February 2008 Archives

Canal Street before streetcars! This is an illustration from an 1857 magazine, before the New Orleans City Railroad Company constructed their streetcar line along Canal from White St. to St. Charles Ave.

The original plan was indeed to construct a navigation canal down the middle of Canal St., which is why it is so wide. Had that plan been followed, Canal would look more like Ponchartrain and West End Blvds. looked before the New Basin Canal was filled in. Canal construction was more difficult than the original planners realized, so it was decided to build a canal that extended Bayou St. John to downtown rather than build a full river-to-lake canal. With the Carondelet Canal following a back-of-town route, Canal St. was poised to become the city's main boulevard.

This illustration shows the wide "neutral" ground between the Vieux Carre on the right and Faubourg Ste. Marie on the left. Since the Creoles and the Americans both needed a shopping district, the central location of Canal St. made it perfect for this role. The buildings along Canal at this time are no more than three or four stories high at this time. The church in the background is the original Christ Church. The Episcopal congregation was located on Canal until Isadore Newman bought the corner of Canal and Dauphine from them in 1883 and built his first Maison Blanche store.

Public transportation along Canal at this time was provided by "omnibus" carriages. These carriages were horse- and mule-powered.

When the commercials first came out, I thought it was bullshit. When the product stuck around, though, I revised the thinking, maybe it was something you had to take for a year before you got any results. Looks like my first instinct was correct:

A federal court jury on Friday found the owner of a company that sells "male enhancement" tablets and other herbal supplements guilty of conspiracy to commit mail fraud, bank fraud and money laundering. Steve Warshak is founder and president of Berkeley Premium Nutraceuticals, which distributes Enzyte and a number of products alleged to boost energy, manage weight, reduce memory loss and aid restful sleep.

I wonder, is this the first time a truly fraudulent product sponsored a NASCAR car/driver?

h/t to an LJ friend...

My buddy Steve (the engineer) sent me this photo, from when we were in school. The caption says it's the 1980 Homecoming Court, but it's actually the 1979 court:

Let's see, I don't know what happened to Gerry Stagg. If I remember, he was a fraternity guy, but not mine (Lambda Chi Alpha). "The Unknown Candidate" is a fraternity brother of mine. He and my friend Steve (the lawyer) were sitting around our house and came up with this idea. They wanted to run around with paper bags on their heads for an afternoon, and the thing snowballed from there to the point where Grant ended up on the court. The Queen, Jocelyn, was nominated by one of the black fraternities, Alpha Phi Alpha or Omega Psi Phi. The greek system was (and still is) pretty segregated. Charlie Tomeny was also a fraternity brother and a cheerleader. He passed away young, in his twenties. We were a homophobic lot at the time, and Charlie caught a lot of crap from the guys when he came out, but nobody wanted to see him get HIV.

Suzanne was the sister of another Lambda Chi, and she was an Alpha Xi Delta. She was dating a nother of my brothers at the time. That spring, her boyfriend got shot in an armed robbery at his dad's business. It happened the day before our fraternity formal, and she decided to go anyway. We always held a party at someone's house before the dance, and that year, my girlfriend offered her parents' house, since it's a great place to entertain a group. (That girlfriend is now my wife. :-)) It was still a rough evening for Suzie, and I spent a lot time walking up and down the block, talking to her and letting her cry it out, much to the chagrin and annoyance of my date. Tommy Russo, can't remember if he was in one of the other fraternities or not. Check out that shirt! Ana was a Sigma Kappa, and eventually married a guy I went to high school with. AnnaLisa was dating the guy who was SGA President at the time of this photo. They broke up and she started dating another brother of mine, whom she eventually married (and I think is still married to). George (her b/f at the time) counted the ballots for the court election himself. I don't think he wanted to rig things to be queen anyway, but it would have looked really bad had he done so and knocked off the first black queen in the school's history. Still, we did learn a lot about elections involving ballot boxes that spring.

Those were some fun days. I was the "legal aid" ombudsman for SGA that year (78-79). We had a program where a student could come to the ombudsman for help, and if s/he thought their situation warranted it, we had an attorney who would come meet with that student, and SGA would pay the attorney's hourly fee for a consultation. The lawyers gave us a good break on the hourly in the hope that they might stumble on a good PI case. I was also a member of the "election council" with George, and we supervised the SGA elections that spring. It was a hotly contested race, with three white guys and one black guy as candidates for President. One of those candidates was another of my fraternity brothers and a good friend. He won, what a coincidence. :-) That started all sorts of grief, since it was the first time a black candidate mounted a serious campaign. His supporters suspected fraud when they lost.

The judicial branch of SGA was called the Honor Council. They decided that there was no fraud, and we were very grateful to two fraternity brothers of mine, my girlfriend, and another guy who would have been a Lambda Chi had he not been pre-med for that decision. :-)

Ah, good times!

I wanted to wait until I could talk for a while with Kevin, my 13-year old, before weighing in on the Clearview Mall controversy. He and his friends are the direct targets of the mall's ire.

For those of you who didn't know this, we live pretty much directly across Veterans from Clearview Mall, three blocks up towards the lake. Kev's friends will occasionally stop by to drag him along to go to Game Trader, a used game-system software place. Once upon a time, when I was going to UNO in the late 1970s, I worked in the men's department of the Maison Blanche there (located where Target is now). Clearview Mall and I are old friends.

