Dictionary of Louisiana Biography – L

Dictionary L

LABATUT, Isidore, physician. Born, New Orleans, April 16, 1793; son of Gen. Jean-Baptiste Labatut (q.v.), commander during the Battle of New Orleans, and Marie-Felicité St. Martin. Education: College of Pontvoix, in France, then at the medical school in Montpellier. In Edinburg, Scotland, received an oculist diploma. Returned to New Orleans to become the first native-born physician to practice there. Administrator of the University of Louisiana, 1852. Died New Orleans, August 2, 1890. M.A. Source: Dufour’s local sketches, Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XIV (1931), 222.

LABATUT, Jean-Baptiste, attorney general, soldier. Born, Bayonne, France, April 25, 1752; son of Jean Labatut and Ana Echavarria. Immigrated to New Orleans in 1781. Married Marie Felicité St. Martin, daughter of Pierre B. and Charlotte Drillion St. Martin, in New Orleans, April 2, 1785. Children: Carlota Félicité, Isidore (q.v.), Jean-Pierre, Louise Eugénie, Marie Clélie, Adèle, and Jules. Was elected second-ward commissioner, January 1, 1793; elected attorney general of the cabildo under the Spanish regime and served from April 4, 1794, to December 19, 1794; petitioned the cabildo for loans for owners of houses burned in the fire of 1794; suggested houses be rebuilt with tile and solid ceramic construction. Appointed treasurer of the municipal council, November 30, 1803, when Louisiana was transferred to France; was brigadier general of the Corps of Veterans and Fire Engineers and an aide to Gen. Andrew Jackson (q.v.) during the Battle of New Orleans; was a director of the first bank in the Territory of Orleans in 1804; on the board of directors of Charity Hospital, 1836. Died, New Orleans, March 9, 1839; interred St. Louis Cemetery I. J.B.C. Sources: Marie Cruzat de Verges, comp., American Forces at Chalmette, Veterans and Descendants of Battle of New Orleans, January 8, 1815 (1966); Jack D. L. Holmes, “The 1794 New Orleans Fire: A Case Study of Spanish Noblesse Oblige,” Louisiana Studies, XV (1976); New Orleans Cabildo Records and Deliberations, Vol. III, No. 3, pp. 38, 127, 179-182; Charles Gayarré, History of Louisiana, 4 vols. (reprint, 1971); St. Charles Parish Original Acts, No. 1073.

LABRANCHE, Alcée Louis, planter, congressman. Born, St. Charles Parish, La.; son of Alexandre Labranche and Marie Jeanne Piseros. Education: Université de Sorreze, France. Married Aimée Sarpy, daughter of Pierre Estang Sarpy. Children: Alcée, Victorine, and Pauline. Operated Glendale Plantation, St. John the Baptist Parish. Served in Louisiana house of representatives, 1831-1833, speaker in 1833. Named U. S. chargé d’affaires in the Texas Republic and served from March 7, 1837, to June 5, 1840. Elected as a Democrat to the Twenty-eighth Congress (March 4, 1843, to March 3, 1845). Organized Texas and Louisiana volunteers in the Mexican War. Naval officer of the port of New Orleans. Died, Hot Springs, Va., August 17, 1861; interred St. Charles Borromeo (Red Church) Cemetery, St. Charles Parish, reinterred Metairie Cemetery, New Orleans. T.D.S. Sources: Notable Names in American History, 3rd ed. (1973); Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Stanley C. Arthur and George C. H. de Kernion, Old Families of Louisiana (1931; reprint ed., 1971); U. S. Dept. of State, United States Chiefs of Mission, 1778-1973 (1973).

LABYCHE, Pierre, planter, notary public, and clerk of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, Western District, Opelousas, La.. Born, Cahors, Département of Lot, France, 1796, son of Gabriel Labyche and Marie Bereche (Benex). Educated in local schools. Married Marie Thérèse Castille, widow of Jean Estorge and daughter of Jean Baptiste Castille and Julie Stelly, at Opelousas, December 6, 1837. Children: Thérèse Flavie (b. 1838), Marie Anne (b. 1840), Pierre Alphonse (b. 1844), Mathilda (b. 1845), and Felicia Amelia (b. 1847). Career: In 1827, assumed the duties of a notary public in Opelousas and Saint Landry Parish. One of the parish’s most prolific antebellum notaries; engaged in other business and civic activities; employed as clerk of the Western District, Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1845; commissioned Saint Landry Parish recorder and registrar of mortgages, 1845. Died in New Orleans, February 18, 1850; interred Saint Landry Roman Catholic Cemetery, Opleousas, Louisiana. K.P.F. Sources: Donald J. Hébert. Southwest Louisiana Records, (1974-1996); Labyche and Castille, Marriage Contract, March 5, 1838; Marriage License #110, (1837), The Pierre Labyche Notarial Acts; The Estate of Pierre Labyche, March 7, 1850, #1476; Conveyance and Mortgage Records, Saint Landry Parish Clerk of Courts Archives, Opelousas, Louisiana.

LA CHAISE, Alexandrine de, see PRADEL, Alexandrine de la Chaise

LACLEDE, Pierre Ligueste, pioneer. Born, Béarn, France, 1724; immigrated to New Orleans, 1755. Education: a well-educated man judging by his two-hundred-book library in St. Louis. Career: in the militia in New Orleans; became a partner with St. Maxent (q.v.) in Maxent, Laclède and Company which was granted, in 1763, exclusive privilege of trade on the Missouri River and the west bank of the Mississippi River for a period of six years. Departed New Orleans, August 1763; arrived Ste. Genevieve on November 3; knew that the key to successful trade would be proximity to the mouth of the Missouri River; few men in American history have made as wise a choice of a settlement site as he did; topographically, it occupied the first elevated land below the meeting of the three great river routes: the Mississippi, the Missouri, and the Illinois; strategically, it stood directly between his English rivals and the rich fur trade of the Missouri Valley; the area was heavily timbered, and there was an abundance of durable stone; began building at the site in February, 1764; laid out plans for the village and named it St. Louis, in honor of the French king; built a two-story stone house which served as headquarters for the company; in October 1766, the company was worth two hundred thousand livres; he owned an 800 arpent estate in 1767; acquired all the assets of the St. Louis operation when the company was dissolved in 1768. Chouteau (q.v.), as second in command, became his working partner. From its earliest days St. Louis was a commercial center and a seat of government; it became known as the “crossroads of America.” Died, near the mouth of the Arkansas River, June 20, 1778. J.B.C. Sources: John Francis McDermott, ed., The French in the Mississippi Valley (1965); John Francis McDermott, ed., Frenchman and French Ways in the Mississippi Valley (1967); Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume, 1607-1896 (1967); James Julian Coleman, Jr., Gilbert Antoine de St. Maxent: The Spanish-Frenchmen of New Orleans (1968).

LACLOTTE, Jean-Hyacinthe, architect, engineer, scenic artist, drawing instructor. Born, Bordeaux, France, 1765 or 1766 (baptized, March 12, 1766); son of Michel Laclotte and Marie Dardan. Received passport to go to Louisiana, August 22, 1804. Worked in New Orleans, ca. 1806-ca. 1815. Architect, Orleans Theatre, 1806; designed turret to contain circular stairway to roof of Cabildo, 1807, never executed; drew plan, subdivision of Faubourg Plaisance, ca. 1807. Formed architectural partnership with Arsene Lacarriere Latour, 1810; partnership included opening school (corner Royal and Orleans streets), with instruction in drawing, architecture, carpentry work, and decorating. With Latour, completed construction of Lemonnier House (corner Royal and St. Peter streets). Scenic artist, St. Peter Street Theatre, 1810, and St. Philip Street Theatre, 1811-1813. Drawing teacher, 1813-1814. Architect, Castillon House (demolished, corner Decatur and St. Peter streets). Artist, painting of Battle of New Orleans, Defeat of the British Army; took drawing to Paris for engraving by Philibert-Louis Debucourt; had battle scene published, Philadelphia, where listed as engraver and architect, 1818. Returned to Bordeaux, 1821, and entered into partnership with Mr. Bieutord, architect-engineer. Died, 1828 or 1829. L.C.H. Sources: The Historic New Orleans Collection, Encyclopaedia of New Orleans Artists, 1718-1918 (1987); Historic American Buildings Survey; Vieux Carré Survey; Samuel Wilson, Jr., interview.

LaCOMBE, Allen “Black Cat,” handicapper, sports promoter, racetrack personality. Born in the central Louisiana community of Echo, ca. 1919; his family moved to the Irish Channel section of New Orleans when LaCombe was an infant. Attended St. Michael’s school and St. Aloysius High School. Claimed to have received his “college training” at the Press Lounge, a Poydras street bar commonly called Raymond’s Beach. Promoted his first fight in response to a girl’s dare at age thirteen; he had been betting on horses for three years despite not being old enough to place the bets himself; won $1.40 on his first bet and claimed to have been “hooked.” His first full-scale sports promotion was the Thanksgiving Day Turkey Bowl, a contest between two leading Irish Channel sandlot football teams; after only three years the Turkey Bowl had relocated to City Park Stadium, where the annual event drew crowds of over 16,000. Drafted into the United States Army, 1942; help stage Army boxing matches in Iran, where the Shah reportedly sparred with LaCombe’s boxers; also hunted gazelles with King Farouk of Egypt and staged a camel race around the ancient pyramids. LaCombe campaigned for governor of Louisiana by hitchhiking across the state in 1959; he proclaimed that he would carry the community of Echo, it being comprised mostly of his relatives, and estimated that he would poll about 3,000 votes by mistake since his name appeared on the ballot between Jimmy Davis and deLesspes Morrison; LeCombe received 4,917 votes. Ran unsuccessfully for mayor of New Orleans in 1962, claiming to be the only candidate that could serve full-time since he was the only one drawing unemployment. In 1969, LaCombe managed the mayoral campaign of Rodney “the gorilla man” Fertel, a wealthy real estate owner, who ran on a promise to acquire a gorilla for the New Orleans zoo; after announcing his candidacy in a gorilla suit, Fertel used the slogan “Don’t settle for a monkey. Elect Fertel and get a gorilla.” Despite only polling 310 votes, Fertel obtained two gorillas for the zoo. LaCombe promoted several special events during the 1960s, including a benefit concert for victims of Hurricane Betsy; held at the Municipal Auditorium, the 1965 benefit featured such acts as Loretta Young, Eddie Fisher, Mel Torme, and Bobby Vinton. Named public information spokesman for the Fair Grounds race track in the 1960s, LaCombe remained in that position well into the late 1980s, claiming that he was “so busy and so happy” he never thought to retire. A professional handicapper, LaCombe taught a course on handicapping at Tulane University; however, he was best known for his notorious lost bets and legendary missed predictions, hence the nickname “Black Cat.” Died, New Orleans, July 19, 1989; a hearse drove his body around the Fair Grounds’ track one last time before interment in St Patrick’s Cemetery, No. 1. J.D.W. Sources: Glen Jeansonne, Race Religion and Politics: the Gubernatorial Elections of 1959-1960 (1977); New Orleans Times-Picayune, July 20, 22, 1989.

LACOUR, Ambroise, Jr., merchant, politician. Born, Mouton Cove, La., 1847; son of Ambroise LaCour, Sr. (q.v.), and Anastasie Mouton. Education: private school taught by his father; bi-lingual. Married (1) Elenore Neck (d. 1886), native of France. Children: Eno and Isaure (twins), Laure Aurore, Loretta and Eloi (twins). Married (2) Oraline Dupree. Children: Sully, Hebron, Olivia, Blanche, Dewey, Louise, Cora, Dedier. Operator of a general merchandise store in Mouton Cove. Member: Vermilion Parish Police Jury; Vermilion Parish School Board. Died, March 11, 1923; interred Banker Cemetery. R.M.L. Sources: Interview with Dedier LaCour; Abbeville Meridional, March 1923.

LAFARGUE, André, cultural preservationist, civic leader, and attorney. Born, New Orleans, ca. 1879. Attended the College of the Immaculate Conception and Tulane University’s law school. Married Marie Generelly; children: Marcel, Fleury, and Evelyn. A leading cultural activist in early twentieth-century New Orleans, stressing in numerous lectures and other activities the need for preserving the Crescent City’s French linguistic and cultural heritage. Served briefly as editor of L’Abeille de la Nouvelle Orléans, Louisiana’s last French-language newspaper. President, Union Français and Athenée Louisianais (1942); second vice president, Louisiana Historical Society, 1924-1930. Officially accepted a statue of Joan of Arc presented by the New York Museum of French Art to the Louisiana Historical Society, May 1, 1918. Wrote several short articles and book reviews for the Louisiana Historical Quarterly, 1920s-1940s. Actively promoted the maintenance of close cultural, economic, and political ties between the Crescent City and France. Chairman of the New Orleans delegation attending the Bicentennial Celebration of the Founding of New Orleans in Paris, France, October 26, 1917. Attorney for the French consulate in New Orleans for many years. Assistant United States commissioner, French Colonial Exposition at Paris, 1931; subsequently honored by the French government with an appointment as commander of the Legion of Honor. Civic activities: Delivered the keynote address at the patriotic commemorative flag-raising ceremony at Jackson Square, January 8, 1918. Chairman, Upper Pontalba Building Commission; member, board of directors, New Orleans City Park. Died, New Orleans, February 3, 1949; interred St. Louis Cemetery #3, New Orleans. C.A.B. Sources: “French Cultural Leader Dies at 70,” New Orleans Times-Picayune, February 5, 1949; “The Statuette of Joan of Arc; Its Presentation and Acceptance,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, 1 (1917-1918): 279-284; “Bi-Centennial Celebration in Paris of the Founding of New Orleans,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, 1 (1917-1918): 18-38; “Raising the American Flag at Jackson Square, New Orleans, January 8, 1918,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, 1 (1917-1918): 212-214; James F. Bezou, “André Lafargue,” Comptes Rendus de l’Atheneé Louisianais (1949): 5-8; New Orleans Times-Picayune, January 19, 1942.

LACOUR, Ambroise, Sr., educator, politician. Born, Alexandria, La., 1819; son of Ambroise LaCour of Luzarche, France, and Charlotte Lafitte of Pointe Coupée Parish, La. Education: unknown. Married Anastasie Mouton, daughter of Joseph Onezime Mouton and Tarezelle Hebert. Children: Ambroise, Jr. (q.v.), Charlotte (b. 1846); Hermogène (b. 1851); Eugène (b. 1855); Phyllis; Roseline (b. 1848); and Arsene (b. 1849). Resident of Perry, La. Early career as a teacher in Vermilion Parish. Vermilion Parish tax collector, 1843-1844; clerk of police jury, auctioneer, commissioner of elections; president of police jury, 1850; sheriff of Vermilion Parish, 1851-1853; alderman, Abbeville town council, 1856; mayor of Abbeville, 1857, concurrently served as president of Vermilion Parish Democratic Convention; clerk of district court, 1868; clerk, Vermilion Parish Police Jury, 1877-1878; enrolling clerk, Louisiana senate. Died, Mouton Cove, Vermilion Parish, La., February 4, 1888; interred Baudoin Cemetery, Perry, La. R.M.L. Source: Author’s research.

LADAVIÈRE, Pierre, Jesuit missionary. Born Condrieu (Rhône), France, September 23, 1777. Ordained priest in 1801; became a member (1806) of the Society of the Faith of Jesus, which was subsequently suppressed in France by Napoleon. After carrying from Rome to Paris the papal bull that excommunicated Napoleon (1809), fled to England, where he was interned as a suspected Napoleonic agent. Released and sent to Canada; subsequently made his way to the United States, where he entered and left the Society of Jesus. Back in France reentered the restored Society of Jesus, 1814, and, after pastoral work in his native land, returned to the United States as a missionary. In Louisiana accepted the dying bishop’s pressing request that he serve with Antoine Blanc (q.v.) as co-administrator of the diocese of New Orleans sede vacante, 1833. Returned to France on business, 1835; retained in the mother country, continued to intercede and recruit for Louisiana, whither returned in 1837. Was one of the founding fathers of St. Charles College, Grand Coteau, Louisiana. During 1840s served at St. Michael’s Catholic Church, Convent, Louisiana. In 1850 moved to Spring Hill College, Mobile, Alabama. Died Mobile, Ala., February 1, 1858. C.E.O. Sources: Joseph Burnichon, La Compagnie de Jésus en France: Histoire d’un siècle, 4 vols. (1914); Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana, (1939); Charles O’Neill, “Ladavière,” in Diccionario Histórico de la Compañía de Jesús, (forthcoming).

