opened an investigations into shootings on the Danziger
Bridge where 2 people were killed and 4 wounded. In 2010 former Lt.
Michael Lohman pleaded guilty to conspiring to obstruct justice. He and
others filed false reports to make the shootings on the Danziger Bridge
seem justifiable.
(SFC, 9/5/05, p.A1)(SFC, 10/1/08, p.A5)(SFC,
2/25/10, p.A4)
2005 Sep 5, President Bush
nominated John Roberts (50) to succeed William H. Rehnquist as chief
justice and called on the Senate to confirm him before the Supreme
Court opens its fall term on Oct. 3. Roberts could shape the court for
decades to come. President Bush and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco,
during a Gulf Coast tour, consoled Hurricane Katrina victims and
thanked relief workers.
(AP, 9/5/05)(AP, 9/5/06)
2005 Sep 6, New Orleans Mayor C.
Ray Nagin instructed law enforcement officers and the US military to
evacuate all holdouts for their own safety. He warned that the fetid
water could spread disease and that natural gas was leaking all over
town.
(AP, 9/6/05)
2005 Sep 7, More than 30 patients
were reportedly found dead overcome by floods at the St. Rita’s nursing
home in suburban New Orleans.
(AFP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 7, Police in Gretna,
Louisiana, pushed back victims trying to leave New Orleans on the
Crescent City Connection, and refused passage.
(SFC, 9/9/05, p.B10)
2005 Sep 8, US Congress hastened
to provide an additional $51.8 billion for relief and recovery from
Hurricane Katrina; President Bush pledged to make it "easy and simple
as possible" for uncounted, uprooted storm victims to collect food
stamps and other government benefits. Tropical Storm Ophelia
strengthened into a hurricane as it stalled 70 miles off the northeast
Florida coast. New Orleans was still 60% flooded.
(WSJ, 9/9/05, p.A1)(AP, 9/8/06)
2005 Sep 8, US grain prices were
reported down as grain elevators along the Mississippi filled to
capacity and grain handling due to Katrina fell to 63%. Early harvests
from Arkansas were particularly hit.
(WSJ, 9/8/05, p.A10)(WSJ, 9/9/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 10, Cadaver dogs and
boatloads of forensic workers fanned out across New Orleans to collect
the corpses left behind by Hurricane Katrina; cleanup crews towed away
abandoned cars and even began readying a hotel for reopening.
(AP, 9/10/06)
2005 Sep 11, Pres. Bush arrived in
New Orleans for a 3rd visit. The airport announced that it will resume
some commercial flights this week and the largest levee breech was
reported closed.
(SFC, 9/12/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 12, Michael Brown, the
director of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), resigned
after being recalled to Washington amid criticism of the federal
response to Hurricane Katrina. Officials reported that 45 bodies were
found at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans. This raised the official
death toll from Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana to 280.
(Reuters, 9/12/05)(SFC, 9/13/05, p.A8)
2005 Sep 13, Louisiana authorities
charged the owners of a New Orleans area nursing home with negligent
homicide in the deaths of 34 patients in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The state death toll was raised to 423.
(SFC, 9/14/05, p.A10)
2005 Sep 13, The New Orleans
Airport resumed commercial operations.
(AP, 9/14/05)
2005 Sep 14, The Port of New
Orleans resumed commercial operations. Officials said damage to
agriculture in the Gulf states due to Hurricane Katrina has topped $3
billion.
(AP, 9/14/05)(SFC, 9/15/05, p.C1)
2005 Sep 15, Pres. Bush prepared
to give a speech in Louisiana outlining government plans to rebuild the
region devastated by Hurricane Katrina, as the disaster death toll
passed the 700 mark.
(AP, 9/15/05)
2005 Sep 19, New Orleans Mayor C.
Ray Nagin, facing pressure from Washington and Hurricane Rita on the
way, halted his campaign to repopulate his city and ordered the few
residents and business owners who had returned to leave again.
(AP, 9/20/05)
2005 Sep 21, Hurricane Rita
intensified into a Category 5 storm with 140 mph winds and threatened
to devastate the Texas coast or already-battered Louisiana by week's
end. More than 1.3 million people in Texas and Louisiana were evacuated
The death toll from Katrina topped 1,000.