I used to be a high school teacher, and a high school soccer referee, so I don't fear teenagers. More importantly, they don't bother me. When I was teaching, I worked nights at the Radio Shack in Lakeside. We used to have hacker kids in and out of the store from 4pm until closing time most nights, and almost all the day on Saturdays. It wasn't a big deal, but these were geek kids. The true mall rats hang out in the food court. From a social standpoint, some of these kids are vain, petty, and disgusting, but that's common of teens. They're not all that annoying to people outside their peer groups.

Clearview Mall has evolved over time. In the 1970s, the big stores were Maison Blanche, Sears, and Gus Mayer (which was where the Bed, Bath and Beyond is now). There were hardly any food places, the K&B soda fountain (the last of its kind in the metro area), A&G Cafeteria (more-or-less where the movie theater is now), and a little snack bar in Sears. When Dillard's closed the MB store and Target came in, the dynamic of the mall completely changed. Now, the mall is more like an oversized strip mall, where people come for a specific purpose, go to Target, go out to eat, go to the show, go to Sears. That you can move through the interior of the mall is convenient but secondary to most shoppers.

This is where the mall and the store owners (other than the major anchors) come into conflict with the kids. The perception is that, if the place is teeming with packs of marauding adolescents, people will drive up to Target or Sears or BB&B, and bypass the Hallmark, candy shop, mobile phone store, etc., inside. Early teens (under sixteen) don't spend money like older teens and twenty-somethings, which is why they're the targets of the weekend ban--nobody sixteen and under after 4pm on Saturdays and Sundays without an escort who has to be over 21.

Naturally, the kids are pissed, and have organized a boycott. One teen even set up a MySpace page to support the mall's position. He's 18, of course, and most likely doesn't have much use for 13-year olds.

Is kicking teens out of the mall on Friday and Saturday nights a huge thing in the Grand Scheme of Things? No, not really. Apart from the kids themselves, the people most inconvenienced are the parents who willingly drop-kick the kids to the mall on weekends so they can get away from them for a while. It shouldn't take much imagination to come up with something to keep them busy on weekends, assuming they're really not simply using the mall as free babysitting in the first place.

And that's really the bottom-line issue: free babysitting. If adult shoppers want Friday and Saturday nights to be "adult swim" at the mall, they need to be imaginative. They need to get JPRD involved and come up with some less-structured activities at the playgrounds. Get the church parishes to sponsor some weekend activities.

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Sheriff Normand and the parents of Metairie should be asking themselves where these kids are going to go if they're denied entrance to the mall. If Clearview Mall doesn't want the younger teens, fine, that's their right (and they're following a national trend). The younger teens don't spend money like their older brothers and sisters, anyway. Where the kids end up on Friday night isn't the mall's problem, but it should be something others consider.

Personally, my kiddo isn't all that upset about the closure. He's a band kid, so he spends a lot of Friday nights at football and basketball games. We often do things as a family on Saturday nights, so that about covers the ban times. His friends are part of the boycott. Other than the game store, Game Trader, and the food court, however, I don't see where they're going to have a big impact on the mall stores or management.

cross-posted from CitiesOfTheDead (dot net)

Socola family tomb in St. Louis Cemetery Number Three, located on Esplanade Ave. by Bayou St. John.

One of the things that will catch my eye when I'm walking through a cemetery is an anomoly. This tomb has a glaring one, a modern metal plaque on the front stone. The architecture of this particular tomb is pretty common of late-19th/early 20th Century, but the metal plaque obviously was added much later. You can see another plaque on the side of the tomb as well.

Here's a closeup of the plaque on the front. The arch at the top of the tomb has "Famille Wm. Socola" engraved on it. William Socola, Jr., is the first name on the plaque, and the 1898 date confirms the tomb's approximate construction date. Madeline M. Socola could have been William Jr.'s wife or daughter.

The later names on the list show one of the problems geneaologists have when researching burial places in New Orleans. Looks like a Socola, married a Robert at some point. Since the wives often outlive the husbands, they often bury their husbands in their family's tomb (unless husband's family has a tomb of their own). It's usually easy for the woman to go to her family's matriarch, get the deed of the tomb to the funeral home, and take care of the arrangements. To hunt down an ancestor from New Orleans, be sure to look at both paternal and maternal burial sites.

The plaque on the side of this tomb also caught my eye. I didn't know "Mr. Kenny," but I knew and still know many men who are just like him, Boy Scout leaders who touched lives. I remember my Scoutmasters just as fondly as Troop 21 remembers Mr. Robert. When I go to adult Scout meetings (I'm an Assistant Scoutmaster for my son's troop), men will come up to me and introduce themselves, telling me how they remember my dad and all the work he did with Scouting when he was alive. (I always joke that I left Scouting when I was in eighth grade, but my dad never quit.) It was nice of the Socolas and Roberts to let the boys and men whose lives this leader touched to remember him in this way.

The stone at the bottom center of the tomb is the military-issue headstone provided by the VA for deceased veterans. It's for George Robert, who was in the US Army in both World Wars, retiring as a Major. He also received the Distinguished Service Medal.

