Ten

I used ta be at

Kaiser, now I'm workin' down the street at the

Tenneco Chalmette Refinery.

Lower Ninth Ward

ATE by ya mama's.

SEVENteenth Street Canal

Six Pack o' Dixie.

FRIED onion rings.

leave it alone, ya make me nuts!

three french breads

Tujague's recipe

for the crawfish they caught in Arabi.

Kaiser's alumininum smelter is on the river, just up the road from the Chalmette National Battlefield. It opened in 1950, and closed in 1983, employing three generations of blue-collar workers from the Ninth Ward and St. Bernard Parish. This article is an interesting history of the plant and why Kaiser decided to close it. The big smoke stack still is the plant's main landmark (that and the fact that it's right across the St. Bernard Highway from Rocky and Carlo's). Next to the plant is a huge slip that is the main property of the Port of St. Bernard. Kaiser owns/operates half, and the parish the other side. Prior to the storm, the slip and the warehouses supporting it were a thriving component of Da Parish's economy.

Just down da street, a bit past the Battlefield, is the Chalmette Refinery. It was owned by Tenneco when Benny wrote the song. Tenneco sold it to an employee group, who then leased the facility to Mobil Oil, and Exxon-Mobil continues to operate the facility.

Facilities like the Chalmette Refinery and the Folger's Coffee plant are why many of us from the area laugh at the "New Orleans Shouldn't Be Rebuilt" crowd. When you look at the oil/gas/chemical industry in the area and combine that with other port activities such as coffee imports, it's clear that New Orleans is still a significant port and important to this nation's economy and national defense.

St. Bernard Parish's relationship with the industry along the river is a love-hate one. The plants provide jobs, but they can be a mess as well. Tanks that ruptured at Murphy Oil in Mereaux spread all sorts of oil-based funk throughout Chalmette and Mereaux, creating a huge environmental mess after the waters retreated. Lucky for Da Parish, they've got a strong and vocal advocate for their issues in Rep. Charlie Melancon. The fact that Da Parish regularly goes Republican in both state and national elections but LA-03 is represented by a Democrat sort of stands karma on its head, but what the heck.

These two photos were shot from the deck of the Steamboat Natchez. My son's in the Brother Martin High School Jazz Band, and they played a gig on the boat on Black Friday. The Natchez does a twice-daily river tour that goes down past Chalmette, turns around, heads upriver past the bridge, then returns to its dock by Jax Brewery.