Oak Alley Plantation – Vacherie, LA

Oak Alley Plantation is a historic plantation located on the west bank of the Mississippi River, in the community of Vacherie, St. James Parish, Louisiana, U.S.Oak Alley is named for its distinguishing visual feature, an alley (French allée) or canopied path, created by a double row of southern live oak trees about 800 feet (240 meters) long, planted in the early 18th century — long before the present house was built. The allée or tree avenue runs between the home and the River. The property was designated a National Historic Landmark for its architecture and landscaping, and for the agricultural innovation of grafting pecan trees, performed here in 1846-47 by a slave gardener.

The Bon Séjour plantation, as Oak Alley was originally named, was established to grow sugarcane, by Valcour Aime when he purchased the land in 1830. Aime, known as the “King of Sugar,” was one of the wealthiest men in the South. In 1836, Valcour Aime exchanged this piece of property with his brother-in-law Jacques Télesphore Romanfor a plantation owned by Roman. The following year Jacques Roman began building the present mansion under the oversight of George Swainy and entirely with enslaved labor. The mansion was completed in 1839. Roman’s father-in-law, Joseph Pilié, was an architect and probably designed the house.

The most noted slave who lived at Oak Alley Plantation was named Antoine. He was listed as “Antoine, 38, Creole Negro gardener/expert grafter of pecan trees,” with a value of $1,000 in the inventory of the estate conducted upon J.T. Roman’s death. Antoine was a master of the techniques of grafting, and after trial with several trees, succeeded in the winter of 1846 in producing a variety of pecan that could be cracked with one’s bare hands; the shell was so thin it was dubbed the “paper shell” pecan. It was later named the Centennial Variety when entered in competition at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, where it won a prize. The trees may be found throughout southern Louisiana, where the pecan was once a considerable cash crop. Although Antoine’s original trees were cleared for more sugar cane fields after the Civil War, a commercial grove had been planted at nearby Anita Plantation. Unfortunately, the Anita Crevasse (river break) of 1990 washed away Anita Plantation and all remains of the original Centennial pecans.

Jacques Roman died in 1848 of tuberculosis and the estate began to be managed by his wife, Marie Therese Josephine Celina Pilié Roman (1816-1866). Celina did not have a skill for managing a sugar plantation and her heavy spending nearly bankrupted the estate. In 1859 her son, Henri, took control of the estate and tried to turn things around. The plantation was not physically damaged during the American Civil War, but the economic dislocations of the war and the end of slavery made it no longer economically viable; Henri became severely in debt, mainly to his family. In 1866, his uncle, Valcour Aime and his sisters, Octavie and Louise, put the plantation up for auction and it was sold for $32,800 to John Armstrong.

Successive owners could not afford the cost of upkeep and by the 1920s the buildings had fallen into disrepair. In 1925 the property was acquired by Andrew Stewart as a gift to his wife, Josephine, who commissioned architect Richard Koch to supervise extensive restoration and modernize the house. As a virus had wiped out the sugarcane industry in the early 1900s, the Stewarts ran Oak Alley Plantation as a cattle ranch. Josephine had grown up on a cattle ranch in Texas and was familiar with this type of industry. Sugar cane cultivation was reintroduced at the plantation in the 1960s. The Stewarts were the last owners to live in residence. Josephine Stewart left the historic house and grounds to the Oak Alley Foundation when she died in 1972, which opened them to the public.

**** My experience … EPIC!!  The beautiful scenery and the massive size of the oak trees really took my breath away.  It truly is epic, one for the books, and breath-taking.  GET OVER THERE IMMEDIATELY!!  

One story that the tour guide, Hannah, told us that really made my jaw drop, was between 1900 and 1920 there was a heard of cattle that lived on the grounds … both IN and OUT of the house.  Yes, you understood me right .. COWS LIVING IN THE HOUSE!!  They destroyed the whole first floor marble floors, and the only marble remaining stands around the fireplaces.

