The Opelousas Patriot ran a June 1856 estate sale notice for thirty-three enslaved individuals in St. Landry Parish. Buried in the legal inventory are seven maternal family groupings. The record was created to transfer property. The work is to read it forward.
Titine of Opelousas: The Woman Who Ran the Old Bank Hotel
Celestine Perrault, known as Titine, ran a large hotel in Opelousas for at least a quarter century. Three generations of her family lived under that roof. A Justice of the Peace kept his office there. This is her documented record.
Who the USDA Helped: Three Crop Notices from One 1909 Louisiana Newspaper
On May 22, 1909, the St. Landry Clarion ran three short notices on one page. Cotton was failing in Lafayette. Potatoes were failing in Avoyelles. Oats and hay were succeeding in East Baton Rouge with USDA help. This is what those three pieces document together.
When You Are Not the First Researcher in the Room: Working from Compiled Records Without Inheriting Their Conclusions
Compiled records, published articles, and family historian notebooks are research maps, not source documents. A four-step method for using another researcher’s work without adopting their conclusions.
Aurelia Godfrey Mitchell: The Lafayette Parish Widow Who Built the South Liberty Oil Field
Aurelia Godfrey Mitchell was born in Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, in 1859 and died in Liberty County, Texas, in 1940. Between those two dates she built an oil and gas estate the Supreme Court of Texas construed twice. The wells still produce under her name today.
General Order No. 28 and the Women of Occupied New Orleans, May 15, 1862
On May 15, 1862, two weeks into the federal occupation of New Orleans, Major General Benjamin Butler issued General Order No. 28. The order disciplined gestures and ignited a propaganda war. This is the documented record.
Marguerite Scypion: The Louisiana Decree That Outlasted Three Sovereigns
Marguerite Scypion’s freedom argument rested on a 1769 decree by the Spanish Governor of the Province of Louisiana against Indian slavery. Her family fought thirty-one years to make the courts read it as the freedom of every descendant of an Indian woman.
The Traditional Birthday of New Orleans: May 7, 1718
May 7 is the traditional anniversary of the founding of New Orleans, but the actual day is not in the documentary record. The land carries an older name still. This is what the record shows.