LAFARGUE, Alvan Henry, physician, civic leader. Born, Marksville, La., October 14, 1883; son of Adolphe Jolna Lafargue, district judge, attorney and newspaper publisher, and Anne Winn Irion. Education: local schools, Louisiana State University; Tulane Medical School; Memphis Hospital Medical School (University of Tennessee Medical School), graduated 1910. Married, Florestine Richard, of Baldwin, La., daughter of Arthur Richard, St. Mary Parish sugar planter, and Blanche Dumesnil. Children: Alvan, Jr. (b. 1913), Myron (b. 1914), Irene (b. 1917), Prudence (b. 1924). Practiced in the Louisiana towns Cheneyville, Baldwin, Franklin, removing to Sulphur, 1915. Parish health official (1934-1938); city health official, member parish, state and national medical associations; director, Lake Charles Charity Hospital (Moss Regional); staff member, St. Patrick and Memorial hospitals, Lake Charles; instrumental in building West Calcasieu-Cameron Hospital in Sulphur, serving as staff first president; Southern Pacific Railroad physician forty-nine years; honored, 1960 for fifty years service by University of Tennessee, West Calcasieu-Cameron Hospital staff, Louisiana Medical Association. Founder, 1925, and president Calcasieu-Cameron bi-parish fair; president, Louisiana Association of Fairs and Festivals; 1963 Louisiana Fair and Festival dedicated to subject. Organized Businessmen’s Club, later West Calcasieu Association of Commerce; active Boy Scouts, 35 years; Silver Beaver award; director, bi-parish Red Cross chapter; president, Gulf Beach Highway Association, which promoted building of Highway 27; vice-president, Louisiana Division of Old Spanish Trail Association, which promoted development of U. S. Highway 90 coast to coast. Active in Democratic party; Sulphur mayor, 1926-1932, member, executive committee. Member: Catholic church; Council 3015 Knights of Columbus, Fourth Degree knight; charter member, president, Rotary Club; Woodmen of World, fifty years; Old War Skule of Louisiana State University City proclaimed “Dr. Lafargue Day” in appreciation for service to the community, placing memorial light on water tower recognizing subject’s delivery of 5,000 babies. Died, Sulphur, February 11, 1962; interred Graceland Cemetery, Lake Charles. G.S.P. Sources: Erbon W. Wise, Brimstone! The History of Sulphur, Louisiana (1981); Lafargue family papers.

LAFAYE, Julian, see CARROLL, John

LAFAYETTE, Lenora, soprano. Born, Baton Rouge, La., July 6, 1926; daughter of Howard Lafayette and Lena Bowers. A graduate of McKinley Senior High School, where he vocal talent was recognized, she continued her education at Fisk University, where she was a soloist for the Fisk Jubilee Singers, and the Juilliard School of Music (New York). Lafayette was the recipient of the 1949 Marian Anderson Award and, in 1950, of the Julius Rosenwald Prize. She subsequently took first prize in the John Hay Whitney Fellowship for European Studies. Lafayette was the first African American singer contracted by a European Opera Houses. In 1951, she made her debut in Basel, Switzerland, where she performed as Aïda, a role she repeated to acclaim when, on short notice, she substituted at London’s Covent Garden on January 28, 1953. In July 1958, she recorded an album of Puccini duets for EMI Records. Engagements followed in Vienna, Munich, Paris, Berlin, and other cities. Subsequently named a permanent member of the opera company in Trier, Germany. Her career was cut short by her untimely death, in Basle, on October 23, 1975. J.A.B. Sources: Time, (February 7, 1953): 49; Opera, 21 (1970): 201; interview with Kirby Green, August 10, 1996.

LAFAYETTE, Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roche-Gilbert du Motier, marquis de, French nobleman and general. Born, Chavaniac, France, September 6, 1757; son of Gilbert, marquis de Lafayette and Marie Louise Julie de la Rivière. Left court of Louis XVI and active service in the French army in 1776 to offer his services to the Americans in their fight for independence. Congress voted him the rank of major general, but gave him no command. In August 1777, he met Gen. George Washington, joined his staff, and became a lifelong friend. Participated in many skirmishes and battles; his troops forced Lord Cornwallis into the trap at Yorktown in 1781 ending the American Revolutionary War. Returned to France, but retained an interest in American affairs. During the Revolution, contributed much of his wealth to the American cause. In 1803, Congress voted him a grant of 11,520 acres of land eventually located in Louisiana in recognition of his contributions of both skill and money. Considered by President Thomas Jefferson for appointment as governor of Louisiana, November 1803. In 1824-1825, Lafayette toured the U. S. at the invitation of President James Monroe and was wildly greeted everywhere. His visit to New Orleans from April 10, 1825, to April 15, 1825, was closely documented by New Orleanian in a book, Visit of General LaFayette to Louisiana … (1825). He lived the remainder of his life in France, active in French politics. Married, Marie Adrienne Françoise de Noailles, April 4, 1774. Children: Henriette (b. 1775), Anastasie (b. 1777), George Washington (b. 1779), Virginie (b. 1782). City and parish of Lafayette named for him. Died, Paris, France, May 20, 1834; interred Picpus Cemetery. P.D.A. Sources: Dumas Malone, ed., Dictionary of American Biography (1933); The New Encyclopaedia Britannica (1983); Peter Buckman, Lafayette (1977); Kathryn T. Abbey, “The Land Ventures of General Lafayette in the Territory of Orleans and the State of Louisiana,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XVI (1933).

LAFFITE, Jean, freebooter, buccaneer. Born, Port-au-Prince, Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti), April 22, 1782; son of a French father and Spanish Jewish mother. Jean the youngest of eight children; Alexandre Frédéric Laffite (alias Dominique You [q.v.]) and Pierre Laffite (q.v.) were his brothers. Early life confused and contradictory; he and Pierre started freebooting operation in New Orleans area; Pierre operated blacksmith shop as a front at corner of Bourbon and St. Phillip streets for selling their contraband from Gulf of Mexico, 1810-1814. Legendary treasure caches buried in several Louisiana areas, some located—some still buried. Laffite and his Baratarians played a major role in Gen. Andrew Jackson’s defense of New Orleans from December 14, 1814, through January 8, 1815. He furnished powder, lead, cannons, and cannoneers. For this patriotic service Jean and his men were pardoned by President James Madison. Jean returned to former activities; ran slaves from Galveston to Louisiana; disappeared from public view in the early 1820s; it was rumored he died; many myths were spawned to explain the remainder of his life. According to The Journal of Jean Laffite (1958), Jean changed his name to John Lafflin. The Journal maintains that he died at Crève Coeur, Mo., May 5, 1854; interred Wesleyan Cemetery, St. Louis. M.P. Sources: Jane Lucas de Grummond, The Baratarians and the Battle of New Orleans (1961); Jean Laffitte, The Journal of Jean Laffitte, The Privateer-Pirate’s Own Story (1958); Lyle Saxon, Lafitte [sic] the Pirate (1930); Stanley Clisby Arthur, Jean Laffite, Gentleman Rover (1952); Lyle Saxon et al., Gumbo Ya-Ya (1945); Dictionary of American Biography (1946); David C. Roller and Robert W. Twyman, eds., Encyclopedia of Southern History (1979).

LAFFITE, Pierre, smuggler, privateer. Elder brother of the celebrated Jean Laffite (q.v.). Born in France, possibly at Bordeaux, ca. 1770; almost nothing is known about him until the Baratarian phase of his career, but he probably arrived in Louisiana sometime after the Louisiana Purchase. Engaged as middleman by the French republican corsairs and Baratarian smugglers; active in the illegal slave trade; agent for South American insurgents and Baratarian smugglers and privateersmen; Jean Laffite’s subordinate only in popular fiction. Arrested by federal authorities on November 16, 1812, charged with smuggling, and jumped bail; indicted by a federal grand jury in New Orleans on July 27, 1814, for aiding and abetting two acts of piracy, and apprehended shortly thereafter; escaped from the Cabildo early in September and enlisted in the defense of New Orleans against the British invasion in December, 1814; served without distinction in the American army at New Orleans and along with other Baratarians received a full pardon from President James Madison in February, 1815. After the War of 1812, the Laffite brothers re-established their smuggling and privateering operation at Galveston, which they occupied from 1817 until their expulsion from Texas in 1820; in November, 1815, Pierre and Jean Laffite enlisted in the Spanish secret service; the Laffites’ efforts to disrupt the activities of the Mexican insurgents and various U. S. based filibustering expeditions failed and their hopes for a Spanish pardon evaporated. While operating out of Mujeres Island off the coast of Yucatan, Pierre Laffite was killed in a skirmish with royalist forces on November 9, 1821. R.C.V. Sources: Stanley Clisby Arthur, Jean Laffite, Gentleman Rover (1952); Jane Lucas de Grummond, The Baratarians and the Battle of New Orleans (1961); Stanley Faye, “The Great Stroke of Pierre Laffite,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXIII (1940); J. Ignacio Rubio Mane, “Los Lafitte, Famosos Pirates y sus Ultimus dias en Yucatan,” Sociedad Mexicana de Geografia y Estadistica, LIV (1940).

LAFFITTE, Paul Boüet, Indian trader and (traditional) first European settler in what is now De Soto Parish. Born in France ca. 1744. Removed to Louisiana, possibly by way of Canada, and settled at Natchitoches in 1770. Prominent in local affairs; trader to the Yatasi and other Caddoan groups in Northwest Louisiana and Northeast Texas; active at Natchitoches, Opelousas, Los Adaes, Nacogdoches. Established vacherie or ranch fifty miles northwest of Natchitoches in Dolet Hills region (eastern De Soto Parish); syndic at Bayuco de las Piedras in the Bayou Pierre Settlement under the Spanish regime; expelled from Texas in 1801, the result of an incident involving the escape of four of Philip Nolan’s party from Nacogdoches. Married (1) Magdeleine Grappe (1754-1781), daughter of the noted Natchitoches trader Alexis Grappe (q.v.); four children, including Pierre Paul Boüet Laffitte (1773-1850), who settled near present-day Carmel. Married (2) Marie Anne de Soto (1763-1833), daughter of Antonio Emanuel Soto y Bermudez (q.v.) and Marie des Nieges Juchereau de St. Denis (q.v.), granddaughter of the founder of Natchitoches; nine children. The date and place of Laffitte’s death are not known, but his name disappears from local records after 1815. R.C.V. Sources: American State Papers, Class VIII, Public Lands; Nacogdoches Archives; Natchitoches church and civil archives, Natchitoches and Baton Rouge, La.

LAFLEUR, Joseph Verbis, clergyman, mili­tary chaplain. Born, Ville Platte, La., January 24, 1912; son of Valentin Lafleur and Agatha Dupré. Education: St. Joseph Seminary College, St. Benedict, La., and Notre Dame Major Seminary, New Orleans. Ordained to the Catholic priesthood at St. John the Evangelist Cathedral, Lafayette, La., April 2, 1938. Served as assistant pastor at St. Mary Magdalen Church, Abbeville, La., 1938-1941. Joined the United States Army Chaplain Corps in 1941. Subsequently assigned to Clark Field in the Philippines with the rank of first lieutenant, 19th Bombardment Group. The bombardment group was trans­ferred following a Japanese attack on December 8, 1941; Lafleur was taken prisoner during the attempted evacua­tion. Interned in Japanese prisoner of war camps on Mindanao and Leyte for more than two years. Died on September 7, 1944, while aboard a Japanese prison ship. Awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, 1942. Posthumously awarded a Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart. His name was inscribed on the monument to American chaplains, dedicated at Arlington National Cemetery, May 21, 1989. B.A.C. Sources: Parish History Collection, Archives of the Diocese of Lafayette; John Hugh McGee, Rice and Salt (1965); Archdiocese for the Military Services, United States of America.

LAFLEUR, Mayus, Cajun musician (accordion), singer, composer. Born Evangeline Parish, La., August 14, 1906. Second Cajun musician to record, in 1928, with Leo Soileau. Died, Basile, La., 1928. B.J.A. Source: Author’s research.

LAFON, Barthélémy, architect, engineer, city planner, surveyor. Born, Villepinte, France, 1769; son of Pierre Lafon and Jean [Jeanne] Roumieux. Educated nearby, possibly in architecture. Left France, arrived New Orleans 1789 or 1790. Designed plans for public buildings including public baths and a lighthouse; designed bridges and a drainage system; designed numerous private homes. Plans for the Pedesclaux-Lemonnier house at 638 Royal Street and the Bosque House at 617 Chartres Street have been attributed to him. Deputy surveyor of Orleans County, 1806-1809; drew maps including “Carte Générale du Territoire d’Orléans Comprenant Aussi la Floride Occidentale et une Portion du Territoire du Mississppi.” Subdivided Faubourg Marigny and Faubourg Annunciation; designed plan for Donaldsonville. Surveyed and recommended improvements to the fortifications of New Orleans during the War of 1812. Was unable to resume architectural career after the Battle of New Orleans; turned to piracy and smuggling. Named natural children, Pierre Barthélémy and Carmélite, and the children’s mother, Modeste Foucher, a free woman of color, in his testament September 4, 1809. Died of yellow fever, New Orleans, September 29, 1820; interred St. Louis Cemetery I. J.F.T. Source: Harriet Pierpoint Bos, “Barthélémy Lafon” (M.A. thesis, Tulane University, 1977).

LAFON, Thomy, philanthropist. Born, New Orleans, December 28, 1810; son of Pierre Larande (French) and Modeste Foucher (black Haitian). Never married. Entered business in New Orleans, ca. 1850; built a fortune of nearly $500,000 through interest on loans and shrewd real estate investments. Philanthropist: patron of the arts and charitable causes in New Orleans (late 1850s-1893), including the Catholic Indigent Orphans’ Institute. Left large bequests to the poor of New Orleans, as well as sums for construction of Berchmans Home, the Home for Aged Colored Men and Women on Tonti Street, and the Lafon Orphan Boys’ Asylum on St. Peter Street He also left money to Charity Hospital of New Orleans, the Society of the Holy Family, the Shakespeare Almshouse, and Straight University of New Orleans. Active in Republican party: member, Radical Republican Club (1865). Member: Catholic church. Died, New Orleans, December 22, 1893; interred St. Louis Cemetery. C.A.B. Sources: Rodolphe L. Desdunes, Our People and Our History, trans. and ed. by Sr. D. O. McCants (1973); Betty Porter, “The History of Negro Education in Louisiana,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXV (1942); Annie Lee West Stahl, “The Free Negro in Ante-Bellum Louisiana,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXV (1942); Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume, 1607-1896; New Orleans Daily Picayune, December 23, 1893.

LAGAN, Matthew Diamond, congressman. Born, Maghera, Londonderry, Ireland, June 20, 1829. Attended the public schools; immigrated to the United States and settled in New Orleans, December 28, 1843. Engaged in manufacturing and mercantile pursuits; during the Civil War fitted out many vessels for the use of the Confederacy and later enlisted as a volunteer in the Confederate Navy. Elected to the New Orleans Common Council, 1867; member of the state constitutional convention in 1879; again elected to the city council, 1882, and served as president and acting mayor during the term. Served as a Democrat in Congress from March 4, 1887, to March 3, 1889; declined renomination; served in Congress again from March 4, 1891, to March 3, 1893. Died, New Orleans, April 8, 1901. Survived by five children: Charles, John, Isabella (Mrs. J. C. DeGrange), Sarah (Mrs. Foster DeBuys), and Matthew D., Jr. Interred Metairie Cemetery. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1949 (1950); New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, April 9, 1901.

LAGARDE, Charles Saturnin, banker, civic leader. Born, Lafourche Parish, La., November 29, 1888; son of Julia Caillouet Lagarde and Joachim Lagarde; one of six brothers and sisters, and of eight half-brothers and sisters. Education: Thibodaux College; Loyola University Law School. Married (1) Enola Courville. Children: Eugene, Emma, Enola, Charles and Marie Louise. Married (2) Cleona Esnault. Resident of St. Charles Parish for fifty-eight years. Lawyer, banker, philan­thropist and humanist. Member, Knights of Columbus Council 2409. Was leading figure in Bank of St. Charles and Trust Company, Luling, La., where he was successively, during his affiliation with that institution, cashier, president, chairman of the board, and chairman emeritus. Died, Luling, La., April 21, 1982; interred St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Thibodaux, La. C.L.J. Source: Author’s research.

LA HACHE, Theodore von, music teacher, composer, organist. Born, Dresden, Germany, ca. March, 1822. Studied music with Carl Gottlieb Reissiger of Dresden. Removed to New Orleans in 1842, and first known published work appeared in 1846. Served as organist-choirmaster St. Theresa of Avila Church in New Orleans, 1850-1866; co-founder of New Orleans Philharmonic Society, 1852, and New Orleans Harmonic Society, 1866. A serious illness in 1866 forced him to discontinue teaching and activities at St. Theresa of Avila. His son, Theodore, Jr., succeeded him at St. Theresa’s. In 1866, he began a partnership with George W. Doll, selling pianos and musical merchandise. They began publishing music in 1867; the partnership was terminated the same year. La Hache continued his share of the business with his son Emile. La Hache’s compositions include piano and sacred music. In 1949, the La Hache Music Library, part of the New Orleans Public Library, was endowed in his memory. Died, New Orleans, November 21, 1869. A.E.L. Source: John Gillespie and Anna Gillespie, A Bibliography of Nineteenth-Century American Piano Music (1984).