PS I hear girls like to be proposed to here .. wink wink haha.  Also, keep your moms away from those Mint Juleps!!

http://www.oakalleyplantation.com/

https://www.facebook.com/oakalleyplantation/

Albania Plantation – Jeanerette, LA

As time and research goes by, I really wish all of these beautiful homes could be toured by the public.  But let’s be real, who has the time to view with their own eyes these magnificent works of art?  

So, I’ll start writing about these private homes once a week to tell stories about the history of the homes.  Here is the first of many:

Albania Plantation is a plantation house located on the Bayou Teche right outside of the town of Jeanerette, Louisiana. The home was built between 1837 and 1842 by Charles Alexandre Grevemberg, who operated a successful sugar plantation on the surrounding 6,500 acres (2,600 ha). The home is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

After Charles Alexandre Grevemberg’s death at Albania in 1851, his wife, Euphemie Fuselier (d. 1886), managed the plantation. Records of the sugar crops made in Louisiana 1859-1860 shows Mrs. Charles Grevemberg producing 475 hogsheads of sugar on the Bayou Teche.

Samuel and Isaac Delgado acquired the property in 1885. Isaac Delgado bequeathed it to the City of New Orleans which operated the sugar plantation through the Delgado-Albania Plantation Commission.

In 1957 the City of New Orleans sold the plantation house and surrounding acreage at public auction. It was acquired by Emily Cyr Bridges, who restored Albania Mansion and opened it to the public showcasing her well-known collection. Miss Emily was an enthusiastic antiquarian who traveled the countryside knocking on doors to add to her collection of Southern plantation furniture and Acadian artifacts, at a time before such objects were highly prized.

 

Miss Emily was the daughter of Paul N. Cyr, Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana from 1928 to 1931, under Governor Huey Long. In one of the more colorful Long era incidents, Cyr had himself sworn in as Governor in October 1931, stating that Long had vacated the office when he was elected U.S. Senator. Long called out the National Guard and the State Police to bar Cyr from the Governor’s Mansion. Miss Emily shared her father’s disdain for Huey Long, and banned his name from being spoken at Albania.

Never a conventional woman, Miss Emily was a pioneer aviator who flew patrol missions over the Louisiana coast as a member of the Civil Air Patrol during World War II.

In Miss Emily’s heyday at Albania she loved to entertain on the galleries; her coterie included artist-in-residence Lucius Lacour. In her later years Miss Emily became reclusive, rarely receiving guests and never leaving her beloved Albania.

The home is currently owned by Hunt Slonem, the celebrated New York artist. Slonem bought the house for about $625,000 in 2005.

Click to access 06_09_InStyleHome.pdf

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Albania-Plantation-House/113263218687233

 

Houmas House Plantation and Gardens – Darrow, LA

Houmas House Plantation and Gardens has reclaimed its position as Crown Jewel of Louisiana’s River Road.

Through the vision and determination of Kevin Kelly, who fulfilled a lifelong dream by acquiring the property in the Spring of 2003, the mansion today reflects the best parts of each period in its rich history alongside the big bend in the Mississippi River.

The first owners of the plantation were the indigenous Houmas Indians, who were given a land grant to occupy the fertile plain between the Mississippi and Lake Maurepas to the north.

The Houmas sold the land to Maurice Conway and Alexander Latil in the mid 1700’s
The original French Provincial house that Latil erected on the property in is situated directly behind the Mansion, adjoined by a carriageway to the grand home described during its antebellum heyday as “The Sugar Palace.” The original home was later used as living quarters for the staff that served the great house.

By the time of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the plantation was established and producing sugar.

In 1810, Revolutionary War hero Gen. Wade Hampton of Virginia purchased the property and shortly thereafter began construction on the Mansion. However, it was not until 1825 when Hampton’s daughter, Caroline, and her husband, Col. John Preston, took over the property that the grand house truly began to take shape.

Construction on the Mansion was completed in 1828. At the same time, Houmas House began to build its sugar production and continued to increase its land holdings, which ultimately grew to 300,000 acres.