The Poor Man this morning:

Mark Penn’s firm charged Hillary’s campaign 3.8 million dollars in January? Really? That’s one month! One month in which her campaign basically augured into the ground! In exchange for crappy spin and inept campaigning she paid this man the equivalent of a middle-of-the-line private airplane? What an amazing gig this guy has. Never won anything, terrible at his job, gets paid truly exorbitant amounts of money for the privilege. He should be appointed head of FEMA.

Reminds me of callers to the late, great, Buddy D's radio show, offering their services to Tom Benson's football club. They were all willing to work for a quarter to half of what Benson was paying his coaches and management, and the callers could easily guarantee the same level of performance.

I'm going to send Hillary my resume. I can give her the same results Penn did for a fraction of the cost in four years.

1. The extent to which the wingnuts are screaming is interesting. As Yglesias says, looks NYT "doesn't have the goods" in terms of proving McCain's banging her. Still, the screaming is at a level where it's going to be terribly embarrassing for all concerned if it does turn out he's doing her.

2. Whether or not McCain is banging a lobbyist is none of our business, just like the blue dress was none of our business. If he did favors for her clients, however, all bets are off.

3. When I'm McCain's age, if I'm still around and banging two blondes, I will be a very happy guy.

An interurban electric car operated by the Orleans-Kenner Railroad, at the company's barn at Tulane Ave. and S. Dupre St. in 1928.

The O-K railroad ran from what is now Williams Blvd. and Jefferson Highway in Kenner to Canal and S. Rampart Streets downtown. The railroad followed Jefferson Highway to the parish line. When it crossed into Orleans Parish, the O-K ran down S. Claiborne, then turned left on S. Carrollton to follow the Tulane Belt path to Canal St. The return was via the St. Charles belt. The O-K ran from 1915 to 1929. NOPSI converted the St. Charles and Tulane Belts to wide gauge in 1929, making the track incompatible with the standard-gauge O-K. Buses were substituted for the interurbans, running from S. Carrollton and S. Claiborne.

One of the most significant differences between the interurban rail cars and traditional streetcars is the baggage compartment between the cab and rider seating. This area enabled farmers from Kenner to bring bushels of produce into town easily. Once at Canal and Rampart, it was an easy trip by wagon or truck to the French Market.

The O-K RR was the city's only true interurban line. Unlike other parts of the country, the geography of the Isle d'Orleans is such that it was too expensive to run electric interurbans through the swamp to higher ground. Connecting the tri-parish (Orleans/Jefferson/St. Bernard) to the rest of the world was the job of traditional railroad service.

We had a great discussion about the O-K Railroad at the East Jefferson Regional Library last week. I'll be posting more info about the O-K RR in the NOSRA wiki in the near future.

The Pitt Theater, located at Elysian Fields Avenue and Robt. E. Lee Blvd. The theater opened in the 1930s. This photo is from 1954.

My memories of the Pitt go back to the 1960s. My dad took us there a few times, because it was down the street from the University of New Orleans, where he worked. When I went to high school, down the street from the theater in the opposite direction from UNO, we'd go to the Pitt all the time.

By the late 1970s, the owners divided the theater in half. In 1977, I watched "Star Wars" three times in a row in one side of the Pitt. In the 1980s, the Pitt was sold to the Joy theater chain. That company divided the Pitt into four and turned it into a "dollar theater." The Pitt was sold in 1999, torn down, and a Walgreen's was built on the corner.

The corner of the building closest to the street corner is a drugstore, Parker's Drugs, in the photo. By the 1970s, that space was a Tex-Mex place, "Taco Tico." It's your classic local version of Taco Bell. There are still a couple other Taco Ticos in town, in Metairie and Kenner, but I miss the one in Gentilly.

The corner of Robert E. Lee Blvd. and Elysian Fields Ave. was a major intersection in Gentilly prior to the storm. Of the four corners, one was Ferrara's Supermarket, one a convenience store/gas station, the Pitt, and a nightclub/disco on the fourth. My fraternity's house was two blocks down from there, and my first apartment after graduation two blocks west. As a college student, grad student, and new high school teacher, the local taco place and cheap movie theater were important parts of my existence.

The Federal Flood dumped 10' of water on the corner of Elysian Fields and Robt. E. Lee. Of the four corners, only the Walgreen's is back.

The other day, I was doing some online research, looking through photo collections for streetcar shots. I came across a shot of Feibelmann's Department Store at the corner of Canal and Carondelet Streets, but the catalog info for the photo had it incorrectly listed as being a photo of the Pickwick Club. The Pickwick Club is the building on the corner of Canal and St. Charles. It's well-known because that's where the reviewing stands were set up for decades so that Rex could toast the King of Carnival on Mardi Gras.

Well, I noticed the record in the LOUIS database had a contact email, so I dropped them a note, pointing out the error. I copy/pasted the photo's record into the message. I got a reply yesterday from them, asking for my address/phone #, so I replied back. Then today I got a call from one of their archivists.

The archivist basically told me that she couldn't help me because she didn't have the accession number of the photo I wrote about, and proceeded to summarily dismiss the pasted record attached to the email as "5 pages of http stuff." She said that I would have to call back with the number she's looking for.