LA HARPE, Jean Baptiste Bénard de, see BENARD DE LA HARPE, Jean-Baptiste

LAINE, George Vitelle “Papa Jack”, musician. Born New Orleans, September 21, 1873. At the turn of the century had as many as five bands, including ragtime units, all composed of white musicians, playing six or seven engagements on the same night. All the bands were named Reliance. He played drums and alto horn, but he was known best for his organizing. The New Orleans Jazz Club named him officially “The Father of White Jazz”. Never recorded, but made tapes at Tulane University under Johnny Wiggs’ leadership. Married: Blanche Huey. Children: Alfred; daughter, Mrs. Ernest Gashek. Died, New Orleans, June 1, 1966; interred Hope Mausoleum. H.C. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, June 3, 1966; December 19, 1939; Dixie (Times-Picayune), November 17, 1974; John Chilton, Who’s Who of Jazz (1972); Al Rose and Edmond Souchon, New Orleans Jazz, A Family Album, 3rd ed. (1984).

LAKANAL, Joseph, academic. Born, Pujet, France, July 14, 1762. Education: University of Toulouse, Seminary of Saint-Magloire, University of Angers (Doctor of Arts). Married (1) Marie-Barbe François, and after her death, married (2) Rosalie-Céleste-Bien Aimée Lepelletier. During French Revolution, elected deputy to National Convention; participated in trial of Louis XVI and the preparation of the Constitution of 1793. As president of Convention’s Committee of Public Instruction, helped to establish France’s national university system, of which he became an officer. Also helped to establish the Lycée des Arts, the French Institute, and the Museum of Natural History. Wrote France’s copyright law and the law concerning vandalism, a word he coined. Under Napoleon, became inspector-general of weights and measures, overseeing implementation of the new metric system. Upon fall of Napoleon, fled to United States to escape Restoration reprisals. Arrived in Louisiana; appointed president of recently organized College of Orleans in New Orleans. Served from August 1822 to July 1823. Discouraged by lack of public support for project, resigned and removed to Mobile where he became a planter. Returned to France, 1837; became president of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences. Died, Paris, February 14, 1845; interred Père-Lachaise Cemetery. Statue of him in Foix; Rue Lakanal, Paris, named for him. L.A.G. Sources: John Charles Dawson, Lakanal the Regicide (1948); Pierre A. Larousse, Grand Dictionnaire universel du XIX siècle, Vol. X.

LALAURIE, Marie Delphine Macarty de López Blanque, popularly known as Madame Lalaurie; reputed abuser of slaves. Probably born in New Orleans, ca. mid-1780s; daughter of Louis Barthélémy de Macarty and Marie Jeanne Lovable Lecomte. Married (1), June 1, 1800, Ramón de López y Angulo (d. 1804); one daughter, Marie Delphine Borja López y Angulo de Candelaria, known as “Borquita.” Married (2), June 16, 1808, Jean Blanque (d. 1816); possibly four children: Marie Louise Pauline, Louise Marie Laure, Marie Louise Jeanne, Jean Pierre Paulin. Married (3), June 12, 1825, Dr. Nicolas Louis Lalaurie. Born into socially prominent Creole New Orleans family; during three marriages, reportedly entertained lavishly and often, the best of Creole society. Fire at the Lalaurie house brought volunteers to 1140 Royal Street, April 10, 1834. Eyewitness reports and rumors, accompanied by contemporary newspaper stories of the discovery of severely mistreated slaves provoked a mob to attack and at least partially destroy the house. Madame Lalaurie escaped to France with her husband where she died probably in the early 1840s. She is possibly buried in St. Louis Cemetery I. Nineteenth-century writers were very harsh in their condemnation of Madame Lalaurie. More recent accounts conclude that these earlier reports were exaggerated. Still 1140 Royal Street continues to be known as the “Haunted House” and stories of Madame Lalaurie’s sadistic behavior persist. J.F.T. Sources: Stanley C. Arthur, Old Families of Louisiana (1931; reprint ed., 1971); Old New Orleans (1944); George W. Cable, Strange True Stories of Louisiana (1889); Henry C. Castellanos, New Orleans As It Was (1895); Mary Gehman, Women and New Orleans (1985); Grace King, Creole Families of New Orleans (1921; reprint ed., 1971); Fred R. Darkis, Jr., “Madam Lalaurie of New Orleans,” Louisiana History, XXIII, (1982); New Orleans Bee, April 11, 12, 1834; New Orleans Times-Picayune, February 4, 1934.

LAMB, Learned, engineer. Born in Vermont. Colonel, U. S. Army; builder of first bridge over Thompson’s Creek separating East and West Feliciana parishes, 1824; contracted by West Feliciana Police Jury to build raised road from St. Francisville to Bayou Sara Landing, La., December 1825. Died, July, 1826; presumed interred in St. Francisville. E.K.D. Sources: West Feliciana Public Records; Minutes of West Feliciana Police Jury, 1824-26.

LAMBERT, Charles-Lucien, musician. Born, New Orleans, son of a free black father. Went to Paris to study music. There he married Françoise Poncet; at least one child, Lucien-Leon-Guillaume (q.v.). Published a piano composition “La Rose et le Bengali”. In 1865, dedicated a cantata to Napoleon III. Removed to Brazil where he became a piano builder. Died there, probably before 1875. M.A. Source: Charles O’Neill, “Fine Arts and Literature; Black Artists and Authors,” in Robert R. Macdonald et al., eds., Louisiana’s Black Heritage (1979).

LAMBERT, Lucien-Leon-Guillaume, musician. Born, Paris, France, January 5, 1858; son of New Orleans musician, Charles-Lucien Lambert (q.v.) and Françoise Poncet. Removed to Brazil as a small child and there, before his 11th birthday, performed in concert with Louis Moreau Gottschalk (q.v.). Went to Paris, and from 1880 to 1882 studied at the Conservatoire with composer Jules Massenet. At age 26, awarded first prize in the Rossini competition for his cantata Promethe enchainé. Produced numerous compositions. In 1914, removed to Oporto, Portugal, to teach composition. Composed a patriotic piece in honor of General de Gaulle which he performed at the French consulate of Oporto, January 1, 1945. Died Oporto, January 22, 1945. M.A. Source: Charles O’Neill, “Fine Arts and Literature: Nineteenth Century Black Artists and Authors” in Robert R. Macdonald et al., eds., Louisiana’s Black Heritage (1979).

LAMBREMONT, John D., educator. Born, Convent, La., January 2, 1892; son of Paul M. Lambremont (q.v.), lieutenant governor of Louisiana, 1908-1912, and Louisa Bourgeois. Educated, local private and public schools; Jefferson College, Convent, La.; Loyola University, New Orleans; Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge. Career: Taught English and Commercial Law at Jefferson College; served as principal of several public schools in St. James Parish. Married, February 7, 1917, Odette Himel of Convent, La. One child: John D. Lambremont, Jr. Member: Roman Catholic church, coordinator of C.C.D. religion classes, St. Michael Church Parish. Member, St. James Parish Library Board of Control. Died, Convent, La., May 7, 1975; interred St. Michael Catholic Church Cemetery. M.D. Source: Author’s research.

LAMBREMONT, Paul M., attorney, lieutenant governor. Born, Bayou Goula, Iberville Parish, La., July 21, 1864; son of Emelie Breaux and Peter M. Lambremont. Education: attended Jefferson College, Convent, La.; graduated from the law department of Tulane University. Began practice as an attorney. Served as secretary of the Pontchartrain Levee Board of St. James Parish, January, 1886. Married Louisa M. Bourgeois (d. 1929), daughter of Lezida Bertaut and Emile Bourgeois of St. James Parish. Children: Edward Nelson, John D. (q.v.), Virginia, and Marie Louise. Superintendent of public instruction, 1888-1892; member, constitutional convention of 1898; member, state senate, 1892-1908; president pro-tem of the senate, 1904-1908; lieutenant governor, 1908-1912. Returned to private practice in Convent, Lutcher, and Plaquemine. Democrat. Member, Louisiana Bar Association; Roman Catholic; Fourth Degree Knight of Columbus; Third Degree in the United Ancient Order of Druids; member of Order of Red Men and the Choctaw Club. Died, May 22, 1930; interred Greenwood Cemetery, New Orleans. J.B.C. Sources: Alcée Fortier, Louisiana (1914); New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, May 23, 1930.

LAMOTTE, Louisa R., educator. Born in New Orleans, a free woman of color. Educated in France where she taught for forty years. Became principal of the Collège des Jeunes Filles in Abbeville, France. Founded and edited a literary journal, La Revue. Awarded Les Palmes Académiques by the French government. Returned to New Orleans, 1894. Died, New Orleans, 1907. M.A. Source: Rodolphe Desdunes, Our People and Our History, trans. by Sister Dorothea McCants (1973).

LAMOUR, Dorothy, actress. Born Mary Leta Dorothy Slaton, charity ward of Hotel Dieu Hospital, New Orleans, December 10, 1914; daughter of John Watson Slaton and Carmen Louise LaPorte; took the surname Lambour from her stepfather after her mother divorced John Slaton and married Clarence Lambour. Married (1) Herbie Kay (stage name of Herbie Kaumeyer), May 10, 1935; divorced, 1939; married (2) William Howard III (d. 1977), April 3, 1943; children: Richard Thomson “Tommy” Howard and John Ridgely Howard. Education: attended Beauregard Grammar School and John McDonogh High School of New Orleans; dropped out of high school in 1928; subsequently attended Spencer Business College. Won the Miss New Orleans contest, 1931; one of five finalists in the Miss U.S.A. contest. Subsequently moved to Chicago with her mother and took a job as an elevator operator in Marshall Field’s Department Store. While working at the store, entered an amateur talent contest. Discovered at the contest by dance band leader Herbie Kay, who hired her as a vocalist. At Dallas, Tex., while touring with Kay’s band, a sign painter reportedly misspelled her surname as Lamour on a hotel marquee; Herbie Kay liked the change and decided to make Lamour her stage name. Appeared later as a vocalist with Rudy Vallee and Eddie Duchin. Was a singer on The Dreamer of Songs radio program, 1934; moved to California when the program, formerly produced in New York City, relocated to Lost Angeles. In California, Lamour launched a career in the movie industry that spanned five decades. Feature-length movies: The Jungle Princess (1936); Swing High, Swing Low (1937), High, Wide, and Handsome (1937), The Last Train from Madrid (1937), The Hurricane (1937), The Big Broadcast of 1938 (1938); Her Jungle Love (1938), Tropic Holiday (1938), Spawn of the North (1938), St. Louis Blues (1938), Man About Town (1939), Disputed Passage (1939), Road to Singapore (1939), Johnny Apollo (1940), Moon Over Burma (1940), Chad Hanna (1940), Road to Zanzibar (1940); Caught in the Draft (1941), Aloma of the South Seas (1941), Beyond the Blue Horizon (1941), The Fleet’s In (1941), Road to Morocco (1942), They Got Me Covered (1942), Star Spangled Rhythm (1942), Dixie (1943), Riding High (1943), And the Angels Sing (1943), Rainbow Island (1943), Road to Utopia (1944), A Medal for Benny (1944), Masquerade in Mexico (1945), Duffy’s Tavern (1945), My Favorite Brunette (1946), Wild Harvest (1946), Variety Girl (1947), Road to Rio (1947), On Our Merry Way (1947), Lulu Belle (1947), Slightly French (1948), The Girl from Manhattan (1948), The Lucky Stiff (1948), Manhandled (1948), Here Comes the Groom (1951), The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), Road to Bali (1952), Road to Hong Kong (1961), Donovan’s Reef (1962), Pajama Party (1964), Death at Love House (The Shrine of Lorna Love) (1976), Creepshow II (1987), Entertaining the Troops (1988). During her early film career, Dorothy Lamour was an important Paramout Studio star; during the 1940s, eight of her films were among the top-grossing movies of the decade. Yet she never achieved superstardom. Best remembered as the foil for Bing Crosby and Bob Hope in the seven “Road” films. Between films, Lamour appeared in two radio programs: The Chase and Sanborn Show, 1937, and the Sealtest Variety Threatre, 1947. Dropped by Paramount Studios in 1947. In 1949, Lamour moved to Baltimore, where she briefly lived as a “rich housewife.” In the 1950s, she turned her attention to television, making appearances on the Colgate Comedy Hour, Damon Runyon Theatre, and Arthur Murray Party. Also appeared on Broadway in Oh! Captain, 1958; toured with DuBarry Was a Lady, 1963; and Hellow Dolly!, 1967. Created and toured the country with her own nightclub act, 1961. “Made innumerable tours on the dinner circuit,” 1960s and ’70s, most notably in “Fallen Angles,” 1974, and “Personal Appearance,” 1977, both staged at the Beverly Dinner Playhouse. Established a line of beauty produces. Won rave reviews as a singer in “Broadway Baby,” a revival of Stephen Sondheim’s “Follies” in Long Beach, Calif., 1990. Died, North Hollywood, Calif., September 22, 1996. C.A.B. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, September 23, 1996; Al Rose, Born in New Orleans: Notables of Two Centuries (1983); James D. Moser, ed., International Motion Picture Almanac (1997); Douglas Gomery, “Lamour, Dorothy,” in Amy L. Unterburger, ed., International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, Volume 3, Actors and Actresses, 3rd ed. (1997); International Celebrity Register, U. S. Edition (1959); Dorothy Lamour and Dick McInnes, My Side of the Road (1980).

LANCASTER, Joseph Bradford, politician, bureaucrat. Born, Covington, La., ca. 1900; son of Judge Joseph B. Lancaster and Amanda Doerr. Married Marie Olinde. Children: Joseph Bradford, Jr., and Marcy. Attended St. Paul’s School of Covington, and Loyola University (New Orleans). Moved to New Roads, La., 1928. Political career: served on the New Roads, La., city council in the 1930s; mayor of New Roads, 1949-1951; state supervisor of public funds, 1956-1964. Administrative career: entered the state bureaucracy as an employee in the supervisor of public funds’ office, 1935; served as Louisiana’s first legislative auditor, 1964-1972. Retired from state service in 1972 and became a consultant for the Baton Rouge State-Times/Morning Advocate. Member, Catholic church; fourth degree knight, Knights of Columbus; charter member and president, New Roads Lions Club, 1954-1955; member, board of directors, False River Golf and Country Club, 1962; president, Pointe Coupée Chapter 2214, American Association of Retired Persons, 1979; president, National Association of State Auditors, Comptrollers, and Treasurers, 1968. Honored by the Pointe Coupée Fair and Festival as an outstanding local citizen, 1986. Died, Baton Rouge, La., February 8, 1989; interred St. Mary’s Cemetery. C.A.B. Sources: Baton Rouge Morning Advocate, February 9, 1989; Judy Riffel, ed., A History of Pointe Coupée Parish and Its Families (1983), 30, 95, 333.

LAND, Alfred Dillingham, lawyer, state supreme court justice. Born, Holmes County, Miss., January 15, 1842; son of state supreme court justice Thomas T. Land (q.v.) and Mary Elizabeth Dillingham; brother of state supreme court justice John Rutherford Land (q.v.). Married Sarah Virginia Lister, November, 1869; five children. Relocated with his family to Shreveport, La., 1846. Education: attended Shreveport schools; two terms at Centenary College; two terms at the University of Virginia; received a law degree from the University of Louisiana (now Tulane University), May, 1861. Served in Company H, 7th Louisiana Volunteer Infantry Regiment, Confederate army, seeing action at the Battle of Manassas, July 21, 1861, and several other smaller engagements; subsequently served with Company A of the 28th Mississippi Cavalry, 1862; and with a unit identified only as Harvey’s Scouts, 1863; badly wounded and honorably discharged, January, 1864. Admitted to the Louisiana bar, 1865. In private practice in New Orleans, 1865-1866, before returning to Shreveport. Elected state district judge for Caddo Parish, September, 1894; reelected in 1896 and 1900. Gov. W. W. Heard appointed Land to fill an unexpired vacancy on the state supreme court in October 1903; defeated for election to a full term on the bench, 1910; served until June, 1912. The candidate that defeated Land for the supreme court seat resigned, November, 1912, and Land was subsequently elected to a full twelve-year term on the state supreme court. Died while a member of the court, June 4, 1917. J.D.W. Sources: Alcée Fortier, Louisiana (1914); The Sesquicentennial of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1813-1963 (1963).