Irishman John Burnside bought the plantation in 1857 for $1 million. A businessman and a character, Burnside increased production of sugar until Houmas House was the largest producer in the country, actively working the crop on 98,000 acres. During the Civil War, Burnside saved the Mansion from destruction at the hands of advancing Union forces by declaring immunity as a subject of the British Crown. In addition to building a railway to carry his products to market —“The Sugar Cane Train (1862)” — Burnside, a bachelor, is also said to have offered payment to any parents in the parish who would name their sons “John.”

An avid sportsman who wagered heavily in horse races, Burnside once secretly purchased a champion thoroughbred back East with the intent of defeating the steeds of fellow local businessmen in a big race. He quietly slipped the racehorse into the billiard room of the Mansion where it was “stabled” until Burnside’s surprise was unveiled at the starting line and hailed in the winner’s circle.

Houmas House flourished under Burnside’s ownership, but it was under a successor, Col. William Porcher Miles that the plantation grew to its apex in the late 1800’s when it was producing a monumental 20 million pounds of sugar each year.

In 1927, the Mississippi came out of its banks in the epic “great flood.” While Houmas House was spared, the surrounding areas were inundated. The ensuing economic havoc was but a prelude to the devastation of the Great Depression just two years later.

Houmas House Plantation withered away. The Mansion closed and fell into disrepair, a condition in which it remained until 1940 when Dr. George B. Crozat purchased it.

Crozat bought Houmas House to be a summer home away from his native New Orleans. He renovated the property with the intent to give it a more “Federal” look than the stately Greek Revival style in which it was conceived. The structure was painted white inside and out. Crown moldings and ceiling medallions were removed and both interior and exterior forms and finishes were simplified.

Eventually, the Crozat heirs opened the property to tourists. In 1963, the defining Bette Davis film “Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte” was shot in the property. The room in which Ms. Davis stayed while filming is preserved as part of today’s Houmas House tour.

In addition to the Mansion and Gardens, history is also reflected in the many antique furnishings and works of art that grace the Houmas House tour. Distinguished by its two Garconierre, the Mansion exudes the warmth of a home (it’s the owner’s active residence), while proudly portraying its role as a landmark in American history.

*** My Experience … G.O.R.G.E.O.U.S.!!  This location as a whole is absolutely breathtaking.  The tour started and so did my excitement.  We were told to walk about the front of the house and to meet under the oak tree.  The tour was to start as soon as they rang the bell.  While sitting down in the small courtyard, we were able to enjoy the squirrels running up, down, and all around this magnificent oak tree.  When the tour guide showed up and began to make her way to the bell, I stopped her.  Being it was my birthday, I only thought it was appropriate that I ring the bell myself haha.  To my surprise, she absolutely let me!!

From there the tour began!!  We were brought from gorgeous room to room, and hearing stories of the past.  My favorite story was of the filming of the movie Hush .. Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1967).  There is a scene in the movie where a severed head rolls down the spiral staircase and the woman at the bottom lets out an ear piercing scream.  The tour guide had us recreate that part of the movie and I got to play the actress.  I don’t think the tour guide was ready for my menacing high pitched scream haha!!  

At the end of the tour, we were allowed to tour the grounds and gardens.  The Japanese gardens was another favorite part of mine.  I would have loved to sit down under the gazebo and listen to the waterfall all day.  Simply beautiful!

Home

https://www.facebook.com/houmashouseplantation

Grevemberg House – Franklin, LA

Built in 1851 by attorney Henry C. Wilson, this stately two-story frame house has four slender Corinthian columns and an upper balcony edged with a balustrade of delicate wooden spindles.  It was acquired in 1857 by the widow of Gabriel Grevemberg after her husband’s death in the tragic hurricane that wiped out the popular Victorian seaside resort on Isle Dernier the previous year.  Restored by the St. Mary chapter of the Louisiana Landmarks Society, it houses the St. Mary Parish Museum and is filled with fine period furnishings and interesting exhibits, including an early cast-iron Grevemberg coffin.

This antebellum townhouse in Franklin’s City Park has been home to large families, and was used by the townspeople as a recreation hall and location for community dances.  After years of neglect, it was in danger of demolition.