I found this a curious attitude for her to take, particularly since the accession number she was looking for was about the fifteenth line of the photo's online record. Maybe if the receptionist that fielded the email in the first place forwarded my reply to her, which was a reply to my original message, that's where the five pages of email came from, but a quick read would have brought the archivist to the information in question.

Now, I'm usually patient with people who don't do email regularly. I hit them often, particularly when talking to older folks about the streetcar nonprofit. I'm wondering if this is common for librarians, though. The librarians I know and talk to are those of you I know from online communities and blogging. Are you guys small islands of tech-savvy in a sea of luddites?

One of the most effective things that Newt the Gingrich did to frame the debate against Democrats in 1994 was "The Contract For America," a point-by-point list of the things a Republican congress would do to turn things around to their way of thinking. They promised to outright do a number of those points in the first 100 days of the session, and at least get tht ball rolling on the rest. The contract was clear, succint and was one of the reasons the Dems had their collective ass handed to them that Novemb

It's in that spirit that I offer my "Ten Things in Twelve Months" list. I've always felt that the whole "hundred days" benchmark was media masturbation. A year, however, is a legimitate time period that voters understand.

1. Fully restore civil liberties in the US. I put this item at a higher priority than the war because the powers that the Republicans and capitulating Democrats have given the government are so indisious that this issue merits immediate attention. There's another equally important factor here: use of those powers is tempting. There are all sorts of stories of the meetings that J. Edgar Hoover used to have with incoming Presidents and Attorneys General, where he brought them inside on all those files he had. This is like "Lord of the Rings" in that the temptation to try to use these powers for good is so strong that I want to see it shut down immediately. Close down the Guantanamo, dismantle the "military tribunal" structure and concept. Destroy any data collected without legal FISA warrants, and set up policies and procedures with stiff consequences for personnel who go off the reservation.

2. Iraq Withdrawl/MidEast Security. I don't say "end the war," because we can't do that. We've lost. This is Vietnam now, a matter of getting our people out and letting the locals settle things amongst themselves. I like Clinton's two brigades a month plan. I don't know enough about Army and Marine logistics to know if that timetable could be accelerated.

Some of the troops we're pulling out will have to stay in that theatre of operations. When the Soviets left Afghanistan, the vacuum created allowed the Taliban to rise, and we all know how well that worked out for us all. Still, ALL National Guard units currently deployed should be brought home in the first year. Those men and women didn't sign on to be in the regular Army, and neither did their families. We owe them their lives back.

3. Universal Health Care. Learn from the 1993 defeat, come back with a bill that will pass both houses and the President can sign.

4. Bring back the WPA. One of the reasons the WPA was created was to be an economic stimulus at a time when so many businesses fell apart so many people were out of work. We'll be in full-blown recession by November. While that's good for the electoral map (no incumbent party wins when the economy sinks on their watch), it's the next administration that will be left cleaning up what Dr. Black calls "big shitpile.

We have massive infrastructure needs in this country. Highways, bridges, schools, public buildings all need repair or replacement. An overwhelming number of the businesses that would benefit from a WPA-style program are owned by Republicans. The problem is that these businesses aren't in the oil industry and they aren't war profiteers. They're the type of people who oppose direct welfare programs. With a WPA-style program, we give them a shot of corporate welfare in terms of government contracts that they simply can't refuse.

Oh yeah, and the first place this WPA-style program goes to work is the Gulf Coast.

5. Establish a General Disaster Insurance Program. Currently, FEMA underwrites flood insurance, and the program is basically solid. There is a lot of potential for expanding the concept to other disasters. With the existing flood insurance program as a base, allow Californians to buy "earthquake insurance," "tornado insurance" for folks in the midwest, and "wildfire insurance" for residents where that's the big threat. Short of a trifecta worthy of the Book of Revelation, the increase in the pool of policyholders should go a long way in reducing the overall risk.

The political benefits to including everyone in "disaster" insurance are obvious. When homes in New Mexico are burned from out of control fires, those people get the same help as when the Mississippi Valley rivers overflow their banks and destroy homes or one of our storms rolls in from the gulf. Make premiums affordable to all homeowners and everyone has a sense of buy-in with the program. We'll have a lot less of these arguments over whether someone's home, town, or city should be rebuilt when disaster strikes.

6. Proper treatment of military veterans. We'll never get the votes of the old farts in the VFW (particularly if we're up against Hundred-Year-Johnny), but way too many of the veterans under 40 have been royally screwed by both Bush administrations. They remember, their wives remember, and they vote. Upgrades and improvements to the VA hospital system should be part of overall health care reform. Serious efforts to look after the mental health needs of veterans will be implemented. Establish re-integration programs to get veterans back into civilian life and the civilian workforce, so we don't create any more ticking timebombs like Tim McVeigh. Give SBA assistance to veteran-owned businesses to help them get contracts for the WPA-style rebuilding program.

7. Adopt sensible energy policies. Carter had it right on energy, but we've really lost our way. Sign and adhere to Kyoto. Offer to host and sponsor "Kyoto 2" or whatever you want to call the next discussion of global warming. Stop worrying about angry Michigan voters and do the right thing in terms of automobile regulations. Promote mass transit: go back to the 80/20 (federal/local) funding formula for new transit programs instead of the 50/50 formula adopted by BushCo. Put a surcharge on airline tickets and dedicate the money to upgrading and improving Amtrak service. Establish policies that all buildings and facilities constructed in the WPA-style program be "greener."