LAND, John Rutherford, lawyer, state supreme court justice, state legislator. Born, Lexington, Miss., July 9, 1862. Son of Justice Thomas T. Land (q.v.) of the Supreme Court of Louisiana and Mary Elizabeth Dillingham; brother of Justice Alfred D. Land (q.v.) of the state supreme court. Married Willie Armstead, 1896; two children: John R., Jr., and Mary Elizabeth. Education: graduated, Thatcher’s Academy, Shreveport, La.; Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va. Admitted to the Louisiana bar, 1884. Political career: Louisiana house of representatives, 1888-1890; district attorney of Caddo Parish, three terms, 1892-1904; district judge for Caddo Parish, three terms, 1913-1921; associate justice, Supreme Court of Louisiana, October 13, 1921-April 18, 1941. Member: state democratic committee, 1888. Died, April 18, 1941. J.D.W. Sources: Alcée Fortier, Louisiana (1914); Henry Plauché Dart and William Maden Deacon, Reference Biography of Louisiana Bench and Bar, 1922 (1922); The Sesquicentennial of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1813-1963 (1963).

LAND, Thomas Thompson, lawyer, state supreme court justice. Born, Rutherford County, Va., December 17, 1815; son of Charles Land and Sarah Bass. Married Mary Elizabeth Dillingham of Washington County, Miss., September 25, 1939; fourteen children, including state supreme court justices, Alfred D. Land (q.v.) and John Rutherford Land (q.v.). Moved with his parents first to Alabama, then to Mississippi. Received his law degree from the University of Virginia. Member of the Mississippi state legislature, 1939. In November, 1945, Land traveled through Louisiana and prospected in eastern Texas; settled in Shreveport, La., 1946, where he established a private law practice. Elected state district judge for the Shreveport area, 1854; subsequently elected to the state supreme court, 1858; upon his election to the high court, Land resettled his family in New Orleans. Reelected to the state supreme court, 1861; served until the end of the Civil War, when he returned to private practice in Shreveport, to which Land had moved his family after the fall of New Orleans, April, 1862. Delegate to the state constitutional convention of 1879; served as chairman of the judiciary committee. Died, Shreveport, La., June 27, 1893. J.D.W. Sources: Louisiana Report, 133 (1913); Goodspeed Publishing, Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (1892), vol. 2:485.

LANDRENEAU, Adam, Cajun musician (violin and accordion), singer. Born, near Mamou, La., September 9, 1909. Recorded by Ralph Rinzler for the Newport Folk Foundation and the Smithsonian Folklife Program; instrumental in Cajun music revival after World War II; active on national and international folk festival circuits, including performances at the Newport Folk Festival and the National Folk Festival, and the tours of Canada and Europe; performed with cousin Cyprien Landreneau (q.v.) Died, near Mamou, La., December 28, 1972. B.J.A. Source: Author’s research.

LANDRENEAU, Cyprien, Cajun musician (accordion), singer. Born, near Mamou, La., April 7, 1904. Recorded by Ralph Rinzler for the Newport Folk Foundation and the Smithsonian Folklife Program; instrumental in Cajun music revival after World War II; active on national and international folk festival circuits, including performances at the Newport Folk Festival and the National Folk Festival, and tours of Canada and Europe; performed with cousin Adam Landreneau (q.v.) Died, near Mamou, February 1, 1982. B.J.A. Source: Author’s research.

LANDRUM, John Morgan, congressman. Born, Edgefield District, S. C., July 3, 1815. Education: pursued classical studies and was graduated from South Carolina College (now the University of South Carolina) at Columbia, 1842. Taught school for several years. Studied law; was admitted to the bar in 1844 and commenced practice in Shreveport, La.; mayor of Shreveport in 1848 and 1849; served as a Democrat in Congress from March 4, 1859 to March 3, 1861. Continued the practice of his profession until his death in Shreveport, October 18, 1861; interred Oakland Cemetery. J.B.C. Source: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1949 (1950).

LANDRY, John Joseph, pharmaceutical salesman, state representative. Born in New Orleans, 1930. Educated at Holy Cross High School, the Southwestern Louisiana Institute (now University of Southwestern Louisiana) in Lafayette, La., and Oklahoma State University. Served in the United States Navy, before becoming a salesman for Kremers Urban; he was later president of Sugico pharmaceutical supply company. He served for some years as the president of Pharmaceutical Repesentatives of New Orleans. He was a member of the Louisiana state house of representative, serving from district 99, 1972-1976. His most significant contribution was the bill that eventually provided special license plates to handicapped individuals. Died, December 24, 1996. D.C.M. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, December 27, 1996.

LANDRY, Joseph, planter, commandant. Born, Acadie (Nova Scotia), 1752; son of Joseph Landry and Marie Josèphe Bourg. Family exiled to Oxford, Talbot County, Md., during Acadian expulsion of 1755. Came to Louisiana in mid-1760s with mother and three sisters; in 1769 owned land on the west bank of the Mississippi River, Cabahannocee. Was a fusilier in Second Company of Acadians, January 15, 1770; lieutenant of militia, 1794; promoted to rank of major, 1804; served as ad interim commandant under Spanish commandant, Croquer, 1799-1803; commissioned first commandant under the American government by Governor W. C. C. Claiborne (q.v.), 1804; title changed to justice of the peace, 1805; elected to state legislative council, September 1805; elected to state senate, July 1812. Owned New Hope (Home) Plantation where sugar and corn were major crops; owned retail sugar business. Married (1) Isabel LeBlanc (d. 1777), daughter of Marie Magdalene Landry and Desiré LeBlanc, April 18, 1775; one son, Louis. Married (2) Anne Bujol (d. 1816), daughter of Anne LeBlanc and Joseph Bujol, November 25, 1779. Children: Carmélite, Céleste, Achille, Joseph, Ursin, Valéry, Mélanie, Arthémise, Trasimond (q.v.), Delphine and Marguerite. Interred October 11, 1814. A mausoleum was dedicated to Joseph, Anne, and their descendants in the Church of the Ascension cemetery, May 1845. J.B.C. Sources: Sidney A. Marchand, The Flight of a Century (1800-1900) in Ascension Parish, Louisiana (1936); Sidney A. Marchand, Pioneer Settlers in the Second Acadian Settlement, Ascension Parish, Louisiana, 1772-1829 (1959); Elfer B. Miller, Joseph Landry, Jr., His Family and the Families of His Children (1983).

LANDRY, Joseph Aristide, congressman. Born, near Donaldsonville, July 10, 1817; son of Narcisse Landry and Marie Henriette Blanchard. Attended school in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Married Anne Estelle Landry, August 21, 1838. Member, state house of representatives in 1840; elected as a Whig to the Thirty-second Congress (March 4, 1851-March 3, 1853). President, police jury of Ascension Parish, 1861. Before the Civil War was first sergeant of the Chasseurs de l’Ascension, and later was attached to Company B of the Cannoneers of Donaldsonville, but the company was disbanded before being called into the Confederate service. Died, near Donaldsonville, La., March 9, 1881; interred Church of the Ascension cemetery. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1949 (1950); Diocese of Baton Rouge Catholic Church Records.

LANDRY, Joseph O., politician. Born, St. Martin Parish, La., February 11, 1834; son of Joseph Adolphe Landry and Arthémise LeBlanc. Commanded battalion in state militia, 1861-1862. Elected lieutenant colonel, Twenty-ninth Louisiana Infantry, May 3, 1862; promoted to rank of colonel, February 4, 1864. Temporarily lieutenant colonel, Twenty-second Louisiana Consolidated Infantry from January 26, 1864, to May (?) 1864. City controller in New Orleans after the war. Administrator of commerce for city of New Orleans in 1870s. A.W.B. Sources: Napier Bartlett, Military Record of Louisiana (reprint ed., 1964); Donald J. Hebert, Southwest Louisiana Records, 33 vols. (1974-1984).

LANDRY, Lord Beaconsfield, physician, educator. Born, Donaldsonville, La., March 11, 1878; son of Pierre Landry. Education: local schools, high school at Gilbert Academy, Baldwin, La.; Fisk University, B. A. in 1902 (where he had been a member of the famous Fisk Jubilee Singers). After teaching until 1904, enrolled at Meharry Medical College, Nashville, Tenn., M. D. degree, 1908. Returned to New Orleans to practice medicine in Algiers. He was successful both in his practice and in civic and community work, organizing and directing the Osceola Five, a vocal group which specialized in music for educational and religious programs. Married Effie McGann. No children. Because of his over twenty-five years of service, including the free medical checkups he had given school children in Algiers, and the service rendered voluntarily as a probation officer, a public school was named for him. Died, New Orleans, January 3, 1934; interred Mount Olivet Cemetery, but later reinterred Nashville. C.V. Sources: Mrs. Lillian Landry Dunn, New Orleans (sister, telephone interview, September 11, 1982); Robert Meyer, Jr., Names Over New Orleans Public Schools (1975).

LANDRY, Lula, singer. Born, Indian Bayou, La., June 26, 1906; one of fourteen children born to Augustin Landry and Ophelia Comeaux. Married Elie Landry, 1926. One child: Glenda (b.1938). “Tante Bula,” as she was known to her family, was a performer of French South Louisiana “home music,” as opposed to dance hall music. Learned her large repertoire of a cappella French songs while taking catechism lessons with her Aunt Olympe (Mrs. Sosthène Landry), and by absorbing with her elephantine memory songs she heard at house parties. Began singing publicly in the 1950s at Abbeville’s Dairy Day Festival, performing more frequently after her husband’s death in 1970. A natural performer, she sang at local and national venues, including the Smithsonian Institution’s Festival of American Folklife, Festivals Acadiens in Lafayette, La., and the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Featured in commercial recording “La musique de la maison: Women and Home Music in South Louisiana” (tentatively scheduled for release 1998, Smithsonian Folkways). Died, September 18, 1991. L.E.R. Sources: Lisa E. Richardson, “Two Female French Ballad Singers of Southwestern Louisiana” (M.A. thesis, 1995); Barry Jean Ancelet, The Makers of Cajun Music (1984).

LANDRY, Paul Anthony “Tony”, businessman, farmer, politician. Born, New Iberia, La., March 30, 1878; son of Alphonse Landry and Clara Comeaux. Education: local schools; Spring Hill College, Mobile, Ala. Entered mercantile business, New Iberia. Married, April 24, 1902, Emma Segura, daughter of Pierre H. Segura (clerk of court, Iberia Parish [q.v.]) and Cora Smith. Children: Paul Anthony, Jr. (b. 1903); Jacob Segura (b. 1907); John Courtney (b. 1918); Emma Joan (b. 1921); Eleanor (b. 1925); and Alfred Smith (b. 1927). Sheriff, Iberia Parish, 1916-1940. Member, St. Peter’s Catholic Church, Knights of Columbus, Council 1208. Died, New Iberia, January 7, 1945. A.S.L. Source: Landry family papers.

LANDRY, Paul Bernard, coroner, mayor, sheriff, state representative. Born, Plaquemine, La., 1879; the sixth child of Luke V. Landry, a Confederate veteran and successful cotton planter, and his wife Ermance Lafeaux, both of distingished Iberville Parish families. Married (1) Leona Barker (d. 1917), August 22, 1906; five children: Jumel Barker, Elmire, Paul B., Jr., Louis Vernon, and Thomas Irwin. Married (2) May Bourg, January 25, 1921; four daughters, including: Dorothy May and Marjorie. Education: early education from local school in Maringouin, La.; graduated from Plaquemine High School; received undergraduate and medical (1904) degrees from Tulane University. For six months after his graduation Landry worked as marine medical inspector for the Louisiana State Board of Health; in this capacity he traveled to Panama and Costa Rica. Subsequently practiced medicine in White Castle, La., 1904-1908; Plaque­mine, La., 1908-1912; and Morley, La., 1912-1917. Settled in Port Allen, La., in 1917 and began a forty-two-year career of public service in West Baton Rouge Parish. Landry was elected mayor of Port Allen in 1918 and served one two-year term in that position; served as coroner of West Baton Rouge Parish, 1918-1936 and 1946-1959; interm sheriff for West Baton Rouge Parish, 1921; and served in the state house of representatives, 1944-1945. Served as a first lieutenant in the medical corps of the United States Army during World War I and was the examining physician for the local draft board during World War II, 1941-1947. Landry served as a special agent for the Louisiana Department of Public Safety for a brief time in 1945. Landry was a member of the East Louisiana State Hospital Board of Administrators, the West Baton Rouge Parish Board of Health, the East Baton Rouge Medical Association, and the Port Allen chapter of the American Legion. Died, Baton Rouge, La., January 15, 1959. D.C.M. and J.D.W. Sources: Baton Rouge State-Times, January 16, 1959; Henry E. Chambers, A History of Louisiana (1935), vol. 2:109-110.

LANDRY, Pierre Caliste, politician, minister. Born a slave, on the plantation of Dr. François Marie Prévost, opposite Donaldsonville, Ascension Parish, La., April, 1841; son of a slave cook named Marcelite and an unidentified white man. Married (1) Amanda Grigsby, 1866; thirteen children: Oscar, Eldridge, Pierre, Jr., Marcelite, Palmerston, Beaconsfield, Amanda, Elsie, Nellie, Willard, Joseph, Louis, and Charles. Married (2) Florence Simpkins, 1886; two children: Lillian and Georgia. Pierre Landry was accorded special privileges and treated as a free person for the first fourteen years of his life. Educated at a school conducted for free blacks on the Prévost plantation. After Dr. Prévost’s death in May, 1848, attempts were made to emancipate Landry, his mother, and his siblings; after a lengthy legal battle, these efforts failed and Landry was sold for the sum of $1,665 to M. S. Bringier, May 29, 1854. Served as a house servant on Houmas Plantation and eventually was appointed superintendent of the yard and yard servants.” Landry was allowed with another slave to open and operate a small plantation store, 1856-1862. Remained on the Bringier Plantation throughout the Civil War and subsequently moved to Donaldsonville after the war in 1866. During his first year of residence in Donaldsonville, Landry founded two schools for blacks, built for his family the first home in the area owned by a freedman, opened a small store, and conducted a prosperous business. Read law under John A. Cheevers and F. B. Earhart in Donaldsonville; subsequently established a law practice. Political career: elected mayor of Donaldsonville, April 17-18, 1868, making him the first African American elected or appointed mayor of any town in the United States. Landry held several political offices in Ascension Parish during Reconstruction including: tax collector, parish assessor, justice of the peace, president of the school board, president of the police jury, and federal postmaster. Served in the state house of representatives, 1872-1874; the state senate, 1874-1880; and the state house of representatives again, 1880-1884. Delegate to, and vice president of, the 1879 state constitutional convention. Retired from politics, 1884. Religious career: delegate to the Mississippi Mission Conference of the Methodist Episcopal (M. E.) Church, held in New Orleans, December 25, 1865; appointed pastor of St. Paul (M. E.) Church, Donaldsonville, La., 1878; presiding elder of the Baton Rouge district, M. E. church, 1881; presiding elder, Shreveport district, M. E. church. 1885; presiding elder, south New Orleans district, M. E. church, 1891. Landry served as dean and acting president of the M.E. church administered Gilbert Academy, Baldwin, Louisiana, 1900-1905. A founder and trustee of New Orleans University: trustee, Straight University, 1874-1882; member of the board of directors: Flint Medical School, and the Thomy Lafon Old Folks’ Home. Served on the executive committees of the black welcoming delegation for United States President-elect William H. Taft, 1909, and Booker T. Washington, 1915. Member of the Knights of Pythias. Landry preformed marriages of blacks for the New Orleans Board of Health office for many years, ca. 1910-1921. Landry was involved in a M. E. church scandal, 1911-1915, and was after associated with the Missionary Baptist Church. Upon his death it was stated that Landry “was believed to have preached to more people of his race than any other man in Louisiana.” Died, New Orleans, December 23, 1921; interred, Carrollton Cemetery. New Orleans, La. J.D.W. Sources: James D. Wilson, Jr., “Pierre Caliste Landry and African-American Leadership in Louisiana, 1841-1884” (M.A. thesis, University of Southwestern Louisiana, 1997); author’s research.

LANDRY, Trasimond, planter, politician, lieutenant-governor. Born, Ascension Parish, La. (then the post of Lafourche des Chitimachas), December 16, 1795; son of Anne Bujol and Joseph Landry (q.v.). Second lieutenant, Seventh Regiment of Louisiana Militia, War of 1812; appointed paymaster in Sixth Regiment of Ascension Militia, May 1814; commanded the militia company, December 1814; joined St. Martin’s company at Camp Hopkins on Bayou Lafourche, March 7, 1815. Helped form family partnership to manage New Hope Plantation, January 25, 1817; acquired share of plantation, March 1821. Elected state representative, July 1824. On August 11, 1825, married Modeste Braud (d. 1863), widow of his brother, Achille, and daughter of Magdelaine Clouatre and Armand Braud. Children: Jeanette Nisida, Marie Henriette, Marie Lise, Jean Trasimond, Samuel Joseph, and Marie Aglae. Appointed in 1833 to solicit subscriptions in Citizen’s Bank of New Orleans. Owned several sugar plantations on both banks of the Mississippi River; resigned as representative, 1831; delegate to Democratic conventions, 1828 and 1836; elected to state senate, 1832; elected lieutenant-governor, 1846; served as colonel of militia during Civil War. Died, October 1, 1873; interred Church of the Ascension Cemetery, Donaldsonville, La. J.B.C. Sources: Elfer B. Miller, Joseph Landry, Jr., His Family and the Families of His Children (1983); New Orleans Daily Picayune, obituary, October 3, 1873.