(AP, 9/21/05)(SFC, 9/22/05, p.A1)(AP, 9/21/06)
2005 Sep 23, Hurricane Rita,
dropped to Category 4, moved toward the Texas and Louisiana coast with
135 mph winds, creating monumental traffic jams along evacuation routes
and raising fears of a crippling blow to the nation's oil-refining
industry.
(AP, 9/23/05)
2005 Sep 23, In New Orleans water
poured over a patched levee, cascading into one of the city's
lowest-lying neighborhoods and heightening fears that Hurricane Rita
would re-flood this devastated city.
(AP, 9/23/05)
2005 Sep 24, Hurricane Rita,
reduced to Category 3, made landfall east of Sabine Pass, on the
Texas-Louisiana line, smashing windows, sparking fires and knocking
power out to more than 1 million customers, but largely sparing
vulnerable Houston and already reeling New Orleans. Within hours it
weakened to Category 2.
(AP, 9/24/05)
2005 Sep 27, Former FEMA director
Michael Brown angrily blamed the Louisiana governor, the New Orleans
mayor and even the Bush White House that appointed him for the dismal
response to Hurricane Katrina in a fiery appearance before Congress; in
response, lawmakers alternately lambasted and mocked the former
official.
(AP, 9/27/06)
2005 Sep 27, New Orleans Police
Superintendent Eddie Compass stepped down from his post 4 weeks after
Hurricane Katrina destroyed the city.
(AP, 9/27/06)
2005 Sep 30, New Orleans Mayor Ray
Nagin invited residents of some of the city's most popular
neighborhoods to return at their own risk beginning today, a move that
could bring back about one-third of the city's half-million inhabitants.
(AP, 9/30/05)
2005 Oct 3, The search for bodies
due to Hurricane Katrina ended with a toll of 972 confirmed deaths in
Louisiana. Mississippi had 221 confirmed dead.
(WSJ, 10/4/05, p.A1)(SFC, 10/5/05, p.A4)
2005 Oct 8, In New Orleans Robert
Davis, a retired elementary teacher, was repeatedly punched in the head
by police in an incident caught on videotape. Davis was not drunk, put
up no resistance and was baffled by what happened. In Dec two police
officers were fired for the incident.
(AP, 10/11/05)(SFC, 10/11/05, p.A4)(SFC, 12/22/05,
p.A9)
2005 Oct 8, Amtrak resumed
passenger rail service to New Orleans as the train called the City of
New Orleans arrived with 29 passengers aboard.
(AP, 10/8/06)
2005 Oct 10, President Bush dined
in the French Quarter of New Orleans and stayed in a luxury hotel to
showcase progress in hurricane-battered city, which was reported to be
turning its attention to removing and scrapping some 200,000 cars,
abandoned and waterlogged from Hurricane Katrina.
(SFC, 10/10/05, p.A5)(AP, 10/10/06)
2005 Nov 5, Louisiana Gov.
Kathleen Blanco slashed state spending by $431 million, but still faced
a half a billion shortfall due to Hurricane Katrina.
(SSFC, 11/6/05, p.A7)
2005 Nov 13, It was reported that
within days after Hurricane Katrina hit, Lily Duke managed to do what
other relief agencies couldn't: get food and water to her neighbors in
New Orleans. Since then she's expanded her network, distributing
medicine, packaged lunches and bags of ice to as many as 20,000 people
a day.
(AP, 11/13/05)
2005 Nov 29, New Orleans Mayor Ray
Nagin announced the beginning of operations for a free city-wide
wireless Internet service, the nation’s 1st such operation. He said the
services would be available city-wide in about a year.
(WSJ, 11/30/05, p.D4)
2005 Dec 26, New Orleans Police
officers shot and killed a man brandishing a knife in a confrontation
that was partially videotaped by a bystander, setting off another
internal investigation of the embattled department.
(AP, 12/27/05)
(AP, 1/14/06)
2006 Jan 13, The population of New
Orleans was estimated at 40% of its original 460,000.
(WSJ, 1/13/06, p.A1)
2006 Feb 2, Tornadoes tore through
New Orleans neighborhoods that had been hit hard by Hurricane Katrina
five months earlier.