In 1963, a group of concerned citizens formed the St. Mary Chapter/Louisiana Landmarks Society to “focus attention on Louisiana’s historic buildings; promote interest in the study of Louisiana’s architectural heritage; to disseminate information on Louisiana’s landmarks and support their preservation; to publish a guide to parish landmarks and to operate a community museum.”  One of their first acts was to write a letter to the Park Board requesting a joint effort to prevent the demolition of Grevemberg House.  They next sent a proposal to the City Council to form a committee to negotiate a lease agreement.

In just a few years, the Landmarks Society deepened the public-private partnership when it requested that the City perform much-needed repairs to the house and further proposed that it be operated by St. Mary Landmarks as a museum.

Involvement at the Parish government level quickly followed, and soon after, state funds for local tourist attractions aided the establishment of parish museums, such as Grevemberg House.

With financial support from the City, St. Mary Parish government, a state grant, and fundraising efforts by the St. Mary Landmarks Society, restoration began.  In 1972, the Grevemberg House Museum held official opening ceremonies.

The initial goal of saving the house was accomplished, and in 1980, the Grevemberg House was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

More challenges were in store for Grevemberg House and St. Mary Landmarks.  Tragedy occurred in 1983 when a fire damaged the house.  The St. Mary Landmarks Society rallied its allies and completed the repairs and repainting in just over a year.  Then in 1992, Hurricane Andrew damaged Grevemberg House, but the structure withstood winds clocked at speeds in excess of 140 mph.

St. Mary Landmarks has continued to grow, and remains dedicated to the Grevemberg House Museum.  More restoration, maintenance and enhancement projects have been completed.  Community, government, and corporate involvement have all greatly contributed to the success of this St. Mary Parish landmark.

*** My Experience … JUST BREATH!!  The tour guide, bless his huge heart, was talking so fast for the first 10 minutes that I was taking extra breaths myself for him.  He totally knows his stuff though.  If you were thinking this was going to be a grand estate plantation house, it’s not.  It was a townhouse of that era.  Still beautiful and full of history, so you won’t be disappointed.

Calumet Plantation – Patterson, LA

“Calumet Plantation” was the name given by Daniel Thompson to a group of adjoining sugar plantations along Bayou Teche that he began assembling about 1866. The residence now known as “Calumet” was the “O. and N. Cornay Plantation” which he purchased in 1871. It was the home of Octave Cornay, who, with his brother, Numa, had built up a large sugar mill complex on land inherited from their mother, Mrs. Henry Cornay (nee Francoise Radeville Haydel), in an area known as Dutch Settlement. She had inherited from her parents, George Haydel and Marguerite Bossier. The original land grant was to Jean Baptiste Bossier. The historical significance of Calumet is multiple. During the Civil War, it was the site of a number of engagements, most notably being the Battle of Bisland, in which 25,000 men were involved, and the naval encounters of the Confederate steamer “Cotton,” which ended in flames at Cornay’s bridge. Daniel Thompson, who acquired the Cornay homesite and occupied it for thirty years until his death in 1900, was a sugar planter of great importance. He was a pioneer in the research and application of the chemical aspect of the sugar industry, and maintained a year-round study with laboratory analyses by chemists working in conjunction with the U. S. Department of Agriculture in Washington, D. C. His work was considered the single-most important contribution since DeBore to the development and advancement of the sugar industry in the United States. His son, Wibray, continued his work for several years after his father’s death. The third highly important owners of Calumet were Harry Palmerston Williams and his bride Marguerite Clark. When they married in 1918, she was at the height of stardom, having moved from a career on the stage in New York to being the most highly paid movie actress in Hollywood. Harry P. Williams was the son of a lumber magnate whose business in the small town of Patterson, Louisiana became the largest of its kind in the world. Harry himself became famous as a pioneer in aviation, starting as a playboy pilot and ending up creating with his partner, an aviation great, Jimmy Wedell, the fastest racing planes in the world. At Calumet, opposite the home, was developed one of the first airports in the South and one of the first airplane manufacturing plants in the United States. Following two tragic plane crashes that caused the deaths of both Wedell and Williams, Marguerite Clark Williams sold her husband’s U. S. Mail contracts and other contracts to Eastern Airlines, and donated the airport to the State of Louisiana. It is still in operation and has a fine museum dedicated to Wedell and Williams, containing some fascinating aeronautical memorabilia.