LANE, Harry Middleton, businessman, civic leader. Born, Pike County, Miss., June 21, 1890; son of Elbert C. Lane and Julia Cutrer. Education: Magnolia and McComb, Miss., schools; New Orleans (Loyola) College of Pharmacy, 1912. Removed to Vinton, 1912, as pharmacist; owner, Lane Drug Store, 1918-1959. Married, June 21, 1916, Mary Edna Guthrey, daughter of John W. Guthrey and Mary Austin of Vinton. Children: Julia (b. 1918), and Catherine (b. 1923). Member, Methodist church; past master, Vinton Masonic Lodge F. & A.M. #364; past patron, Ruth Chapter, Order of Eastern Star; past president, Vinton Rotary Club; Calcasieu Parish School Board, 1950. Died, Lake Charles, La., February 22, 1959; interred, Forest Lawn Cemetery, Beaumont, Tex. G.S.P. Sources: Vinton News, February 27, 1959; Lake Charles American Press, obituary, February 24, 1959; Beaumont Enterprise, obituary, February 24, 1959; Lane family papers.

LANG, Henry Albert, pianist, educator, composer. Born, New Orleans, October 9, 1854. Studied piano at the Stuttgart Conservatory with Lehert and Pruckner, and composition with Immanuel Gottlob Faisst; graduated 1875. Studied composition with Vincenz Lachner in Karlsruhe. Toured Germany with violinist Edward Reményi. Taught at the Conservatory at Karlsruhe, then Riga and Königsberg. Returned to the United States, 1890, taught at Galveston, Tex., and Philadelphia. Head of the Department of Theory and Composition at the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music. Composed two symphonies, a violin concerto, a cello sonata, a piano quintet, two piano trios, two string quartets and songs. Died, Philadelphia, Pa., May 27, 1930. M.A. Sources: Louis Panzeri, Louisiana Composers (1972); Nicolas Slonimsky, Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (1984).

LANGLOIS, Auguste Barthélémy, clergyman, conservationist, botanist. Born, Chavanay, Department of Loire, France, April 24, 1832. Education: Montbrison, Department of Loire, and Mount St. Mary of the West Seminary, Cincinnati. Ordained to priesthood in Cincinnati, June 11, 1857. Pastor of St. Thomas Parish in Pointe-à-la-Hache, La., 1857-1887; traveled frequently along waterways in lower Plaquemines Parish to serve flock; founded St. Cecilia Parish at Jesuit Bend, 1871; pastor of St. Martin de Tours Parish in St. Martinville, La., 1887-1900. Youthful interest in botany revived at Pointe-à-la-Hache; systematically collected and classified more than 20,000 specimens of Louisiana plants, 1877-1900; published catalog of plants of lower Louisiana, 1887; lectured on botany at Catholic Winter School in New Orleans and DePaul University in Chicago. Langlois Herbarium at Catholic University, Washington, D. C., named in his honor following donation of part of his botanical collection. Died, St. Martinville, July 31, 1900; interred St. Martin de Tours Church. C.E.N. Sources: Diary of the Diocese of New Orleans, 1897-1908, in Archives of the Archdiocese of New Orleans; Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana (1939); Roger Baudier, 1844-1944, One Hundred Years, St. Thomas Parish, Pointe-a-la-Hache, Plaquemines Parish, La. (1944); St. Martin de Tours Sacramental Registers.

LANSOT, Aimable Désiré, miniature and portrait painter. Born, Orval, France, ca. 1799; son of Marie Madelaine [P?]illet by her first marriage. In New Orleans, 1834-1851. He was also a teacher of drawing, restorer of paintings, and one of the earliest daguerreotypists in New Orleans. Unmarried. Died, New Orleans, April 17, 1851. J.A.M. Source: The Historic New Orleans Collection, Encyclopaedia of New Orleans Artists, 1718-1918 (1987).

LANUSSE, Armand, educator, poet, publisher. Born, New Orleans, 1812. Important sources disagree on his schooling—E. L. Tinker claims he was educated in Paris, R. L. Desdunes maintains that he “visited France only through the prism of his imagination.” Married and had five children, four sons and a daughter. Described by biographer as “a poet, teacher, politician, and patriot,” Lanusse, it seems, was most proud of the circumstances of his birth, of being a Creole. Though nearly white himself in a white-dominated society, Lanusse was critical of two of the practices of some of the generally light-skinned Creoles of color, “passing” and placage, as diminishing “his people.” Instead he encouraged the colored Creoles to pursue a greater share of their rights in a society bent on restricting them. The moving force behind publication, in 1843, of a little magazine, written in French, which published the works of the Negro literati of New Orleans. The magazine was known as L’Album Littéraire, Journal des Jeunes Gens, Amateurs de Littérature. Contained poems, short stories, and editorials all written by the free black intellectuals centering about Lanusse and often carrying the message that all free blacks would do well to strive for certain rights then denied them. Probably only four or five issues of L’Album Littéraire appeared. It was, however, the first instance of the publication in Louisiana of the writing of blacks. Followed, in 1845, by another Lanusse project entitled Les Cenelles, a collection of eighty-five poems written in French by seventeen free men of color. It represented, according to Rodolphe Desdunes (q.v.) in his book Nos Hommes et Notre Histoire (1911), “a triumph of the human spirit over the forces of obscurantism in Louisiana that denied the education and intellectual advancement of the colored masses.” Themes and tones are those of French Romanticism and, like L’Album Littéraire before it, it was the first volume in its category in Louisiana. Lanusse, the man responsible for Les Cenelles, wrote the dedication, the introductory essay, and contributed sixteen poems to the anthology. Though still young—early thirties—when he published this volume, Lanusse spent the rest of his life not with literature but in education. With other gens de couleur libres he fought to realize the legacy of Madame Bernard Couvent (q.v.), free person of color, who had provided in her will for a free school to be established “for the colored orphans of the Faubourg Marigny.” Built in 1848, Lanusse served as principal of l’Institution Catholique des Orphélins Indigents from 1852 to 1866. Hardworking, demanding, innovative, and well respected, Lanusse molded “Madame Couvent’s School” into a highly regarded institution. During the Civil War his tenure as principal was briefly interrupted when he was drafted into the service of the Confederate Army. Restored to his civilian duties, Lanusse, a proud Louisianian, was arrested for “attempting to tear down” the Union flag, flying, on General Butler’s orders, over his school—an act for which Lanusse later apologized. Lanusse, frustrated by the constant refusals of the Federals to recognize their special status, advised his fellow Creoles to emigrate to Mexico. Ignoring his own advice, Lanusse remained to protect Madame Couvent’s School during the postwar scramble for power. A participant in these maneuverings himself, seeking, among other things, the vote for qualified blacks, Lanusse was a contributor to the two black newspapers, L’Union and The Tribune. Died, New Orleans, 1867. D.W.M. Sources: Rodolphe Desdunes, Our People and Our History, trans. and ed., Dorothea Olga McCants (1973); Charles B. Rousseve, The Negro in Louisiana (1953); Edward L. Tinker, Creole City; Charles E. O’Neill, “Fine Arts and Literature; Nineteenth Century Louisiana Black Artists and Authors” in Robert MacDonald, John Kemp, and Edward Haas, eds., Louisiana’s Black Heritage (1979).

LAPEYROLERIE, Frank C., civic leader. Born, Reserve, La., August 7, 1911; son of Felicia White and Charles Lapeyrolerie. Graduated from Reserve Fifth Ward High School. On January 22, 1928, married Marguerite Demorelle. Children: Frank, Winthrop and Raymond. Served in the U. S. Army, 1943-1945. In 1965 received citation from National American Red Cross. Served on the Council on Aging; also associated with St. John the Baptist Parish Civil Defense, Water District No. 1, Southern Rural Electric Association, St. John Chapter of the American Red Cross, Federation of Southern Cooperatives, and the NAACP. Member, East St. John High School Booster Club, AFL-CIO, the St. John Self-Help Credit Union, Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workers Association, and St. John United Appeal. Also, E. O. Moss Grand Assembly Fourth Degree New Orleans Central Committee and Council 53 of the Knights of Peter Claver. Died, September 18, 1978; interred St. Peter Cemetery, Reserve. M.G.K. Sources: L’Observateur, May 17, 1978; Family notes of Mrs. Frank Lapeyrolerie, June 21, 1982.

LA PICE, Pierre Michel de Bergondy, planter, agricultural pioneer. Born in Saint-Domingue, 1797. Married Marie Louise Demié, also a refugee from Saint-Domingue, at Natchez, Miss., October 18, 1822; four sons and two daughters: Ambrose, Joseph François, Emile Demié, Bergondy, Mme. Armand Pilié and Josephine La Pice Longpré. After the revolution in Saint-Domingue, La Pice’s family settled in New Orleans, 1804. He fought in the War of 1812 before moving to Natchez, Miss., where he entered the merchant business as the representative of a New Orleans mercantile business owned by himself and one Millandon. While in Natchez, La Pice became active in local politics, assisting in the establishment of the Bullet Bayou settlement and even declining the governorship of Mississippi. In 1834 La Pice moved to St. James Parish, La., where on his Lauderdale Plantation, he successfully produced the first pound of white sugar made from cane juice; he later developed the sugarcane species known as La Pice cane. Built the first five-roller cane mill and the first effective bagasse burner. His cotton plantations in Concordia Parish, La., were the first in Louisiana to use steam to gin cotton. Died, St. James Parish, ca. 1884. L.F.P. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, February 10, 1963; Goodspeed Publishing Company, Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (1892).

LAPLACE, Basil, planter, pharmacist. Born, Accous, France, 1830. Married Eugenia Savage, of New Orleans, 1861; children: Albert, Ernest, Basil, Eugenia, and Ulysses. After being educated at French medical school, Laplace opened Laplace Drugstore in New Orleans, 1853; developed Laplace’s Indian Turnip Syrup, a popular local medicine. He acquired land holdings in the area now known as Laplace, La.; his plantation, called Laplace, encompassed roughly 9,000 arces of land. Died, St. John the Baptist Parish, December 16, 1884. A portrait of La Pice painted by George David Coulon was donated by his descendents to the Louisiana State Museum in 1973. L.F.P. Sources: Goodspeed Publishing Company, Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (1892); New Orleans Times-Picayune, January 28, 1973; Baton Rouge Sunday Advocate, March 29, 1981.

LARCADE, Henry Dominique, businessman, politician, congressman. Born, Opelousas, La., July 12, 1890; son of Henry Dominique Larcade, Sr., and Felicia Dominique. Education: Opelousas High School, the Academy of the Immaculate Conception, and Opelousas Institute. Married Virginia Budd of Opelousas, June 13, 1913. Military service: private, 348th Infantry, Eighty-seventh Division, Camp Pike, Arkansas, during World War I; later commissioned second lieutenant, Quartermaster Corps, Officers’ Reserve Corps. Began as a runner in the cotton business for two years. Entered the banking business, progressing from clerk, teller, cashier and trust officer to director of St. Landry Bank and Trust Company, from which he resigned in 1929. Director, Planter’s Bank, Opelousas, 1930-1935. Established the Larcade Insurance Agency in Opelousas in 1910; developed the firm into the largest general insurance business in St. Landry Parish; retired as president and manager in 1954. Public offices: St. Landry Parish School Board, 1913-1928; Louisiana senate, 1928-1932; assistant clerk of the Louisiana senate, 1932-1936; Louisiana house of representatives, 1936-1940; United States House of Representatives, 1942-1952 (not a candidate for renomination in 1952); Louisiana senate, 1956-1960; announced as a candidate for Louisiana lieutenant governor in 1963 but did not qualify. In Congress, served on the Education, Flood Control, Patents, Pensions, Territories and Public Works committees; chaired the Rivers and Harbors Subcommittee of the Public Works Committee, 1951-1952; consistently opposed President Harry S Truman’s foreign policy and supported measures aiding agriculture; supported successfully a tidewater seaway connecting New Orleans to the Gulf of Mexico. Longite: in the Louisiana senate, was one of the fifteen signers of the “round-robin” statement that the signers would under no circumstances vote for the conviction of Gov. Huey Long (q.v.) on the impeachment charges being drawn up in the Louisiana lower house, thus blocking any action on the impeachment. Memberships: American Red Cross Chapter (chair); Association of Commerce; Order of the Elks (exalted ruler); Woodmen of the World; American Legion; Forty and Eight; United Service Organizations; District Boy Scout Council; Rotary Club (charter member and president); Knights of Columbus (Fourth Degree). In Washington, D.C., president of the Louisiana State Society. Enjoyed playing golf. Died, Opelousas, March 14, 1966; interred St. Landry Roman Catholic Church Cemetery. J.F.G. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, March 15, 1966; Who’s Who in the South and Southwest (1950); William E. Skaggs and J. B. Lux, eds., Louisiana’s Business and Professional Directory (1954); Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971).

LA RENAUDIÈRE, Philippe de, colonial settler, mining director. One of two men of similar name to serve as director of mines for the Company of the Indies, 1718-ca.1722 (q.v. Philippe Renault). Born, Perigord, France; emigrated to the Louisiana colony aboard the Comte de Toulouse under a roll dated November 15, 1718 that termed him “Clerk of the Company and Conductor of Mines.” An unnamed wife accompanied him—on the ship and to Upper Louisiana, where La Renaudière was to attempt development of Illlinois’s and Missouri’s silver, iron, and copper deposits. Church registers of the village of Kaskaskia in 1721 identify that wife as Perrine Pivert and refer to La Renaudière variously as “Director of Mines” and “Commis­sioner of Mines for the Company of the West.” With the formation of the provincial council in 1722, La Renaudière was transferred to the council’s payroll. As the council faded into oblivion in the 1724-26 period, so did La Renaudière. After Véniard de Bourgmont’s (q.v.) expedition to the Paducas in 1724 (which he accompanied as “mining engineer”), a few cameo appearances in the notarial records of Fort de Chartres in 1726 and 1727, and a pair of job-related citations by New Orleans’s Superior Council during the summer of 1728, he is found no more in the colony. His widow and children surfaced in 1734 at the outpost of Natchitoches, where the widow lived out her days in very modest circumstances. Offspring of Philippe de La Renaudière and Perrine Pivert (a native of Vitré, Brittany) were Charles (born July 3, 1721 at Kaskaskia; died the winter of 1773-74 at Natchitoches leaving numerous progeny); Marie Françoise (born September 3, 1723 at Kaskaskia; wife of Pierre Benoist and George Avenal, with whom she appears to have left the colony in the 1740s); Agnès Geneviève (born ca. 1727 at Kaskaskia; wife of Guillaume Bergeron dit St. Onge, by whom she left numerous progeny, and Hyacinthe Ferret of Pointe Coupée); and, probably, Philippe (who served as godfather in 1744 to a child of Agnès). E.S.M. Sources: Roll of the Comte de Toulouse, Colonies, G1, 464 and B43, 374-78, Archives Nationales, Paris; Register 1, Parish of Notre-Dame d’Immaculée Conception, Kaskaskia; Registers 1-4, Parish of St. François, Natchitoches. Index to French Archives, Clerk of Court’s Office, Natchitoches (for descriptions of missing documents); Margaret Kimball Brown and Lawrie Cena Dean, The Village of Chartres in Colonial Illinois, 1720-1765 (1977), 850-51, 910-11; “Records of the Superior Council of Louisiana,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, 4 (1921): 483; Elizabeth Shown Mills, “Parallel Lives: Philippe de La Renaudière and Philippe (de) Renault, Directors of the Mines, Company of the Indies,” Natchitoches Genealogist (1998).

