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Prytania Theatre
The Prytania Theatre is the oldest operating theater in New Orleans, dating back to 1915. It is the only single-screen, suburban theater in the state of Louisiana. It caters to film buffs and families…
A Streetcar Named Desire
A Streetcar Named Desire is the title of a 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Tennessee Williams, adapted in 1951 for the big screen by director Elia Kazan. It is undoubtedly one of the most famous…
Saenger Theater
The Saenger Theatre witnessed and mediated the rise and fall of several different forms of entertainment, including vaudeville, jazz and orchestral music, and motion pictures in its first decades on…
Mahalia Jackson
Mahalia Jackson, also known as the Queen of Gospel, was born and raised in New Orleans. In 1995, the performing arts center located in Louis Armstrong Park was name in her honor.
Lafayette Square
Planned in 1788, Lafayette Square is named after Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de LaFayette: a French aristocrat and general who fought on the American side of the American Revolution.
Saenger Amusement Company
The Saenger Amusement Company, organized in 1912 by brothers Julian and Abraham Saenger, grew into one of the largest motion picture chains in the south, with a peak total of 324 Saenger theaters…
The Monteleone's Literary Legacy
Declared a national literary landmark by the Friends of the Library Association in 1999, Hotel Monteleone opened in 1886 when a Sicilian-born cobbler named Antonio Monteleone purchased the Commercial…
"House Sold to Out-of-Towner" Tennessee Williams Moves In
Tennessee Williams was no stranger to New Orleans. Some of his most famous works, including A Streetcar Named Desire, are set in the city. Although Williams spent decades living on and off in rental…
William Sydney Porter: Becoming O. Henry
In February 1896, William Sydney Porter was indicted for embezzlement of funds from the First National Bank in Austin, Texas, where he had been recently employed. In July of that year, instead of…
Le Petit Salon
Le Petit Salon was once the most exclusive and prestigious private women’s organization in New Orleans. Founded in 1924 and described as a “circle of distinguished ladies,” the Salon quickly became an…
Tennessee Williams' Early Days in New Orleans
In his over 40 years living in New Orleans, famed playwright Tennessee Williams resided in several French Quarter locations. Arriving in New Orleans in 1938, a 28-year-old Williams rented a room at…
The Lyle Saxon House
In 1891, Lyle Saxon was born in Baton Rouge and, after attending Louisiana State University, moved to New Orleans to become a newspaper reporter. He played a pivotal role in the French Quarter…
Sherwood Anderson
“Blessed be these people,” Sherwood Anderson wrote in 1922 from his third-floor apartment in the Vieux Carré. “They know how to play. They are truly a people of culture.” Anderson, riding the crest of…
Algiers Immigrant Quarantine Detention Center
Treatment and quarantine of newly arrived immigrants at ports around New Orleans were based on discriminatory ideologies and lead to the mistreatment of many people who arrived in this region from…
“Confined in the Dungeons”: Orleans Parish Prison and Self-Emancipated People
Located in Treme, the original Orleans Parish Prison stood where the Municipal Auditorium and Louis Armstrong Park stand today. From the 1830s to 1895, the prison housed individuals accused of crimes,…
The Story of Fanny: Escaping Bondage in New Orleans
There were times when enslaved people in New Orleans could no longer bear the intense burden that came with the constant suffering of bondage. Escape became the last hope for some of these slaves…
St. Louis Hotel & Exchange: Auctioning Off Lives
Numerous 19th-century travelers who frequented New Orleans for business and pleasure described the slave auction block in St. Louis Hotel. Sensationalism aside, visitors recorded their surprise at the…
Leidenheimer Baking Company
Founded in 1896 by George Leidenheimer, Leidenheimer Bakery’s original bread baking style was far different from today's classic French Bread, po-boy making loaves. Leidenheimer established his…
Dryades Street Library and YMCA
Today home to the Dryades YMCA, this beautiful building, erected in 1915, was the first New Orleans Public Library created to serve black New Orleanians and had the capacity to hold 10,000 books.
Streetcar Historian Michael Mizell-Nelson
Michael Mizell-Nelson was a historian of the streetcar, exploring the labor history and publicizing the connection of streetcar strikes to the creation of the Po Boy Sandwich, examining streetcar…
The Demise of Gallatin Street
In 1924, Times-Picayune journalist Lyle Saxon provided a description of Gallatin Street as it appeared in the 1920s, calling it “deserted, forgotten, given over to warehouses and storage rooms of…
The Barrooms and Brothels of Gallatin Street
Gallatin Street was once filled with barrooms, dance houses, and brothels — most institutions serving as all three. There was rarely a fee to enter, but men were encouraged to buy a drink for their…
The People of Gallatin Street
Gallatin Street’s close proximity to the port made it a quick and frequent stop for those who docked, worked, or lived near the booming economic area. Close to half a million immigrants came through…
Gallatin Street: An Introduction
A small, two-block stretch called Gallatin Street, now called French Market Place, was once the headquarters of vice in New Orleans. A visitor to the street in 1873 described the scene for the…