 *** My Experience … TREES!!  This is a privately owned location.  I was unable to get on the property because I didn’t feel like getting trespassing charges against me on my day off haha.  Although, the internet says it’s a museum, but I was able to get in contact with anyone there to see if it was open to the public. 

As I was trying to get a clear picture of the house, from the side of the highway, it was very hard to view through all of the trees.  There was a wooden swing set and a fabulous tree house on the grounds.  Even though there wasn’t any cars on the highway, I made sure to put my flashers on.  So, please don’t call the police on me!!  haha .. It almost felt like I was a gorilla in the mist.

The Shadows on the Teche Plantation – New Iberia, LA

The Shadows, built as the home of a sugar planter, is situated on the banks of the Bayou Teche in the heart of Cajun Louisiana. Four generations of the Weeks family lived at The Shadows from 1834 until 1958, when the property was given to the National Trust for Historic Preservation by the great-grandson of the builder.

Immediately after acquiring The Shadows in 1922, William Weeks Hall guided the stately plantation home through its first major construction project. By the early 1950s, Hall had exhausted what he believed to be his options for preserving the family home, and he began to look for a suitable steward of the estate. Hall eventually found a partner in the National Trust, who accepted the estate shortly before his death in 1958.

Shortly thereafter, the National Trust embarked on a series of repair and restoration projects based on an extensive architectural survey, the Weeks Family Papers collection, and other artifacts and home inventories. A rich collection of 17,000 family letters, photographs, and receipts preserved in trunks in the attic provides this Southern plantation house with one of the best documented tour experiences in the country.

The Shadows is owned and operated by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

*** My experience … soothingly quiet.  I’ve been here a couple of times on tours of the house, and once on the grounds for my best friend’s bridal photos.  There is a lot of Weeks family history here.  Four generations to be correct!!

Side note:  make sure to bring your reading glasses.  There is a door, showcased in the art studio part of the home, that has TONS of famous people’s signatures.  See if you are able to spot the signature of the famous mouse creator!!  

http://www.shadowsontheteche.org/

https://www.facebook.com/ShadowsontheTeche

The Myrtles Plantation – St. Francisville, LA

General David Bradford was forced to flee from President George Washington’s army in 1794, because of his leadership role in the Whisky Rebellion. General Bradford arrived in Louisiana and obtained a Spanish land grant of roughly 650 acres. A wealthy judge and businessman from Washington County, Pennsylvania, Bradford showed interest in the area before the conclusion of the unsuccessful Whisky Rebellion forced him to settle there. Bradford built the plantation that was later named “the Myrtles” in 1797. He died in 1808, and his widow sold the land to her son-in-law, Clark Woodruff, a lawyer and friend of Andrew Jackson. In 1834 Woodruff sold it to Ruffin Gray Stirling, who restored the plantation. The Stirling family held the plantation until 1894, after which it passed through a succession of owners. Restoration efforts on the gracious 1 1/2-story country house began in the mid-1970s.

The house itself is a broad, low, rambling frame mansion with a clapboard exterior and was built in two halves. The first half, which was built in 1796, forms the western six bays of the main façade. These were increased in size due to mid-19th-century restoration, when the house also received a southward extension that almost doubled its size. The unusually long gallery is supported by an exceptional cast-iron railing of elaborate grape-cluster design. It is the interior detailing, however, which is perhaps the most important feature of the Myrtles Plantation. Most of the ground floor rooms have fine marble, arched mantles in the Rococo Revival style, with central console keystones or cartouches. Most of the rooms have plaster-ceiling medallions, no two of which are the same. All of the flooring and most of the windows in the house are original. The Myrtles Plantation is an outstanding example of the expanded raised cottage form that characterized many Louisiana plantation houses by the mid-19th century. The plantation house is touted as one of the most haunted houses in America, as it was the scene of a Reconstruction-era murder and other more natural deaths that have entered into local folklore over the years. Restored to its 1850s grandeur, complete with fine French furnishings and chandeliers, the Myrtles enhances its haunted-house reputation with candlelight mystery tours.