LARNED, Sylvester, clergyman. Born, Pittsfield, Mass., August 23, 1796; son of Simon Larned, a U. S. congressman. Education: Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vt., 1813; Andover Newton Theological School, Newton Centre, Mass., 1813-1814; and Princeton Theological Seminary, 1815-1817. Ordained by the Presbytery in New York City, July 15, 1817. Preached in various large churches but refused all offers of a pastorship. Was influenced by his friend Rev. Elias Cornelius, a Congregationalist, to engage in a missionary tour of the Old Southwest, and especially New Orleans. Appointed by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian church to solicit donations in New Orleans and vicinity for Princeton Theological Seminary. Arrived in New Orleans, January 22, 1818. Conducted services for several months in the Episcopal “Christ Church”; the two groups developed a harmonious relationship though each retained its denominational identity. Accepted offer to be the establishing pastor of a Presbyterian church in New Orleans. The First Presbyterian Church, erected on St. Charles Street, was dedicated July 4, 1819. At the urging of his parishionera, he left the city and went to St. Francisville for the remainder of that summer because of the yellow fever epidemic. Remained in New Orleans the following summer during a reoccurence of yellow fever and ministered to the sick and dying, visited hospitals, and tended to the needs of his congregation. Contracted the disease and died, August 31, 1820. Buried according to the rites of the Episcopal church with Rev. James T. Hull (q.v.), the only other Protestant clergyman in New Orleans, officiating. Interred Girod Street Cemetery; reinterred, 1841, under a monument erected to his memory on Lafayette Square in front of the church he helped establish. The Sylvester Larned Institute in New Orleans, a four-year school providing instruction for young ladies, opened September, 1870; the Institute later became coeducational and remained in operation eleven years. J.B.C. Sources: Penrose St. Amant, A History of the Presbyterian Church in Louisiana (1961); Louis Voss, comp., Presbyterianism in New Orleans and Adjacent Points (1931); Timothy F. Reilly, “Religious Leaders and Social Criticism in New Orleans, 1800-1861” (Ph. D. dissertation, University of Missouri at Columbia, 1972); Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, III (1900).

LAROCCA, Dominic James “Nick”, cornetist, bandleader, composer. Born, New Orleans, April 11, 1889; son of an Italian immigrant shoemaker. Famous as the leader and organizer of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. In 1917 released what is often called the first jazz record, “Livery Stable Blues” and “Original Dixieland One-Step.” The band played 10 weeks at the London Palladium in 1919, then went back to New York where it broke up in 1924. Reorganized in 1936, folded in 1939. LaRocca composed “Tiger Rag”, “Fidgety Feet”, “Jazz Band Ball”, “Original Dixieland One Step”. Married: Ruth Pitre. Children: Carolyn, and Mrs. Theodore Ochoa, Jr., Dominic, Jr., Jerome, James, Carl. Died, New Orleans, February 22, 1961. H.C. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, February 23, 1961; Leonard Feather, The Encyclopedia of Jazz in the Sixties (1966); Charles Claghorn, Biographical Dictionary of American Music (1973); Al Rose and Edmond Souchon, New Orleans Jazz, A Family Album, rev. ed. (1964); H. O. Brunn, The Story of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band (1960).

LARUE, Alfred (stage name Lash LaRue), actor. Born, Gretna, La. The date of his birth is a matter of some controversty, but it is thought to have been June 15, 1917; son of Charles LaRue and Sarah Louise LaRue. Columnist Dennis Rogers, LaRue’s longtime friend, claimed that the actor was married “as many as a dozen” times; children: three sons and two daughters. After his father was killed in World War I, LaRue moved with his mother to Ohio and then to California. Appeared in approximately seventy-five movies between 1938 and 1963, but was best known for the two dozen B-movies in which he starred between 1945 and 1952. These films, which included, Wild West, Outlaw Country, The Frontier Phantom, Son of Billy the Kid, Mark of the Lash, and Border Feud, made LaRue a national film star with a large following among child matinee moviegoers. Wore a black outfit and battled outlaws with a bullwhip in his most popular movies. Appeared in the Lash of the West television series, 1953-1953. His career subsequently declined as television began to divert audiences from matinee movies. Made numerous personal appearances at county fairs, rodeos, and film festivals. An arrest for vagrancy in 1966 prompted him to begin a career as an itinerant preacher. Preached at numerous churches in Louisiana and Mississippi between 1966 and 1975. Religious career ended in 1975 following his arrest for marijuana possession. Had a bit part in the 1986 remake of Stagecoach. Died, Providence St. Joseph Medical Center, Burbank, Calif., May 21, 1996. C.A.B. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 31, 1996; Time, June 10, 1996; Al Rose, Born in New Orleans: Notables of Two Centuries (1983).

LA SALLE, René-Robert Cavelier, sieur de, explorer. Born, Rouen, France, November 21, 1864, son of wholesale merchant, Jean Cavelier and Catherine Geest. Education: attended the local Jesuit grammar school and in 1658 entered the Society of Jesus’ novitiate in Paris; in 1660 entered College Henri IV, a Jesuit college at La Flèche; spent a year of study at Tours and taught in a grammar school at Blois in 1666. On March 28, 1667, was released from the Society of Jesus at his own request; sailed for Canada in the summer of 1667 to join his brother, Abbé Jean Cavelier, a priest of the Company of St. Sulpice in Montreal; was given land by the Sulpicians which is still known as “Lachine” and began his career as a fur trader. Took the name La Salle from the family-owned property in Rouen. Returned to France in 1674 where he was enobled and granted the seigneury of Fort Frontenac on Lake Ontario, thus monopolizing the area fur trade; received permission on May 12, 1678, from King Louis XIV, to explore the western part of New France (at his own expense); began descent of the Mississippi River in February, 1682, and reached the lower part of the river near Southwest Pass in April; all land drained by the river was named Louisiana and claimed for France on April 9, 1682. Sailed for France the following year seeking permission to establish a settlement at the mouth of the river; received a patent on April 14, 1684, giving him the title of governor of all Louisiana with powers of command; expediton sailed on July 24, 1684, and, missing the mouth of the river, landed in what is now Matagorda Bay, Texas, January 19, 1685; searched for the mouth of the river for two years; met his death on March 19, 1687, at the hands of mutineers near the Brazos River. Although hampered by character defects and lacking the qualities of leadership, his vision, tenacity, and courage pointed the way to a large portion of the French colonial empire that was eventually built by others. M.C.R. & J.B.C. Sources: Charles L. Dufour, Ten Flags in the Wind (1967); The New Columbia Encyclopedia (1975); E. B. Osler, La Salle (1967).

LA SERE, Emile, congressman. Born, Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti), 1802. Removed with family to New Orleans ca. 1805 (probably 1809). Education: completed preparatory studies in New Orleans. As a young man, became a clerk at a mercantile house in Jackson, La. Removed to New Orleans, ca. 1825, and became a clerk for merchant James Amar. Later served as a clerk for McClannahan & Bogart and was assigned to Mexico. Returned to New Orleans and became a merchant sometime before 1840. Active in Democratic party: sheriff, Orleans Parish, 1840-1846; member of Congress, 1846-1851; served as chairman, Louisiana Democratic Central Committee for 15 years before the Civil War; was outspoken critic of Know-Nothing party; supported secession. Because of outspokenness, was a principal in “eighteen or twenty duels.” Civil War service: major, 10th Louisiana Infantry Regiment, 1862; resigned commission, July 1862, to become regimental quartermaster; admitted to U. S. General Hospital, Chester, Pa., July 17, 1863; captured by Federal forces while a patient in a Richmond hospital, April 3, 1865. Because of political connections with Mexican leaders, returned to Mexico after the war and obtained favorable business concessions. Served as president, Tehuantepec Railroad Co. Returned to New Orleans and resumed his mercantile business. Died, New Orleans, August 14, 1882; interred Metairie Cemetery. C.A.B. Sources: New Orleans Daily Picayune, August 14, 1882; Andrew Booth, comp., Confederate Soldiers and Commands (1920); Goodspeed’s Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (1892; reprint ed., 1975); Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXIII (1940); XXV (1942); XXVI (1943).

LASSEIGNE, Augustin, planter, banker, merchant, philanthropist. Born, Lions, St. John the Baptist Parish, La., February 5, 1862; son of Gustave Lasseigne and Eva Marie Cambre. In 1883, married Clothilde Perilloux of St. John the Baptist Parish. Children: George A. Lasseigne, Esther (Mrs. Joseph M. Ory), Palmyre (Mrs. F. J. Aycock), and Loretta, who died unmarried at the age of nineteen. Although he had little formal education, through his energy, thrift and good business acumen, he acquired large land holdings on his own and in partnership with others. His first partnership with Leon Keller of St. James Parish was successful and encouraged his further acquisitions. They included San Francisco Plantation in Garyville and Woodland Plantation in Laplace which he owned with the Ory brothers. Other holdings were Cedar Grove near White Castle in Iberville Parish, Ellington near Luling and Modoc near Destrehan in St. Charles Parish. In St. John the Baptist Parish he also owned Bossier, Cornland, and Hope plantations. He operated stores on San Francisco, Woodland, and Sarpy plantations. These business ventures did not stop him from being active in the political and religious life of the parish. Served for sixteen years as president of the police jury, taking part in all the progressive movements for the parish and at times lending large sums of money to the parish for improvements. He was one of the organizers of the St. John Welfare League, a political organization. An active member and organizer of the St. Peter Council #2426, Knights of Columbus in Reserve. After he moved to Laplace in 1898 he was instrumental in Woodland Plantation’s donation of the property for the St. Joan of Arc Chapel. Member, Woodmen of the World and the Patriotic Knights of Honor. Helped organize the Bank of St. John and served as its second president from 1909 until his death in 1925. D.L.C. Source: Author’s research.

LASSEIGNE (LeSeigne), Leonard, progenitor of the Lasseigne family in Louisiana. Born, Perigord, France, ca. 1723-1724. Arrived in Louisiana as a soldier in the French Army. Military record shows that he was discharged, September 1, 1751, re-enlisted and was discharged again on October 1, 1754. Married Marie Jacobe Cresman, of Swiss descent, ca. 1753. Children: Ponce Lasseigne, married Catherine Tregre; André Lasseigne, married Charlotte Vicknair; Charles Lasseigne, married Euphrosine Madeline Madère; Marie Catherine Lasseigne, married J. A. Percy; Marie Delphine Lasseigne, married André Triche; Anne Lasseigne, married Michel Cambre. Court records show that he owned property in what is now Laplace in St. John the Baptist Parish in the late 1700s. Died, March 13, 1805. D.L.C. Source: Author’s research.

LASSEIGNE, Wallace, journalist. Born, Reserve, La., October 13, 1878; son of Rosala Jacob and Charles Lasseigne. Education: St. John Parish schools; Louisiana State University. Married Noelie Haydel. Children: Larry, Robert, Leslie (Mrs. Paul Mabile), Ruby (Mrs. C. Dubroc), Jennie Bell (Mrs. Octave Mabile), Mabel (Mrs. Helmuth Montz) and Thelma. Published L’Observateur, a weekly newspaper, founded by his father. Served on the St. John Parish Ration Board during World War II. Died, July 18, 1966; interred St. Peter Cemetery, Reserve, La. M.G.K. Source: Family notes of Mrs. Paul Mabile, July 12, 1982.

LASTIE, Walter, drummer; rhythm and blues musician. Born New Orleans, 1938. Began career as a child at the Guiding Star Spiritual Church. Toured with Fats Domino, played with Ray Charles, Eddie Bo. Played with the Lastie Family Band, also known as “A Taste of New Orleans,” which had been featured on a one-hour television documentary highlighting famous musical families in the city. Wife, Sarah; daughters, Kim, Andrea. Died, New Orleans, December 28, 1980; interred Rest Haven Memorial Park. H.C. Soures: New Orleans Times-Picayune, December 30, 1980; January 2, 1981.

LASTRAPES, Henry, politician. Born, St. Landry Parish, La., April 29, 1879; son of Henry Lastrapes, Sr., and Alicia Jubertie. Educated local schools. Married, October 26, 1899, Lelia McKinney, daughter of Ernest McKinney and Lou Gelvin. Children: Lelia (b. 1906), and Henry (b. 1914). St. Landry Parish clerk of court, 1912-1964. Died, Opelousas, La., August 17, 1967; interred Opelousas. K.P.F. Sources: St. Landry Parish Probate #14,323; St. Landry Catholic Church, Vol. III, p. 237 #37; Washington Catholic Church, Vol. I, p. 193.

LATOUR, Arsène Lacarrière, civil and military engineer, spy. Born in France, ca. 1775. Educated in engineering and architecture at the Paris Academy of Fine Arts. Immigrated to Saint Domingue, 1793; arrived in Louisiana sometime between 1802 and 1810; first notice of his presence in New Orleans is an advertisement in the Louisiana Courier of October 17, 1810. In 1810 Latour entered into a partnership with Hyacinthe Laclotte, which lasted until the firm went bankrupt in 1813. During the British invasion of Louisiana, Latour offered his services to the United States; upon the recommendation of Edward Livingston, he joined Andrew Jackson’s staff as chief engineer, Seventh Military District, and provided advice on tactics and defensive works; Jackson’s general orders of January 21, 1815, acknowledged Latour’s “talents and bravery.” Latour wrote a detailed account of the New Orleans campaign, which he dedicated to Jackson; the manuscript was translated into English and published at Philadelphia in early 1816 as Historical Memoir of the War in West Florida and Louisiana in 1814-1815. While writing his book, Latour secretly became an agent of the Spanish government; traveling incognito with the pirate (and fellow spy) Jean Laffite, Latour carried out a clandestine reconnaissance of the Arkansas region between May and November, 1816, and reported his findings to the captain-general of Havana, Cuba; adopting the alias John Williams, Latour traveled to Cuba in March, 1817, and was interviewed by Spanish authorities, to whom he expressed a desire to settle in Cuba. Latour’s reports on the prospects of Anglo-American expansion in the Southwest and his recommendations for suppressing filibustering activities in Texas were generally well received by the Spanish government, but his career as a secret agent appears to have ended in 1817. He appears to have remained in Havana for a number of years, but evidently returned to Paris and died there in 1839. R.C.V. Sources: Archivo General de Indias, Seville, Spain, Papeles Procedentes de Cuba; Edwin H. Carpenter, Jr., “Arsene Lacarriere Latour,” The Hispanic American Historical Review, 8 (1938); “Latour’s Report on Spanish American Relations in the Southwest,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly 30 (1947).

LATROBE, Benjamin Henry, architect. Born, Fulneck, England, May 1, 1764; son of Benjamin and Anna Margaret Antes Latrobe. Education: local schools of Fulneck; advanced studies in Saxony, Germany; studied architecture in London. Removed to Richmond, Va., 1795, and then in 1798 to Philadelphia, Pa. Designed buidlings in Philadelphia in the classical style and developed and designed the Philadelphia waterworks system. When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1801, Latrobe named one of the architects of the United States Capitol in Washington, D. C. Moved family to Washington, D. C., in 1807. In 1811 Latrobe was dismissed from his U. S. Capitol position and removed to Pittsburgh, Pa., to design steamboats for Nicholas Roosevelt and Robert Fulton. Between 1815 and 1817 he worked again on the U. S. Capitol. Removed to Baltimore, Md., in 1818, and to New Orleans in 1819. In New Orleans he had been commissioned by city authorities in 1811 to design and build a waterworks system. Earlier, in 1804, he had submitted the design for the Mississippi River lighthouse at the mouth of the river; in 1807 he submitted the design for the U. S. Customhouse in New Orleans, possibly the first Greek Revival structure in the city; and in 1811 designed a grave monument for Gov. William C. C. Claiborne’s wife. Due to delays from the War of 1812, Latrobe did not remove to New Orleans to execute his waterworks design until 1819. While in New Orleans on the waterworks project, he also designed the State Bank of Louisiana building and a tower for St. Louis Cathedral. Married (1), February 27, 1790, Lydia Sellon (d. 1793). Children: Lydia (b. 1791) and Henry (b.1792). Married (2), May 2, 1800, Mary Elizabeth Hazelhurst of Philadelphia. Children: Juliana (died), John, Juliana, Benjamin, Mary Agnes (died), John H. B. Active in Jeffersonian Republican politics. Died, New Orleans, September 3, 1820, from yellow fever; interred Protestant section of St. Louis Cemetery I. A.S.T. Sources: Edward C. Carter II, et al., eds., The Journals of Benjamin Henry Latrobe, 1799-1820: From Philadelphia to New Orleans III (1980); Talbot Hamlin, Benjamin Henry Latrobe (1955); Benjamin Henry Latrobe, The Journal of Latrobe; Samuel Wilson, Jr., ed., Impressions Respecting New Orleans by Benjamin Henry Boneral Latrobe (1951); Fiske Kimball, “Benjamin Henry Latrobe,” Dictionary of American Biography (1946).

LATULIPE, maroon slave of the Trenaunay plantation of Pointe Coupée Post. Of the Hibou nation. Returned to assassinate his master, Claude Trenaunay de Chanfret (q.v.), with a rifle shot on the night of July 10, 1792. After a thorough search for Latulipe for two days, he was found hanged in his cabin in the slave quarters; his body was dismembered and displayed on poles at the plantation as an example to the other slaves. D.N.K. Source: Pointe Coupée Parish Records, Document 1762, July 10, 1792.