8. Common-sense counterterrorism. BushCo have not only trampled on the Constitution in the last eight years, but they've done a positively awful job of protecting this country from terrorist attack. From Ashcroft's grandstanding to the "color code" alert system to the antics of the TSA at airports, "Homeland Security" has been mocked more than it's been praised. Pull DHS together and make it work right. Spin off the pieces that don't fit. Make TSA work the way it was originally intended, staffing it with properly-trained security officers who are looking for people that might hijack planes.

9. Re-define the role of the Department of Education. Federal assistance to public education is one of the areas where Grover Norquist almost got his wish. The Republicans are coming closer and closer to being able to drown the Dept. of Education in a bathtub. I'd rather see the wingnuts yelling about "states rights" and "federal extortion" when it comes to education policy than having them in a position where faith-based charter schools and voucher programs are gaining strength.

10. Presidential World Tour. When a large company fires a CEO, one of the first things the new boss will do is get on a plane and visit that company's customers personally, re-assuring them that things are back on track. The new CEO will eat humble pie, admit that the previous guy was a screw-up, and list the ways things will be better in the future. Our next President should do the same. With most of the world thinking we Americans are a bunch of complete fools, I can't think of a better way to show we're moving back to sanity than to send the "first black" or "first woman" President on a rock-star style promotional tour. Give speeches, make public appearances, have substantive talks with world leaders. It's possible to run this government from Air Force One for a week at a time, so go to Europe one one trip, Asia a couple months later, etc. The world will catch the same fever our campaigns have on this, and will want to be able to say they saw/met our "first-whatever" President.

I know that a lot of the points on my list are part of the campaign platforms of both Obama and Clinton. Nothing here is new ground, really, and none of this is beyond the level of "progressive" or "populist" of either candidate. The bottom line is that Americans like "top-ten" lists, be they from Letterman, or just their own daily "to-do" lists. They're easy benchmarks for performance that everyone can understand. It's one thing to put up a bunch of position papers on a campaign website, it's another to say, I will do these following things in my first year.

Please use comments here to put up your own top-ten list.

Von Dullen streetcar 2020 at Carrollton Shops. The work the craftsmen of Carrollton are doing to get the Von Dullens and the 400s back on the lines is incredible. Here, 2020's body is on the lift so the undercarriage can be inspected. The trucks are still the ones damaged by the Federal Flood. Those will be replaced by new trucks and a new propulsion system from Brookville Mining Corporation.

The "red ladies" that were damaged in the storm are all up at Carrollton (except for 2013, which is at BMC). They've been cleaned out, the bodies are being stripped and sanded all the way down to the bare metal. They are then run through the paint shop, for new primer and exterior coats. 2020 has completed this process, all the way down to the lettering, striping, and detail work. As soon as the new propulsion systems are fabricated and shipped down, the Von Dullens will be back at work on Canal St. and N. Carrollton Avenue.

Carrollton Station, located on Willow Street (the rear is on Jeanette Street) just off of S. Carrollton Avenue, is the home base of the Rail Department. The 2000-series Von Dullens as well as the 400-series Riverfront streetcars were fabricated here. The craftsmen who work here are some of the world's best experts on both "conventional" streetcars as well as LRVs (Light Rail Vehicles). They're good at both the old and the new because they maintain the fleet of 35 900-series streetcars from 1923 as well as the newer red ones. The 2000-series Von Dullens may look like "conventional" streetcars, but they have modern trucks, propulsion, and electronics, just like the slick LRVs you see in cities like San Diego and Baltimore. We just like our streetcars to have that classic, arch roof look that everyone associates with New Orleans.

An American businesswoman was carted off to jail by religious police in Saudi Arabia for sitting with a male colleague at a Starbucks in Riyadh, the Times of London reported.
The woman, who spent a day behind bars, was strip-searched and forced to sign a false confession before being released, the newspaper said. The Times declined to publish her name at her request.

Dillard University, located at 2601 Gentilly Blvd. This is a WPA photo of the campus right after it opened in 1935. The building on the left is Rosenwald Hall, and Kearney Hall is visible in the right background. The photo was shot from Gentilly Blvd., which was a one-lane road at the time. Now it is a 4-lane boulevard, and Dillard is a gated community monitored by campus police for the safety of faculty and students.

Dillard is an Historically Black University. It was founded by the United Methodist Church and still operates under the church's auspices. Dillard opened its doors in 1930, the result of a merger between Straight University and New Orleans University. The University is named after philanthropist and Tulane graduate, Dr. James Hardy Dillard.

President Bill Clinton will be speaking today, in support of his wife's presidential campaign, at Dillard's Lawless Assembly Center (formerly known as Lawless Memorial Chapel). The chapel is dedicated to Alfred Lawless, Jr., a leader in African-American education in New Orleans, and his son, Dr. Theodore K. Lawless, an internationally known physician.