*** My experience … HOLY GHOSTS, BATMAN!!!  There is a reason this plantation has been named “America’s Most Haunted House”.  I went with a group of my closest girlfriends and my mom on the night mystery tour.   We had a discussion about the tour before we entered the house.  We were going to be the last people into a room and the last people out of the room.  While in the last room, I was the last person to walk in, and I had to stand in the corner alone.  I decided to be a little trickster … BAD IDEA.  While tapping my friends on the shoulder and then looking away, I felt a tap on MY shoulder.  Remember when I mentioned that there was no one behind me??  Yeah.  I wasn’t going to tell them about the tap on my shoulder, because come on, who would believe me.  So after a few seconds of contemplating, I told my mom who was right in front of me.  Immediately she turned around, and was pale.  She told us that she was weak, and needed some air.  She left the tour and the house at that time.  

On the way home that night, she was freezing cold and was covering herself with a blanket.  She was physically sick.  She said “I feel like someone is sitting on my back”.  FYI, she stayed feeling this way until the next morning.  Mom said that her whole body was aching the next day. 

Side note:  don’t play with the spirits … they will get you!!  I personally will not be going back to have a ghost ride piggyback on me haha.

http://www.myrtlesplantation.com/

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Myrtles-Plantation/124358360949014

Nottoway Plantation – White Castle, LA

 

The Nottoway Plantation House, one of the largest antebellum plantation houses in the south, is composed of 64 rooms, 7 staircases, and 5 galleries. This 53,000-square foot plantation home, constructed by John Hampden Randolph in 1858, is a fine example of an antebellum home. Randolph, whose father had come from Virginia in 1820, purchased the area in 1841. In 1860 Nottoway Plantation encompassed 6,200 acres and Randolph, the builder and owner of the property during that time, owned 155 African-Americans that worked his sugarcane plantation as slaves. When Randolph was ready to build his house, he went to New Orleans and asked various architects to submit designs, and chose Henry Howard’s. Nottoway survived the Civil War, however damage occurred when a Union gunboat on the Mississippi River attempted to destroy the magnificent house until the gunboat officer realized he had once been a guest there and decided to spare Nottoway The Randolphs held onto the house through the Civil War and Reconstruction until 1889, when Mrs. Randolph sold the mansion following her husband’s death.

Nottoway sits about 200 feet behind the Mississippi River Levee surrounded by oaks, magnolias, pecan trees, and sweet olives. Nottoway House is distinctive for being an essentially Italianate Style plantation house built in an era dominated by Greek Revival architecture. Nottoway contains an elegant, half-round portico as the side gallery follows the curve of the large ballroom bay window. Nottoway’s thin Italianate pillars stretch vertically to touch all of its three levels, extending from the house’s one-story brick base to the paramount height of the third-story made of wooden frame. From the front gallery the Mississippi River is in view. The interior of Nottoway is white in color, including Corinthian columns, lace curtains, carved marble mantels and even the floor, creating an elegant environment.

**** My experience … STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL!! If you find yourself in the museum video room, don’t forget to press the button on the wall … it starts the film. Don’t sit there for 10 minutes like Mom and I did until we read the sign haha. Also, make sure to take a selfie in the full length mirror in the ball room. It’ll make you look so thin!!

http://www.nottoway.com/

https://www.facebook.com/NottowayPlantation

 

The Start of Something Beautiful

This whole blog started when I was going through festivals around Louisiana.  I realized that some festivals took place on the beautiful grounds and gardens of the plantations around the area.  Being a lover of Louisiana history, I decided that I wanted to learn and tour a few around my area.  I began digging and reading.  Some were magnificently restored, some were horribly disintegrating, and some had only a historical site plaque marker .. only a few hundred year old oak trees to mark the grounds of what once was.

So begins my tour.  I would like to share my sights and descriptions of my treasure hunt of plantation homes.  Let the touring begin!!