LAUGHLIN, Clarence John, writer, photographer. Born, Lake Charles, La., August 14, 1905. Education: local schools. Began writing in 1925 (poetry and fiction). Photographer with the U. S. Corps of Engineers, 1936-1940; photographer with the National Archives, U. S. Signal Corps, and Office of Strategic Services, 1941-1946; photographer with Vogue magazine, 1940-1941; 1948-1955 architectural photographer. Co-author of New Orleans and Its Living Past (1941); author of Ghosts Along the Mississippi (1948); author of numerous articles and poems in literary, architectural and photographic publications; exhibitions included hundreds of one-man and group exhibitions, 1936-until death, and lectures at museums, galleries, and universities; work is included in public and private collections in the United States, Europe and Australia, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Meltropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the New Orleans Museum of Art, and The Historic New Orleans Collection, which houses his archive. A monograph of his work, The Personal Eye, was published by Aperture in 1973. Married Elizabeth Heintzen of New Orleans. Children: John C. Laughlin, David C. Laughlin, and Andrea Laughlin Freewater. Died, New Orleans, January 2, 1985. J.H.L. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune/States-Item, January 3, 1985; The Clarence John Laughlin Collection (The Historic New Orleans Collection, Manuscripts Division).

LAURA, Mother, see O’Brien, Catherine

LAURENT, L. D., community leader. Resident of Alexandria. First superintendent, Louisiana Colored Farmer’s Alliance, 1889-1891. Member, Louisiana People’s party executive committee, 1892. A.W.B. Source: William Ivy Hair, Bourbonism and Agrarian Protest (1969).

LAURENT, Lubin, attorney, historian. Born, Edgard, La., December 5, 1889; son of Emile Laurent and Annette Becnel Laurent. Education: degree in electrical engineering from Louisiana State University, 1913. Married; one daughter, Jacqueline. Served as superintendent of parish public schools, 1917-1925. Law degree from Loyola University, New Orleans, 1928. Practiced law in New Orleans and returned to Edgard in 1955. Assistant district attorney for the Twenty-ninth Judicial District, 1955-1959. Member, Louisiana Historical Society and Louisiana Bar Association. Author, A History of St. John the Baptist Parish. Lived in Baton Rouge after retirement. Died, February 18, 1979. M.G.K. Sources: Family notes in vertical file of St. John the Baptist Parish Library; River Parish Focus, Vol. III, No. 3, August-September, 1979.

LAUSSAT, Pierre Clément de, administrator, diplomat. Born, Pau, France, November 23, 1756; son of Jean-Gratien de Laussat and Jammes-Joséphine d’Augerot. Educated in French law. Named receiver-general of finances for a local assembly in province of Béarn, 1784-1789. Career fluctuated with several changes in political institutions between 1789 and 1799. Napoleon appointed Laussat as colonial prefect of Louisiana, highest ranking French civilian in the colony, on August 20, 1802. Left with his entourage for Louisiana. Louisiana Purchase terms finalized April 30, 1803. Appointed to serve as commissioner of the French government for the retrocession of Louisiana from Spain to France and the transfer from France to the U. S. After completion of this duty on December 20, 1803, he served as colonial prefect of Martinique; was captured by the British; released at the end of 1809. Continued to serve French government even after Napoleon’s exile. Received Cross of St. Louis and was made a baron. Retired from public service in 1825. Married Marie-Anne Peborde. Four (?) children: Zoë, Sophie, Camille, Son (?). Died, Château of Bernadets, France, 1835. P.D.A. Sources: Pierre-Clément de Laussat, Memoirs of My Life to My Son … , trans. by Sister Agnes-Josephine Pastwa, ed. by Robert D. Bush (1978); Alcée Fortier, Louisiana, 3 vols (1914).

LAVAL, Jean-Marius, clergyman, prelate. Born, St. Etienne, France, September 21, 1854; son of François Laval and Catherine Crozet. Education: Little Seminary in Montbrison and Saint-Michel’s Seminary in Saint-Etienne. Arrived in New Orleans in 1872 as an ecclesiastical student and completed studies at Archdiocesan Seminary on Ursulines Street. Ordained to priesthood at St. Mary Church (Archbishopric) on November 10, 1877. Appointed assistant at St. Joseph Parish in Baton Rouge, 1877-1884; pastor of St. Gabriel in Iberville, 1884-1890, St. Francis de Sales in Houma, 1890-1894, St. Joseph in Baton Rouge, 1894-1895, and St. John the Baptist in New Orleans, 1895-1902; rector of St. Louis Cathedral, 1902-1911, and pastor of St. Vincent de Paul Parish in New Orleans, 1911-1937; vicar general of the archdiocese, 1898-1937, and administrator of the archdiocese, 1934-1935, after death of Archbishop John Shaw (q.v.). Consecrated titular bishop of Hierocaesarea at St. Louis Cathedral on November 29, 1911; served as auxiliary to Archbishops James Blenk (q.v.), John Shaw, and Joseph Rummel (q.v.). Awarded France’s Cross of Chevalier of the Legion of Honor. Died, San Francisco, Calif., June 4, 1937; interred St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans, June 9, 1937. C.E.N. Sources: Jean-Marius Laval Papers, Baudier Historical Collection, and Parish History Collection in Archives of the Archdiocese of New Orleans; Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana (1939); Catholic Action of the South, June 10, 1937.

LAVEAU, Marie (I), aka Widow Paris, voodooist. Born, New Orleans, 1783 or 1784; illegitimate daughter of Charles Laveau and Marguerite Darcantel. A free woman of color with admixture of white and aboriginal Indian lineage; educated informally. Married, August 4, 1819, Jacques Paris, free quadroon of Saint-Domingue, in a ceremony conducted by the historically reputed cleric, Père Antoine (q.v.); widowed one year after marriage followed by a common-law relationship to Louis Christophe Duminy de Glapion with whom she bore fifteen children; an avowed Catholic who introduced the use of its conventions in the practice of voodoo, opening it to public participation, and placing it on a paid basis. Died, June, 1881; believed interred in a family crypt in St. Louis Cemetery I, New Orleans. C.D.J. Sources: Robert Tallant, Voodoo in New Orleans (1946); Lyle Saxon, Fabulous New Orleans (1928); Henry C. Castellanos, New Orleans As It Was (1895); Curtis D. Jerde, research notes, Ph. D. candidate in American History, Tulane University.

LAVEAU, Marie (II), aka Marie Glapion, voodooist. Born, New Orleans, February 2, 1827; illegitimate daughter of Marie Laveau (I [q.v.]) and Louis Christophe Glapion. A free woman of color with admixture of white and aboriginal Indian lineage; educated informally; apparently one of several daughters born to Marie Laveau (I) who bore her Christian name. She practiced the Voodoo art concurrently with her mother, creating much confusion for retrospective accounts. Also, the name appeared frequently in association with the practice of the rites both earlier and later than the documented lives of the two Marie Laveaus presented here. Died, June 11, 1897; interred in a family crypt in St. Louis Cemetery I, New Orleans. C.D.J. Sources: Robert Tallant, Voodoo in New Orleans (1946); Lyle Saxon, Fabulous New Orleans (1928); Henry C. Castellanos, New Orleans As It Was (1895); Curtis D. Jerde, research notes, Ph. D. candidate in American History, Tulane University.

LA VERGNE (also LAVERGNE), Hughes de, politician, banker. Born, New Orleans, 1789; only child of Marie Isabella du Vergier and Pierre de la Vergne, a native of France and the first of the family to settle in New Orleans. Education: private, devoted chiefly to the study of mathematics. On October 13, 1813, married Marie Adèle de Villeré, daughter of Jeanne Henrietta de Fazende and Jacques Philippe de Villeré (q.v.). One child, Jules, survived to adulthood. Served on the staff of Gen. Andrew Jackson (q.v.) as a major; in 1816 appointed private secretary to his father-in-law, then governor of the state; appointed secretary of state, 1820; served as colonel on the staff of Gov. Thomas Robertson (q.v.); became a notary public and on April 3, 1826, was admitted to the bar; in 1833 became cashier of the City Bank of New Orleans and two years later its president. Died, February 15, 1843. J.B.C. Sources: Alcée Fortier, Louisiana (1914); Grace King, Creole Families of New Orleans (1921; reprint ed., 1971); Stanley Clisby Arthur, Old Families of Louisiana (1931; reprint ed., 1971).

LAW, John, financier. Born in Scotland, 1671; son of a goldsmith and banker. Orphaned at age fourteen; moved to London, involved himself in a duel with a rival, and was subsequently sentenced to death (dueling was a capital crime in England). As an adept student of mathematics, finance, taxation, and trade, Law travelled among the continental European capitals, working as a financial consultant to countries devastated by the wars of Louis XIV. In 1717, he arrived in France and was granted permission to create a private bank that issued paper money (as opposed to hard currency or coin) in an effort to expand credit and stimulate trade. He formed the Company of the West (also known as the Mississippi Company) which immediately issued 200,000 shares at 500 livres each. Although Law paid dividends from the invested capital, his retainers continued to back him. In 1718, the Company of the Indies was formed as a parent of the Mississippi Company, and the 50,000 shares issued were a much coveted item in France. Law’s private bank became the Royal Bank in the same year, and exercised control over tax collections and operation of the royal mint. All of these ventures were secured by the predicted prosperity of the colonies, which by this time had received thousands of European immigrants. Investors then began to question the Company’s earning potential, exchanging their stocks for hard currency, and eventually a panic ensued; the French government banned the circulation of gold and silver by May 1719. With all of his assets confiscated by the state, Law barely escaped from the angry mobs with his life. He died a pauper in Venice, Italy, in 1729. N.P.W. Sources: Marcel Giraud, A History of Louisiana, vol. 5, The Company of the Indies, 1723-1731 (1987); Clayton Rand, Stars in Their Eyes: Dreamers & Builders in Louisiana (1953); Pat Curtin, “The Mississippi Bubble: The Fantastic Story of One John Law, Who Tried Financial Wizardry to Free France From Debt and His Failure,” Baton Rouge Morning Advocate, July 5, 1953.

LAWLESS, Alfred, educator, clergyman. Born, Thibodaux, La., July 16, 1872; son of Serena and Alfred Lawless. Education: Straight College (now Dillard University), B.A., 1900; Straight Theological Seminary, B. D., 1902. Married Harriet Eliza Dunn, May 13, 1892. Children: Theodore Kenneth (q.v.); Oscar Godfrey (b. 1896); Gertrude Ellen (b. 1898). Public school teacher, 1895-1901; principal, Pointe Dupe High School, 1903-1904; principal, Fisk Colored School, New Orleans; pastor and founder of Beecher Memorial Congregational Church, 1904-1910; superintendent of Southern Churches, headquarters, Atlanta, Ga., 1910-1933. Organized within the church the first temporary school for children in the black neighborhood. Served on executive committee of National Association of Teachers in Colored Schools. Created the Seventh Ward Educational League in New Orleans. Member, Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, Inc.; Odd Fellows; Masons; Interdenominational Ministers’ Alliance; New Orleans Colored Teachers’ Association. District superintendent of Congregational Churches with headquarters in New Orleans. In 1954, the Alfred Lawless Elementary School, New Orleans, named in his honor. Religion: Congregationalist. Died, Atlanta, Ga., September 9, 1933; interred Mount Olivet Cemetery, New Orleans. Lawless Memorial Chapel, Dillard University, dedicated October 23, 1955. C.T. Sources: Joseph Boris, ed., Who’s Who in Colored America (1927); Robert Meyer, Jr., Names Over New Orleans Schools (1975).

LAWLESS, Theodore Kenneth, dermatologist, philanthropist, businessman, academic. Born, Thibodaux, La., December 6, 1892; son of the Reverend Alfred Lawless and Harriet Dunn. Education, secondary education, Straight College (now Dillard University); Talladega College, A. B., 1914; University of Kansas Medical School, 1916; Northwestern University, M. D., 1919; Northwestern University, M.S., 1920; Internship, Vanderbilt Clinic of Columbia University, Massachusetts General Hospital, L’Hopital St. Louis of the University of Paris, the University of Freiburg, Germany, and the University of Vienna. Instructor in Dermatology, Northwestern University, 1924-1940; diplomate of the American Board of Dermatology and Syphilology, 1935; private practice in Chicago, Ill.; director of the Supreme Life Insurance Company; charter member and director of the Marina City Bank; president of the South Michigan Corporation; president/associate founder of Service Federal Savings and Loan Association; member of the Chicago Board of Health; member of the Mayor’s Advisory Committee on Regional Interest in the President’s Program on Heart Disease, Cancer, and Stroke; Prison Welfare Commission. Contributed to building of Lawless Memorial Chapel of Dillard University; Lawless Department of Dermatology in the Belison Hospital Tel Aviv, Israel; the Lawless Clinic & Research Laboratory in Dermatology of the Hebrew Medical School in Jerusalem; the Chemical Laboratory and Lecture Auditorium of Roosevelt University; The Theodore K. Lawless Gardens at 35th and Rhodes Avenue, Chicago; gave Dillard University the Gentilly Garden apartments, landscaped residences for faculty; founder of the Weizmann Institute of Science Summer Camp for Talented Children; established in the Provident Hospital a well equipped staff and clinical laboratory for experimental medicine. Member, American Medical Association; the National Medical Association; Illinois Medical Society; Chicago Medical Society; Cook County Physicians Association; Metropolitan Dermatological Society. A fellow of the American Association of the Advancement of Science. Honorary degrees from: Talladega College, Talladega, Ala., (D.Sc.); Bethune-Cookman College, Daytona, Fla. (LL.D.); Virginia State University, Petersburg, Va., (LL.D.); University of Illinois (LL.D.). Awards and citations: Distinguished Service Citation from University of Kansas; The Harmon Award in Science; The Burnham Award of Roosevelt University; The Greater Chicago Churchman Layman-of-the Year Citation; the Citation of the United Church Board of Homeland Ministries; the Distinguished Service Award of Huston Tillotson College and Dillard University; the Distinguished Service Award of Phi Beta Kappa; the Service Award of the Cook County Physicians Association; The Citation of the Weizmann Institute of Science at Rehovoth, Israel; the Golden Touch Award of the City of Hope—A Pilot Medical Center Trustee; thirty-ninth recipient of the Springarn Medal of the NAACP Numerous scientific publications over a span of fifty years. Died, Chicago, May 1, 1971. C.T. Sources: “Medical History,” Journal of National Medical Association, LXII (July, 1970); G. James Fleming, ed., Who’s Who in Colored America (1950).

LAWRASON, Samuel McCutcheon, attorney. Born, New Orleans, July 31, 1852; son of George Carson Lawrason and Zelia McCutcheon. Education: France and Spain; University of Virginia, civil engineering degree, 1872; University of Louisiana, LL. D., 1874. Opened law practice in New Orleans, 1874. Married Harriet Mathews, daughter of George Mathews, 1875. Removed to West Feliciana Parish, La., where he practiced law, 1875; elected parish judge, 1876, serving until office abolished, 1879; prime mover in Ballot Reform League, 1879; member school board, West Feliciana Parish, 1884-1905; member, 1887-1923, board of supervisors, Louisiana State University, an early advocate of co-education; state senator, 1896-1900, 1920-1924; vice-president, Louisiana constitutional convention, 1898; author of Lawrason Act by which municipalities in Louisiana are incorporated without specific act of legislature, 1898; unsuccessful candidate for lieutenant governor, 1908. Member, State Board of Education, 1908-1912; member, warden, lay reader, Grace Episcopal Church, 1875-1924; member, Feliciana Lodge #31, Free and Accepted Masons, Worshipful Master, 1924. Died, November 1924; interred Grace Church Cemetery, St. Francisville, La. E.K.D. Sources: Files of Lawrason & Kilbourne, Attorneys at Law, St. Francisville, 1909-1924; West Feliciana Public Records; Lawrason family papers; New Orleans Times-Picayune, November 9, 1924.

LAWRENCE, A. B., clergyman, journalist. Born, Connecticut, 1787. Educated in New York state and converted to Presbyterianism. Later removed to Kentucky and was ordained there before removing to Tennessee. About 1837 removed to New Orleans where he joined the Louisiana Presbytery. Lawrence’s chief accomplishment was his editorship of the New Orleans Observer, a denominational newspaper which stressed conservative Presbyterian doctrine. He later removed to Mississippi. Died near Edwards Depot, Hinds County, Miss., of pneumonia, November 1, 1882. T.F.R. Source: Minutes of the Synod of Mississippi, from 1861 to 1867 (1880).