(AP, 2/2/07)
2006 Feb 13, US government
investigators told the Senate that FEMA has let nearly 11,000 unused
manufactured homes deteriorate on old runways and open fields in
Arkansas, and spent $416,000 per person to house a few hundred
Hurricane Katrina evacuees for a short time in Alabama last fall.
Auditors reported that millions of dollars in disaster aid had been
squandered, paying for such items as a $450 tattoo and $375-a-day
beachfront condos.
(USAT, 2/14/06)(AP, 2/13/07)
2006 Feb 17, Louisiana lawmakers
voted to assume control of new Orleans levees from local boards.
(WSJ, 2/18/06, p.A1)
2006 Feb 20, Louisiana Gov.
Kathleen Blanco outlined a $7.5 billion rebuilding, relocation and
buyout plan for residents whose homes were damaged by last year’s
hurricanes.
(SFC, 2/21/06, p.A4)
2006 Apr 22, In New Orleans, La.,
Mayor Ray Nagin failed to get a majority vote and was forced into a
runoff to be held in May with Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu.
(SSFC, 4/23/06, p.A3)
2006 May 3, Vernon Jackson (53),
owner of iGate, pleaded guilty in Alexandria, Virginia, to bribing Rep.
William Jefferson, D-La., with more than $400,000 to promote the
Kentucky’s firm’s high tech business in Africa between 2001 and 2005.
(SFC, 5/4/06, p.A3)
2006 May 20, New Orleans Voters
re-elected Mayor Ray Nagin, whose blunt style endeared him to some but
outraged others after Hurricane Katrina, giving him four more years to
oversee one of the largest rebuilding projects in U.S. history.
(AP, 5/21/06)
2006 May 21, In Louisiana a
shooting spree at The Ministry of Jesus Christ church in Baton Rouge
left 4 people dead. Anthony Bell (25) then kidnapped his wife and
killed her. He was charged with murder in the deaths of his wife and
her grandparents, great aunt and a cousin.
(AP, 5/22/06)(SFC, 5/22/06, p.A3)
2006 May 24, House Republican and
Democratic leaders jointly demanded the FBI return documents taken in a
Capitol Hill raid as part of a bribery investigation of Rep. William
Jefferson of Louisiana.
(AP, 5/24/07)
2006 Jun 1, A contrite U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers took responsibility for the flooding of New Orleans
by Hurricane Katrina.
(AP, 6/1/07)
2006 Jun 13, US Congressional
investigators said fake aid to Katrina victims may have cost taxpayers
up to $1.4 billion. A FEMA official found the claims hard to credit.
(WSJ, 6/14/06, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/15/06, p.A1)
2006 Jun 15, US House Democrats
voted to strip embattled Louisiana Congressman William Jefferson of his
seat on the House Ways and Means Committee.
(AP, 6/15/07)
2006 Jun 17, In Louisiana 5 people
aged 16-19 were gunned down just outside the business district of
New Orleans.
(SSFC, 6/18/06, p.A4)
2006 Jun 19, New Orleans Mayor Ray
Nagin asked the state to send National Guard troops to help patrol the
city streets under a growing crime problem. Louisiana Gov. Kathleen
Blanco said she would send National Guard troops and state police to
patrol the streets of New Orleans after a bloody weekend in which six
people were killed.
(SFC, 6/20/06, p.A1)(AP, 6/19/07)
2006 Jul 7, Louisiana joined 21
other states in banning Internet hunting, the practice of using a mouse
click to kill animals on a distant game farm.
(www.livescience.com/othernews/060707_internet_hunting.html)
2006 Jul 17, Louisiana Attorney
General Charles Foti alleged that a doctor and two nurses decided to
administer lethal doses of morphine and a sedative to at least four
trapped and desperately ill patients during Hurricane Katrina.
(AP, 7/18/06)
2006 Jun 20, National Guardsmen
rolled into New Orleans to reinforce a depleted police department and
battle a surge in violence.
(AP, 6/20/07)
2006 Jul 28, In New Orleans 4 men,
3 brothers and a friend, were killed in the Treme neighborhood as they
sat on the porch of an abandoned house. The dead included 16-year-old
twins, their brother (21) and a friend (39). Another shooting the next
day put the year to date homicide number in New Orleans at 77.