Of all the colleges and universities in New Orleans, Dillard was hit hardest. The London Avenue Canal is the western boundary of the campus. Floodwalls along this canal breached on 29-August-2005, the result of a 40-year pattern of lies and perpetrated on New Orleans by the US Army Corps of Engineers that has brought shame and dishonor upon the United States Army. A large number of Dillard students evacuated to Shreveport, LA, and were taken in by Centenary College in that city. The university began the rebuilding process in the winter of 2006, operating out of an office building downtown. The main Gentilly campus is still undergoing renovation and repairs as classes and student life have resumed.

Two engines owned by the New Orleans Public Belt Railroad pulling a mixed-consist freight train along the New Orleans Riverfront.

Even before the storm, many folks began to forget just how significant the Port of New Orleans is to the United States. While other ports along the Gulf Coast have taken away business from New Orleans, the city's port is still the one at the mouth of the biggest river in the nation. As such, it's the largest port for rubber and coffee imports, and a major port for grain exports.

The NOPB Railroad connects rail traffic from the major carriers with port facilities. Hopper cars carrying grain use NOPB to access elevators on the river, and the railroad connects a number of cargo wharves and a large container/intermodal facility with the rest of the nation.

NOPB is owned by the City of New Orleans. It was established in 1904, operating over 25 miles of main track (including the Huey P. Long bridge across the Mississippi) and 75 miles of yard track.

These two engines are approaching the "Moonwalk," which is the walkway in front of the river across Decatur St. from Jackson Square. It's a tricky area to navigate for both streetcars and trains, because tourists are crossing over from Washington Artillery Park and the French Market parking lot to the Moonwalk. Still, the trains must roll, servicing the wharves on either side of the French Quarter.

Because of its location, New Orleans is still quite the train city, in spite of the general decline of passenger rail in the last 50 years. Three Amtrak trains terminate at New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal: The Crescent, the City of New Orleans, and the Sunset Limited. Additionally, several railroads have significant facilities and operations in the metro area, on both sides of the river. The city government in the early 20th Century was aware that the interests of competing railroads might not coincide with those of the city, hence the creation of the Public Belt.

found by one of my LJ-friends...

:-)

PGT Beauregard was alive and well when this photo was shot, which is one of the reasons you don't see his statue on the City Park side of Bayou St. John. The bayou was still a navigable waterway at this time, a "back door" to the city. Fishing boats and others would come in from the Gulf of Mexico, into Lake Borgne, then Lake Pontchartrain, finally coming down Bayou St. John. That's why the bridge at the end of Esplanade Avenue was a drawbridge. Shrimp boats and oyster luggers would go out from the old turning basin near Congo Square, up the bayou to the lake, and return with their catches.

At this time, the New Orleans City RR Co. ran streetcar lines up to either side of the bridge. On the west bank of the Bayou (left in the photo), the Bayou Bridge & City Park line operated from the Half Way House to the bridge. On the eastern side, the Esplanade line ran the length of that beautiful street, turning into barn, looping around the block, along the bayou on Moss St., then re-joining the Esplanade tracks for the inbound run. The NOCRR had just begun streetcar operations four years earlier, in 1861. Even though the Civil War was raging in other parts of the country, New Orleans was an important port, and opportunities abounded for entrepeneurs. Because the city did not oppose the Union occupation after the naval battles were lost by the Confederacy, New Orleans was spared the fate of many other southern cities. Commerce and development continued throughout the war, in spite of the harsh rule of Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler, USA, whom the locals called "Beast."

This area was referred to as the "back of town" in those days. As the neighborhoods of Mid City and Faubourg St. John spread out this point at City Park, the term "back of town" came to refer more to the neighborhoods around S. Carrollton and Tulane Avenues.

Mardi Gras Morning...

and that's one of my favorite Carnival tunes, particularly when Kermit Ruffins and Da Rebirth do it.

Every New Orleanian has a Mardi Gras Strategy. For the wealthy, it's all about the Rex parade. For the black middle class, the strategy is participating in or watching Zulu. For college students, it's about going downtown, getting drunk and crazy in the French Quarter.

Our family's Mardi Gras Strategy has evolved as my boys have grown older. Originally, our plan involved going out on St. Charles Avenue, somewhere around where my father-in-law's accounting firm would go. The firm would rent an apartment on or near the parade route, so we'd have a place with food, and most importantly, a bathroom. The bathroom is the most essential component of a Strategy, because it factors in how much beer one can consume. We'd go out very early on Carnival Day and put up a ladder with a wooden seat on top that the boys could sit in, above the fray, to enjoy the parades.

Then my f-i-l passed, and the boys got older, we began to leave the ladder and seat behind. That made us more mobile. A couple of buddies of mine started riding in the Zulu parade, so we'd go closer to downtown to catch that parade as well. When my oldest was in high school, he was in NJROTC, and marched in several parades. By Carnival Day, he wanted to see some of New Orleans, then hang out with his friends. Little brother is now a band kid, so he's got essentially the same attitude as big brother (who is now at uni in Atlanta; we call him and tell him we miss him).

So, this year's Mardi Gras Strategy involved both New Orleans and Metairie. The idea was to see the best parade of the day, Rex, then head back out to the 'burbs, so Kevin could catch several of his friends in parades out here. We headed out to Napoleon Avenue at 7am this morning, and by 7:20am, we were sitting out on the neutral ground of one of the loveliest boulevards in the city. While my wife and son walked around, I kicked back with an anthology of alternate history stories (e-book, reading on my PDA). We were a block down from Our Lady of Lourdes Church, waiting for Rex.

