Historical Facts About New Orleans

Jackson Square, the heart of New Orleans, was originally called Place d’ Arms—where the signing of the Louisiana Purchase was celebrated   It was renamed Jackson Square in honor of Andrew Jackson after the victorious Battle of New Orleans.


 New Orleans was known as the “Greenwich village of the South” and was  a haven for authors like Tennessee Williams, author of A Streetcar Named Desire; William Faulkner wrote his first novel, Soldier’s Pay in what is now Faulkner House Books; and Truman Capote sold paintings in Jackson Square.  It is rumored that O’Henry picked up his pen name in New Orleans.


 Café du Monde, located at the French Market, 800 Decatur and opened 24 hours a day, is the oldest coffeehouse in New Orleans.  Famous for beignets and chicory coffee which were both introduced by the Acadians.  When coffee was scarce, chicory (the root of the endive) was roasted, ground and added to the coffee for flavor and body.

 
History of Mardi Gras
The French introduced masked balls in 1718; the Spanish banned them; but the Americans restored them in 1827.  Mardi Gras events begin on Twelfth Night (January 6) and end at midnight the Tuesday before Lent.


 The Big Muddy--The mighty Mississippi begins as a one foot deep and eighteen inch wide stream at Minnesota's Lake Itasca and flows about 2,348 miles to the Port of New Orleans, the second largest port in the world, before emptying into the Gulf of Mexico.

 New Orleans was founded in1718 by Jean Baptiste La Moyne, Sieur de Bienville. At first, it was nothing more than a trading camp on a curve in the east bank of the Mississippi River. Later, the city was organized into a rectangular, fortified community, which still exists today as the French Quarter. The resulting streets were named for French royalty and nobility.
 Although established as the capitol of the French colony of Louisiana, it was actually twice the capital of Louisiana. The capital was moved from New Orleans to Donaldsonville in 1825, to Baton Rouge in 1846, to New Orleans in 1864 (during Reconstruction) and once again to Baton Rouge in 1879.

In 1803 the United States paid France $15 million for the Louisiana Territory. 828,000 square miles of land west of the Mississippi River. The lands acquired stretched from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains and from the Gulf of Mexico to the Canadian border. Thirteen states were carved from the Louisiana Territory. The Louisiana Purchase nearly doubled the size of the United States.
 

Louisiana is the only state that still refers to the Napoleonic Code in its state law.