(SSFC, 7/30/06, p.A15)
2006 Aug 16, Over 80 immigrant
workers in New Orleans filed suit against Decatur Hotels LLC saying
they were being exploited. The workers from Peru, Bolivia and the
Dominican Rep. had not been reimbursed for travel and were not getting
the promised work hours.
(SFC, 8/17/06, p.A16)
2006 Aug 17, In New Orleans Merck
& Co. lost a second federal trial over its withdrawn painkiller
Vioxx and must pay $51 million to a retired FBI agent who had a heart
attack after taking the drug for more than two years.
(AP, 8/17/06)
2006 Aug 24, A US House report
said 70% of contracts for Hurricane Katrina were let with little or no
competition. 4 Katrina contractors were indicted for taking $700,000
for no work.
(WSJ, 8/25/06, p.A1)
2006 Aug 29, President George Bush
visited New Orleans one year after Hurricane Katrina devastated the
region to offer comfort and hope to residents.
(AP, 8/29/07)
2006 Sep 25, Murphy Oil agreed to
pay $330 million to settle a class-action suit filed by victims of
Hurricane Katrina whose homes and businesses were inundated when
floodwaters carried nearly 1.1 million gallons of crude oil from a
company storage tank.
(WSJ, 9/26/06, p.A12)
2006 Sep 25, The Louisiana
Superdome, a symbol of misery during Hurricane Katrina, reopened for a
New Orleans Saints game. The Saints defeated the Atlanta Falcons, 23-3.
(AP, 9/25/07)
2006 Oct 12, A blast occurred when
a tugboat pushing two barges hit an undersea pipeline in West Cote
Blanche Bay, 100 miles southwest of New Orleans. 4 bodies were found
and 2 people were missing.
(WSJ, 10/13/06, p.A1)(AP, 10/13/06)
2006 Nov 29, A US federal judge
ordered FEMA to resume housing payments to Katrina victims.
(WSJ, 11/30/06, p.A1)
2006 Dec 4, In Jena, La., six
black students (the Jena Six) beat a white schoolmate in an altercation
that stemmed from the hanging of nooses in August in a tree on school
grounds under which white students regularly gathered. The black
teenagers were initially charged with attempted murder, but later
dropped to aggravated second-degree battery in 4 cases. In September,
2007, charges against Mychal Bell were moved to juvenile court
following huge civil rights protests. It was later reported that 7
black students were involved in the Dec 4 beating. On Dec 3, 2007, Bell
pleaded guilty to a juvenile charge of 2nd degree battery in return for
an 18-month sentence. On June 26, 2009, 5 members of the Jena 6 pleaded
no contests to misdemeanor simple battery with no jail time.
(SFC, 9/21/07, p.A3)(SFC, 9/28/07, p.A3)(Econ,
9/29/07, p.33)(SFC, 12/4/07, p.A3)(SFC, 6/27/09, p.A5)
2006 Dec 30, The body of Gerald
Washington (57), mayor-elect of Westlake, Louisiana, was found shot to
death in the parking lot of a former school. He was the first black man
elected to lead the largely white town. On Jan 2 investigators ruled
his death a suicide.
(AP, 1/2/07)(SFC, 1/3/07, p.A2)
2007 Jan 6, New Orleans considered
a curfew as 8 slayings took place in the 1st week of the new year.
(SSFC, 1/7/07, p.A10)
2007 Feb 13, A powerful storm and
likely a tornado hit the New Orleans area killing an elderly woman,
injuring at least 15 other people.
(AP, 2/13/07)
2007 Mar 12, New Mexico’s Gov.
Bill Richardson signed a bill that outlawed cockfighting. This left
Louisiana as the only state to allow organized cockfighting.
(WSJ, 3/13/07, p.A4)
2007 Mar, Some 47 bodies of
bottlenose dolphins washed up on the shores near Galveston, Texas.
Toxins off the Louisiana coast were suspected.