Rex is the King of Carnival. The official name of the organization that puts on the parade is The School of Design. Their membership is a list of the wealthiest and most influential folks in town. Actually, that's the wealthiest and most influential white folks in town, I should say.

Cops always lead off Carnival parades. They're important, for crowd control, gun control, etc. There's a DHS unit that is part of the cop part of the parade that I find amusing, because I've never really thought of a Carnival parade as a turrist threat.

The Golden Band From Tiger Land. For those of you not from Louisiana, that's the Louisiana State University Marching Band. If you've never experienced American Football as played in the SouthEastern Conference of the NCAA, you can't fully appreciate why the premier parade of Carnival would choose this band as their lead unit. LSU's band is why we have our current Mardi Gras Strategy as a family. My eighth grade trombone player worships this band. I don't know if he'll go to LSU for uni, but for right now, this is the Coolest Band On The Planet.

Rex, King of Carnival. This year, he's John Edward Koerner, III. Koerner married into a wealthy Uptown family, but he also made a few bucks on his own--his family IS Barq's root beer. Koerner sold the consummate New Orleans cold drink to Coca-Cola, and has used the money for a lot of philanthropic purposes, particularly since the storm. It's kind of an interesting twist that Koerner is a graduate of the A. B. Freeman School of Business at Tulane University and a HUGE Tulane fan, because the Freeman family started the Louisiana Coca-Cola Bottling Company.

The Ross Volunteers of Texas A&M University. My oldest considered being an Aggie, but decided to go to become a Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech (and a hell of an engineer!).

The Hebrus River. The theme of the Rex parade this year is "Royal Rivers."

His Majesty's Streetcar. The Knights of Babylon have the best streetcar float, a Carnival replica of a Stephenson Bobtail streetcar, but Rex's streetcar is still pretty cool.

Marines! LSU may have led off Rex, but most of the marching units in the parade are military bands. In addition to Marine Reserve Forces Band New Orleans, there were three US Army bands. Military bands are a true treat, because these men and women are not only professional musicians, they're professional soldiers. Depending on the command, bandsmen/women are also combat troops.

One of the most enjoyable moments of Rex today came further up the route. As the MRFBNO made their way down St. Charles Ave., there were a number of points where they had to stop while waiting for the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club to go in front of Rex. One of the teevee stations caught the band at a point where several of the local Marines went into an impromptu number on the street. You could see the "WTF?" looks on some of the other musicians' faces when about six of their colleagues formed a Dixieland combo in the street and did a couple of numbers. Just after that, the parade was ready to move forward again, and the band re-formed as the well-disciplined unit they are to move down the route.

Three "riding Lieutenants" of the Rex Organization. There are several groups of these riders, one each in purple, green, and gold, the colors of Carnival.

Once Rex passed by, we said good-bye to friends along the route and quickly headed back to Metairie. Kevin was able to see some of his friends riding in "truck" parades in the 'burbs. The floats you see in these photos are typical of our regular Carnival parades. On Mardi Gras, however, groups of families parade on floats that are pulled by 18-wheeler cabs, hence the term "truck parades." These folks make a day of it, assembling at their starting points early in the morning and riding the parade routes. Behind Rex are two truck parades, Elks Orleanians and the Krewe of Crescent City. In Metairie, the Krewe of Argus is followed by two of its own truck parades, Elks Jefferson and the Krewe of Jefferson.

And now, after grilling a couple of nice steaks (it's Carne Vale, after all), I'm enjoying a nice rose' and watching Tweety make an ass of himself.)

Toujours Mardi Gras!

The Krewe d'Etat's members consist of many of the families who make up the "old-line" Carnival krewes of the Mistick Krewe of Comus and the Knights of Momus. Neither of those krewes have paraded since 1991, when the New Orleans City Council passed an ordinance requiring Carnival organizations to open up their membership rolls to inspection, so the city could validate that they didn't discriminate. In spite of a successful civil rights lawsuit against the city, the parades have not returned to the streets. Several krewes formed by younger members of these families began parading in the 1990s, d'Etat among them.

Political satire is the main feature of this parade, as well as keeping alive some old traditions. Before photojournalism, the newspapers would print illustrations of a parade's floats in the next day's paper. In keeping with that custom, d'Etat passes out flyers that show the float drawings.

d'Etat doesn't have a king, they have a Dictator:

Here's the Title Float:

Here's one that's sure to warm the hearts of many a Democrat:

The title is "Left Wing Chicken" The flyer's description of the float:

Guess Who's measuring the drapes at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? Here's a hint: think plump thighs, no breasts and a cackle only a rooster can love. That's right, it's the left-wing special herself, Hillary Clinton.

It goes on from there, as you might expect. The Bush float was entitled "Blame Duck Gumbo" and featured Karl Rove as a pink elephant, seen in the current pResident's drunken fantasies.