(SFC, 3/19/07, p.A2)
2007 Apr 3, Eddie Robinson
(b.1919), 56-year head football coach at Grambling College, died in
Ruston, La.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Robinson_(football_coach))
2007 Apr 24, A tornado in the
Texas border town of Eagle Pass killed at least 10 people and destroyed
two schools and more than 20 homes. The storm killed 2 more people in
Arkansas and Louisiana.
(AP, 4/25/07)(SFC, 4/26/07, p.A3)
2007 Jun 4, US Rep. William
Jefferson, a Democrat from Louisiana, was indicted for graft involving
Nigerian business schemes that netted him over $500,000 in bribes.
Jefferson has maintained his innocence.
(WSJ, 6/5/07, p.A1)(AP, 6/4/08)
2007 Jul 9, US Sen. David Vitter,
R-La., acknowledged that he was on the list of phone records just
released by Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the alleged “D.C. Madam.”
(SFC, 7/11/07, p.A6)
2007 Aug 2, A US appeals court
ruled that Katrina victims cannot collect for damage from levee
breaches.
(WSJ, 8/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Sep 6, A jury in St.
Francisville, La., acquitted Sal and Mabel Mangano, the owners of a
nursing home where 35 patients died after Hurricane Katrina, of
negligent homicide and cruelty charges.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2007 Sep 20, Some 20,000 people
gathered in Jena, Louisiana, to protest what they considered to be the
overzealous prosecution of 6 black high school students charged with
beating a white schoolmate last December.
(SFC, 9/21/07, p.A3)(Econ, 9/29/07, p.33)
2007 Oct 4, Former city
maintenance worker John Ashley shot five people in a law office in
Alexandria, La., killing two of them; Ashley was shot and killed by
police following a standoff.
(AP, 10/4/08)
2007 Oct 20, Piyush "Bobby" Jindal
(36), the son of Punjabi immigrants, won an election in Louisiana to
become the United States' first Indian-American state governor. Jindal,
a Republican member of the House of Representatives, also became the
youngest governor in the US. He became the first nonwhite to hold the
job since Reconstruction.
(AFP, 10/21/07)(AP, 10/20/08)
2007 Nov 16, Marchers surrounded
the Justice Department headquarters to demand federal intervention in
the Jena Six case in Louisiana and stepped-up enforcement of hate
crimes.
(AP, 11/16/08)
2007 Dec 13, In Louisiana 2
graduate students from India were found tied up and shot in the head on
the edge of Louisiana State Univ.
(SFC, 12/15/07, p.A4)
2007 Dec 20, The New Orleans City
Council voted to demolish 4,500 public housing units as police used
chemical spray and stun guns to on dozens of protesters who tried to
force themselves into the council chamber.
(SFC, 12/21/07, p.A6)
2008 Feb 8, In Louisiana Latina
Williams (23) shot and killed 2 fellow students, Karsheika Graves (21)
and Taneshia Butler (26), at Louisiana Technical College.
(SFC, 2/9/08, p.A4)
2008 Feb 9, Sen. Barack Obama
swept the Louisiana primary and caucuses in Nebraska and Washington
state, slicing into Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's slender delegate lead
in their historic race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Obama also won almost 90% in the Virgin Islands. McCain narrowly won
Washington while Huckabee took Kansas along with a narrow win in
Louisiana.
(AP, 2/10/08)(SSFC, 2/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 22, In New Orleans Pres.
Bush ended a 2-day meeting with PM Harper of Canada and Pres. Calderon
of Mexico as all three defended NAFTA. Bush denied the US is in
recession calling the current economic situation a slowdown.
(SFC, 4/23/08, p.A3)(WSJ, 4/23/08, p.A1)
2008 May 8, In Louisiana Carl
Hunter (73), a construction company owner who lost two homes in
Hurricane Katrina, claimed a $97 million Powerball prize, a jackpot won
off a ticket he bought at a convenience store where he stopped to buy
his wife a gallon of milk. Hunter took a lump sum payment that will
give him $33.9 million after taxes.
(AP, 5/9/08)
2008 May 17, In Louisiana 6 train
cars derailed spilling 8-10 thousand gallons of hydrochloric acid and
forming a toxic cloud over Lafayette, 125 miles west of New Orleans.
(WSJ, 5/19/08, p.A2)
2008 Jun 25, The US Supreme Court
ruled the death penalty cannot be imposed for child rape, its first
decision in more than 30 years on whether a crime other than murder can
be punished by execution. It struck down a Louisiana law that allowed
the execution of people convicted of a raping a child.
(AP, 6/25/08)
2008 Jun 30, Louisiana’s Gov.
Jindal vetoed a 123% pay increase passed the state’s legislators. Their
pay had not risen since 1980. he had initially refused to veto the bill.
(www.cnsnews.com/Public/Content/Article.aspx?rsrcid=32011)
2008 Jul 23, In Louisiana an oil
tanker and an oil barge collided near New Orleans creating a 12-mile
oil slick and closing almost 100 miles of the Mississippi River. Over
400,000 gallons of fuel spilled into the river.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.A3)(SFC, 7/25/08, p.A2)
2008 Sep 1, Hurricane Gustav
smashed into the Gulf coast as a Category 2 storm with 110-mph winds
just southwest of New Orleans, where levees held as waves splashed
over. Some 750,000 people were left without power in Louisiana. It was
later estimated that the storm caused at least $372 in damage to
crops.
(SFC, 9/2/08, p.A1)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.36)(Econ,
10/4/08, p.34)
2008 Sep 2, New Orleans residents
were blocked from returning home due to damage from Hurricane Gustav,
but Mayor Nagin said they would be allowed back on Sep 4.
(WSJ, 9/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 23, Ronald Dominique,
suspected of killing as many as 23 men in southern Louisiana over 10
years, pleaded guilty to killing 8 men. He was sentenced to serve 8
consecutive sentences of life in prison.
(SFC, 9/24/08, p.A4)
2008 Sep 27, Kirsten Brydum (25),
a community activist from San Francisco, was robbed and murdered while
bicycling in New Orleans. She had helped organize the “Really, Really
Free Market” held monthly in San Francisco’s Dolores Park.
(SFC, 10/3/08, p.B1)
2008 Nov 9, In Louisiana Raymond
"Chuck" Foster, 44, shot and killed an Oklahoma woman, who was lured
over the Internet to take part in a Ku Klux Klan initiation, after a
fight broke out when she asked to be taken back to town. The group
tried to cover it up by dumping her body on a rural roadside and
setting her belongings aflame. Foster, the local Klan leader was soon
in jail on a second-degree murder charge, and seven others were charged
with trying to help conceal the crime.
(AP, 11/12/08)
2008 Nov 19, Germany chemical
company BASF SE said it is temporarily closing 80 plants worldwide due
to slumping demand and cutting production at 100 more, including
facilities in Texas and Louisiana. Some 20,000 workers are affected.
(AP, 11/19/08)
2008 Dec 6, Indicted Democratic US
Rep. William Jefferson was ousted from his New Orleans area district,
while Republicans narrowly held on to the seat vacated by a retiring
incumbent. Republican attorney Anh "Joseph" Cao won 50% of the vote to
Jefferson's 47% and will become the first Vietnamese-American in
Congress.
(AP, 12/7/08)
2009 Jan 4, In Louisiana 8 people
were killed when a PHI Inc. helicopter, bound for offshore oil fields,
crashed about 100 miles southwest of New Orleans.
(SFC, 1/5/09, p.A3)
2009 Feb 20, Louisiana Gov. Bobby
Jindal announced that he will decline stimulus money specifically
targeted at expanding state unemployment insurance coverage, becoming
the first state executive to officially refuse any part of the federal
government’s payout to states.
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/19092;_ylt=AlTYJh.MxX8VcaG8HASlBbYDW7oF)
2009 Feb 20, in Homer, La.,
police officers Tim Cox and Joey Henry were involved in the fatal
shooting of Bernard Monroe Sr. (73). The shooting sparked protests and
at least 2 investigations. In July both officers resigned from the
police force.
(SFC, 7/30/09, p.A4)
2009 Feb 28, In Louisiana 3
½ years after Hurricane Katrina, the National Guard pulled the
last of its troops out of New Orleans, leaving behind a city still
desperate and dangerous.
(AP, 2/28/09)
2009 Apr 11, In Louisiana gunmen
kicked down an apartment door and opened fire killing 2 children and a
woman in Terrytown.