I didn't get a good shot of Vitter's float, but here's the drawing:

The title is "Whore D'Oevures" and here's the blurb:

Passing important federal legislation can sure work up an appetite, especially if you like spicy appetizers. Fortunately for Senator David "Family Values" Vitter, the D. C. Madam delivers her own unique brand of whore d'oevures. Just phone in your order and -- voila! -- a "side dish" appears within minutes. Ah, so many delectable, tasty treats...and so little time! But beware, Diaper Dave, these tit-bits come with a warning: they are known to cause massive political heartburn -- and the new delivery boy, Larry Flynt, has been known to spill the contents of even the Madam's best customers' trays!

The other floats skewered Mayor Nagin, the Louisiana Recovery Authority, Governors Blanco and Jindal, the cast of "The View," and the various crooks from the Markey-Marc Morial administration, as well as a few others.

Happy Mardi Gras!

One of the more interesting memes spread by pro-Obama partisans is the notion that electing Hillary Clinton means that the Clintons between them will cause the Dems to lose Congress, like what happened in 1994, when Bill was President.

OK, now I know that a voter who is 18-25 this year was between four and eleven years old in 1994, but that's still no excuse for not understanding what happened in that election cycle.

Coming into the 1994 election, the Democrats held the House of Representatives for over 40 years. The chamber was rocked by scandals, most notably the House Banking Scandal and the Congressional Post Office Scandal.

At the time, the House operated its own "bank," and allowed CongressCritters to overdraw their accounts and not back them up on their Visa cards. The abuse of the "bank" ran from simple overdrafts to felonies. In the end, one Republican, four Democrats, the Dem Delegate from DC, and the House Sergeant At Arms were all convicted or pled guilty to charges stemming from this scandal.

The Congressional Post Office scandal netted a big fish, Dan Rostenkowski (D-IL). "Rosty," a product of the Cook County political machine, was chairman of Ways and Means at the time. He was convicted and sentenced to 18 months for laundering money through the post office.

While the corruption of the House Bank was bi-partisan (many Republicans were just as guilty of the overdrafts as Dems), the Post Office scandal was essentially Rosty's thing. The GOP leadership, led by then Minority Whip Newt the Gingrich, was outraged at how then-Speaker Tom Foley (D-WA) was sitting on the accusations and reports alleging wrongdoing by Rostenkowski.

In short, the House was a sewer of corruption, Democratic corruption. That's what happens when you're in control of an institution for generations. GOP attempts to break the Dem lock on the House date back much farther than Clinton's presidency. One of the main vehicles of attack was GOPAC, a Republican Political Action Committee that was formed in 1977. GOPAC's leadership was taken over by Gingrich during the term of Bush 41, and Newt used the PAC's fund raising power to put the squeeze on Speaker Foley.

And squeeze he did, shouting the sins of the Democrats to anyone who would listen. In 1992, Gingrich began to seriously push the notion of term limits for CongressCritters, a concept vehemently opposed by Foley and the Democrats. Term limits became one of the highlights of "The Contract for America," a series of pledges and promises Republicans running for Congress in 1994 signed and promoted.

Clinton's policies of that first year and a half didn't help, either. This was when Hillary led the task force on health care. Some of the things being put forward by the task force were unacceptable to Congressional Dems and the interests that pumped millions of dollars into their campaign warchests. Hillary's style (and that of her task force staff) chafed a number of Congressional leaders, slowing down any hope of moving forward on the issue. But, in the end, it was the CongressCritters themselves the people blamed. When Dems in Congress blocked Republican initiatives put forward by St. Ronald of California and Bush 41, they were participating in "divided government." Ronnie's people weren't much better than the current turds in the West Wing, so it wasn't hard to explain the opposition. When Clinton took office, though, there was no division of government, and the youthful, charismatic Southerner made the Critters look bad.

And boy, were they spanked for their misdeeds. Thirty-four (34) incumbent Dems lost their seats in 1994, compared to no Republicans. The total swing with open seats was 54. Among those defeated were Rostenkowski (IL-5), running for his 18th term, Neal Edward Smith (IA-4), also running for an 18th term, Jack Brooks (TX-9), running for his 21st term, and the Speaker, Tom Foley (WA-5), running for his 15th term.

To attribute the ability to oust 34 incumbent Dems, including such senior members as listed above, to a President who had been in office a mere 22 months is preposterous.

The Senate

On the Senate side, open seats killed the Democrats' hope of keeping control of the chamber. Two incumbent Dems were defeated, Harris Wofford (PA) and Jim Sasser (TN). Scandal tainted the Senate at this time as well. Dennis DeConcini (AZ) retired after becoming part of the "Keating Five," one of the many aspects of the "Savings and Loan Scandals" of the 1980s.

(Interestingly enough, John McCain was also a member of the Keating Five. Useful information to remember. Or maybe look up for those of you who didn't know that in the first place.)

In addition to DeConcini, the Majority Leader, George Mitchell (he of steroid fame of late) retired, creating an open seat in ME. MI, OH, OK, and TN also had open seats, the latter the result of Al Gore becoming veep. Again, it's possible to argue that Clinton's first year in office had some impact on these races, but there's no way the blame for all these races can be laid at Clinton's feet.

The dynamics of Congressional elections have been different for every cycle in the 20th century as well as the 21st. To say that we'll have the same situation as 1994 simply because the President's name might be Clinton again ignores these dynamics.