(SSFC, 4/12/09, p.A6)
2009 Apr 24, David Duke (59), the
former Grand Wizard of the Louisiana-founded Knights of the Ku Klux
Klan, arrived in Prague at the invitation of a local far-right group,
Narodni Odpor (National Resistance). He was soon arrested and
questioned for several hours on suspicion of promoting movements
seeking the suppression of human rights. Duke was freed during the
night and forced to leave the country the next day.
(AFP, 4/25/09)
2009 May 18, In Larose, Louisiana,
middle-school student Justin Doucet (15) fired a gunshot at a teacher
in a classroom and then shot himself and died on May 23. Doucet left a
handwritten journal and an apparent suicide note that described his
intention to kill other people.
(AP, 5/19/09)(SFC, 5/19/09, p.A5)(SFC, 5/26/09, p.A4)
2009 Aug 5, Federal jurors in
Alexandria, Va., convicted former Louisiana Rep. William Jefferson on
11 0f 16 counts that included bribery, racketeering and money
laundering. The next day jurors said Jefferson must forfeit $470,000 in
bribery receipts. On Nov 13 he was sentenced to 13 years in prison.
(SFC, 8/6/09, p.A6)(SFC, 8/7/09, p.A5)(SFC,
11/14/09, p.A7)
2009 Sep 5, In Louisiana Dennis
Carter Sr. (50) shot his estranged wife, son and 2-year-old grandson to
death and critically wounded his pregnant daughter-in-law at their
rural home, then killed himself as police tried to pull over his car 20
minutes later.
(AP, 9/6/09)
2009 Sep 24, A US federal jury
rejected a New Orleans family’s claims that a FEMA issued trailer they
lived in after Hurricane Katrina was defective and exposed them to
dangerous fumes. The trailer made by Gulf Stream Coach Inc. had been
occupied for 19 months by Alana Alexander and her son (12).
(SFC, 9/25/09, p.A8)
2009 Oct 10, In Louisiana 2 Cessna
150s, each carrying 2 people, collided near Pineville Regional Airport,
killing 2 and injuring 2.
(SSFC, 10/11/09, p.A6)
2009 Oct 14, President Barack
Obama called for a second round of $250 stimulus payments for seniors,
veterans, retired railroad workers and people with disabilities. The
payments would be equal to about a 2% increase for the average Social
Security recipient, who will not receive a cost of living increase next
year. Obama visited New Orleans and listened to continued fallout from
Hurricane Katrina.
(AP, 10/15/09)(SFC, 10/16/09, p.A16)
2009 Oct 16, Two US civil and
constitutional rights groups called for Keith Bardwell, a justice of
the peace in Louisiana, to resign for refusing to issue a marriage
license to an interracial couple. Bardwell held that most interracial
marriages failed and had told the couple to go seek another justice of
the peace.
(SFC, 10/17/09, p.A4)
2009 Nov 18, US District Judge
Stanwood Duval ruled that the Army Corps of Engineers' failure to
properly maintain a navigation channel led to massive flooding in
Hurricane Katrina. The ruling gave more than 100,000 other individuals,
businesses and government entities a better shot at claiming damages.
The ruling was the "first time ever the Army Corps has been held liable
for damages for a major catastrophe that it caused."
(AP, 11/19/09)
2010 Jan 8, Lashonda Booker, a
former Federal Emergency Management employee and her cousin, Peggy,
Hilton were charged with stealing over $721,000 in Hurricane Katrina
relief money. Booker had worked in FEMA’s Biloxi, Miss., office.
(SFC, 1/12/10, p.A4)(http://tinyurl.com/yer5crg)
2010 Feb 6, Louisiana Lt. Gov.
Mitch Landrieu was elected mayor of New Orleans, the first white man to
hold the position since his father, Moon Landrieu, left office in 1978.
(SSFC, 2/7/10, p.A12)
2010 Feb 7, The New Orleans Saints
capped off an outstanding season with an upset over the Indianapolis
Colts, 31-17, in Super Bowl XLIV.
(http://nfl.fanhouse.com/2010/02/07/saints-shock-colts-in-super-bowl-xliv/?ncid=webmaildl5)
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Subject = Louisiana
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