LAWRENCE, Henry Effingham, planter, merchant. Born, Bayside, Long Island, N. Y., May 29, 1810; son of Judge Effingham Lawrence and Ann Townsend. Married, 1844, Frances Emily Brashear, daughter of Dr. Walter Brashear (q.v.) and Margaret Barr. Children: Walter (b. 1845), Robert Brashear (b. 1847), Townsend (b. 1849), Nancy Barr (b. 1851), Margaret (b. 1853), Mary Effie (b. 1855), and Lydia Lee (b. 1859). Successful coffee merchant in New Orleans. Promoted New Orleans, Opelousas, and Great Western Railroad construction to link Algiers with Brashear where he lived on Tiger Island Plantation. Was appointed special envoy by Secretary of State Daniel Webster in 1842 to negotiate the release of Americans taken prisoner by Santa Anna. After Dr. Brashear’s death in 1860, Lawrence managed his father-in-law’s estate. Mrs. Lawrence and son Townsend donated, 1876, square in Morgan City, La., named Lawrence Park. Died, en route from Bayside to New York City, August 17, 1875; interred Bayside. L.K.L. Source: Brashear-Lawrence Papers, Morgan City Archives.

LAWRENCE, John William, architect, academic. Born, New Orleans, October 30, 1923; son of William Noel Lawrence and Theresa Ormond. Education: local schools, Tulane University, B. S., 1944; Columbia University, M. S., 1948. Military service: U. S. Naval Reserve, 1943-1946. Married Maxine Marie Stiegler, December 16, 1950. Children: Mark, John, Mary Elise, Annette, Elizabeth. Instructor at Tulane University, 1949-1960; professor and dean of Tulane University School of Architecture, 1960-1971. Partner in architectural firm of Lawrence and Saunders; design consultant of the Public Housing Administration; principal investigator and administrator of the Vieux Carré Survey; director of the Tulane Design Project for the Vieux Carré waterfront; member of the Vieux Carré Commission. Awarded the Cardinal Lecaro Medal of excellence in church design for 1963. Constultant for Ford Foundation’s Program in the Humanities and the Arts; chairman and national secretary of the Committee on Creativity in Design for the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture; member of 1970 Urban America, Inc.; member, American Institute of Architects, Catholic Art Association, Tau Sigma Delta, Gargoyle; member, editorial commission of A Guide to New Orleans Architecture, 1949-1959. His works published in leading American and foreign journals and books on contemporary architecture; consultant to Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District. Posthumously awarded the John H. Stibbs Award for 1971. Died, New Orleans, April 20, 1971; interred St. Louis Cemetery II. E.S.** Sources: Who’s Who in America, 1962-1963; New Orleans States-Item, April 20, 22, 23, 1971; New Orleans Times-Picayune, April 21, 1971; Clarion Herald, April 22, 1971.

LAYSSARD, Antoine Valentin, administrator. Born, ca. 1749, third son of Etienne Maraffret Layssard I and Hélène Fazende. Commandant of Rapides Post during portion of period from 1794-1803. According to the 1810 census, a wife and thirteen children under the age of 10 shared his home on Bayou Rapides. Leader in civil and military affairs. Captain in the force that helped Gen. James Wilkinson (q.v.) expel the Spaniards from Louisiana in 1806. Died after 1820 census. L.S.* Sources: Elaine H. Brister, Once Upon a River (1968); Henry G. & Elizabeth Eskew, Alexandria ‘Way Down in Dixie (1950); Catherine Baillio Futch, The Baillio Family (1961).

LAZARO, Ladislas, physician, congressman. Born near Ville Platte, La., June 5, 1872; son of Marie Denise Ortego and Alexandre Lazaro. Education: local public and private schools; Holy Cross College, New Orleans; Louisville (Ky.) Medical College, graduated, 1894. Married Mamie Curley of Washington, La., December 21, 1895. Children: Mary (Mrs. Edward Lake), Elaine (Mrs. South Trimble), Eloise (Mrs. Allen White), and Ladislas, Jr. Practiced medicine in Washington until 1913; president of St. Landry Parish Medical Society and first vice-president of the state medical society. Became interested in agricultural pursuits and operated his own farm near Washington. President, parish school board for four years; served in the state senate, 1908-1912; elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-third and to the seven succeeding congresses; was ranking Democrat on the house Merchant Marine Committee; took a leading role in the legislation which led to the authorization of the Intracoastal Waterway project; supported the tariff on sugar and rice; was nominated for his house seat five times without opposition; served from March 4, 1913, until his death. Member, Roman Catholic church, the Elks, and the Knights of Columbus. Died, Washington, D. C., March 20, 1927; interred Old City Cemetery, Ville Platte. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Who’s Who in Louisiana and Mississippi (1918); New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, March 31, 1927.

LEA, Fannie Heaslip, author, journalist. Born, New Orleans, October 30, 1884; daughter of James John and Margaret Heaslip Lea. Education: Newcomb College, B. A. degree, 1904; graduate work in English for two years at Tulane University. Feature articles for New Orleans newspapers from 1906 to 1911 and short stories in national magazines such as Harper’s and Woman’s Home Companion. Married Hamilton Pope Agee, 1911, and removed to Honolulu, where she gave birth to a daughter. Divorced from Agee in 1926, removed to New York City, where she lived the remainder of her life. A writer from her youth, she produced over one hundred stories, two volumes of poems, and essays in major publications, as well as publishing nineteen novels, highly popular with readers. The author’s novels generally are entertaining light romances, well written and with believable characters. Situations and characters are sometimes more provocative in her short stories, where she examines unstereotypical themes. The first of several plays, Round-About, was produced by the New York Theater Assembly in 1929. An Episcopalian, a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and the Authors’ League of America. Her works include: Quicksand (1911); Jaconetta Stories(1912); Sicily Ann (1914); Chloe Malone (1916); The Dream-Maker Man (1925); With This Ring(1925); With or Without (1926); Wild Goose Chase (1929); Happy Landings (1930); Goodbye, Summer (1932); Take Back the Heart (1931); Half-Angel (1931); Summer People (1933); Doree (1934); Anchor Man (1935); Crede Byron (1936); The Four Marys (1937); Once to Every Man (1938); Not for Just an Hour (1939); Nobody’s Girl (1940); There Are Brothers (1940); Sailor’s Star (1944); The Devil Within (1948); Verses for Lovers (and Some Others) (1955). The author’s papers are at the University of Oregon Library, Eugene, Oregon. Died, New York, January 13, 1955. D.H.B. Sources: S. J. Kunitz and H. Haycrarft, eds., 20th Century Authors (1942); 20th Century Authors, First Supplement (1955); National Cyclopedia of American Biography; American Women Writers, II (1980).

LEACOCK, William Thomas, clergyman, pro-slavery spokesman. Born, England, ca. 1810. A graduate of Queen’s College, Oxford, lived in Jamaica before coming to the lower Mississippi Valley where he traveled widely. Though trained in the formalism of the Church of England, he was popular in New Orleans for tastefully blending both high and low church characteristics. Leacock became rector of Christ Church in 1852 and remained there until his death in 1884. In 1860, he won national attention when he and his clerical colleague, the Rev. Benjamin M. Palmer (q.v.) of the city’s First Presbyertian Church, issued published sermons in favor of self-determination for the South and its institution of slavery. T.F.R. Sources: Penrose St. Amant, “Louisiana: Protestant Episcopal Church,” in Samuel S. Hill, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion in the South (1984); Benjamin M. Palmer and W. T. Leacock, The Rights of the South Defended in the Pulpits (1860); Timothy F. Reilly, “Religious Leaders and Social Criticism in New Orleans, 1800-1861” (Ph. D. dissertation, Univ. of Missouri at Columbia, 1972).

LEAKE, James Rucker, businessn, politician. Born, St. Francisville, La., February 5, 1907. Education: local schools; Spring Hill College, Mobile, Ala.; and Louisiana State University. Married Elizabeth O’Donnell of Monroe, La., June 21, 1932; developed Pecan Grove, first subdivision in St. Francisville, 1946; board of aldermen, St. Francisville, 1948-1955; mayor pro-tem, 1952-1955; served in Louisiana house of representatives, 1955-1966, influential in paving parish roads, installing dial telephone service; chairman of special commission to re-apportion legislature; chairman, House Health and Welfare Commission; resigned from legislature, 1966. Appointed member State Tax Commission, June 1967; named president of Bank of Commerce, 1965. Died September 22, 1969; interred Grace Church Cemetery, St. Francisville. E.K.D. Sources: Oath Book, West Feliciana Parish; Leake family papers.

LEAKE, William Walter, attorney, politician. Born, West Feliciana Parish, La., April 22, 1833; son of James Leake and Mary Rucker. Education: Centenary College, Jackson, La., 1846-1849. Station agent West Feliciana Railroad, 1853. Studied law under L. D. Brewer and J. H. Collins, St. Francisville attorneys, 1856; admitted to Louisiana bar, 1857. Joined firm of Brewer & Collins which became Collins and Leake after Brewer was killed in the explosion of the steamboat Princess, 1859. Married Margaret Mumford, 1857. Civil War service: captain, Company C, First Louisiana Cavalry, 1861-1863; resigned commisison, returned to St. Francisville where he entered Col. Ogden’s Battalion of Cavalry and Artillery, serving until 1865. While at home was notified of death of J. E. Hart, lieutenant commander, USS Albatross, a gunboat then shelling towns of Bayou Sara and St. Francisville, and, as Senior Warden of Feliciana Lodge No. 31, F & AM, read Masonic burial rites as the rector of Grace Episcopal Church buried Hart in Grace Church Cemetery, April 11, 1863. After the war, resumed practice of law; appointed district attorney, Fifteenth Judicial District, by Gov. Francis T. Nicholls (q.v.), 1879; member, constitutional convention, 1879; Louisiana senate, 1880-1884; chairman, Education Committee, 1880-1882; judge, Court of Appeals, 1896-1904; president, People’s Bank, St. Francisville, 1905; member and master, Mason Feliciana Lodge No. 31; member, Grace Episcopal Church; charter member, Bayou Sara Lodge No. 15, Knights of Pythias. Died, St. Francisville, January 20, 1912; interred Grace Church Cemetery. E.K.D. Sources: True Democrat, January 27, 1912; Goodspeed’s Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (1892); Minutes, Feliciana Lodge No. 31, F & AM; Parish register, Grace Church.

LEAKE-ROBINSON, May E., journalist. Born, Baton Rouge, May 11, 1864; daughter of E. P. Thomas. Education: Reed Villa, private school, Baton Rouge. Taught in public and private schools of East Baton Rouge, Pointe Coupée, and West Feliciana parishes. With first husband W. W. Leake, Jr. (d. 1901) founded the True Democrat as anti-lottery organ, 1893; remained its editor until her death, a ceaseless advocate of good roads, good public schools, and tireless booster of twin towns of St. Francisville and Bayou Sara. Married (2) Elrie Robinson, (q.v.) who joined her in newspaper and became noted authority on antique type. Died, June 3, 1925; interred Grace Church Cemetery, St. Francisville. E.K.D. Source: True Democrat, June 6, 1925.

LEARY, Calvin, planter. Born, Duplin County, N. C., February 2, 1811; son of Job Leary and Jane Cox. Removed to Houston County, Ga., in 1834. Married (1), 1834, Hephzibah Lofton, daughter of Joel Lofton and Nancy Taylor, who also resided in Houston County Children: Caroline (b. 1837), James (b. 1839), Martha Anne (b. 1841), Robert M. (b. 1843), John Calvin (b. 1845), William Penn (b. 1847), and Frances Jane (b. 1849). Became a successful planter in Houston County, Ga. Elected sheriff of Houston County, 1846. Was a major in the Georgia militia and known thereafter as Major Leary. Removed to Bienville Parish, La., January 1850 and purchased land which is presently located in Webster Parish, 4 miles southeast of Minden. His plantation, named Sunnyside, consisted of over 2,000 acres. In 1860 he owned 23 slaves. In addition to cotton and corn, he planted wheat, oats, and rye. Orchard, begun in 1853, contained over 24 named varieties of apples and pears. Raised cattle, hogs, sheep and horses. Marketed beef and pork. Kept detailed plantation records. Entries date from 1848 to 1881. Known as the “Model Farmer” of North Louisiana. In 1857 he chaired a meeting in Mt. Lebanon to organize the Bienville Parish Agricultural Society, which held an agricultural fair in 1858 and 1859, the first of its kind to be held in Louisiana. In 1865, 12 years after his first wife’s death, he married (2) a widow, Elizabeth Hamilton Branch. One child: Evie (1866-1868). Died in Minden, La., June 22, 1882; interred Sunnyside Plantation Cemetery near Minden. W.W.C. Sources: William W. Colbert, Jr., “Descendants of Job Leary and Jane Cox Leary” (unpublished compilation, 1965); North Louisiana Historical Association Journal, II, No. 2 (Fall, 1970); Dept. of Archives and History, Atlanta, Ga.

LEATHERS, Thomas P., steamboat pioneer. Born, Kenton County, Ky., May 24, 1816; son of John Leathers and Jane Stork. Became a mate on brother’s river steamer, 1836; worked with brother on Mississippi River until 1845. Established, 1845, his own steamboat company and built the first of a series of steamers named the Natchez. Established, 1845, a record for steamboat travel between New Orleans and St. Louis, 3 days, 21 hours, 50 minutes. Removed to New Orleans, 1859. Active in steamboating during Civil War and afterward. Married a Miss Bell, 1844. One child, Jesse, named for his maternal grandfather. A.W.B. Sources: E. W. Gould, Fifty Years on the Mississippi (1889); Goodspeed’s Bio­graphical and Historical Memoirs of Louisisana (1892).

LEBEAU, Pierre Oscar, clergyman. Born, Pointe Coupée (New Roads), La., February 24, 1870; son of A. O. Lebeau and E. Bergeron. Education: college studies at St. Mary’s in Kansas; began seminary studies in 1890 at St. Mary’s Seminary and St. Joseph’s Seminary in Baltimore, Md. Ordained 1895 as a member of the Society of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart. Became founding pastor of Immaculate Conception Parish, Palmetto, La., 1897. Area where the church was built originally known as Petite Prairie, but renamed in honor of Lebeau. Became pastor in 1909 of first Josephite parish in New Orleans, first known as St. Dominic’s, later St. Joan of Arc. Died, New Orleans, December 17, 1915. Interred Immaculate Conception churchyard, Lebeau, La. T.B.J. Source: The Josephite Archives, Baltimore, Maryland.

LEBLANC, Dudley J. (“Couzin Dud”), entrepreneur, politician. Born, Capitan Community near Youngsville, La., August 16, 1894. Education: local schools; University of Southwestern Louisiana. Served as sergeant in the U. S. Army in World War I. Married Evelyn Hebert of Abbeville, La. Children: Dudley, Jr., Roland, Jean, Morgan, Kay Thérèse, and Bertha Anne LeBlanc. Elected member of the Louisiana house of representatives in 1924; member, Louisiana Public Service Commission, 1926; elected and served as senator, 1940-1944; 1948-1952; 1964; president, Association of Louisiana Acadians; active in the formation of CODOFIL; authored three books: The True Story of the Acadians (1927); The Improved Version (1932); The Acadian Miracle (1966). Formed the Happy Day Co. in 1945, traveling extensively promoting the sale of Hadacol; newscaster in both English and French on local radio stations in 1946; co-founder of an insurance business. Member: Catholic Church donated land on which St. Theresa Catholic Church of Abbeville now stands. Died, October 22, 1971, interred St. Mary Magdalen Parish Cemetery, Abbeville. O.C.G. Sources: Perry Howard, Political Tendencies in Louisiana; Acadiana Profile, VI, Nos. 1-2; New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 29, 1966; October 24, 1971; March 29, 1971; October 23, 1971; Lafayette Daily Advertiser, January 27, 1969; October 22, 1971; Abbeville Meridional, November 19, 1963; Lafayette Tribune, August 7, 1930; Dudley J. LeBlanc, The Acadian Miracle (1966).

LeBLANC, Fred S., lawyer, jurist, politician. Born on a small River Road farm five miles south of Baton Rouge, July 24, 1897; son of Wallace B. LeBlanc and Marie Von Phul. Education: attended the Convention Street School in Baton Rouge; St. Vincent’s High School (later Catholic High School); law degree, Louisiana State University Law School, 1920. Career: assistant district attorney, East Baton Rouge Parish, 1928-1935; Mayor of Baton Rouge, 1941-1944; attorney general for the state of Louisiana, 1944-1948 and 1952-1956; district attorney, East Baton Rouge Parish, 1949-1952; judge, nineteenth judicial district, 1958-1969. Member: Judicial Council of the State Supreme Court, (1963-1966), American Bar Association, Louisiana Bar Association, East Baton Rouge Parish Bar Association, Atomic Energy Commission, American Legion. Died, Baton Rouge, June 11, 1969. J.D.W. Sources: Lafayette Daily Advertiser, June 12, 1969; New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 12, 1969; J. Cleveland Fruge, Biography of Louisiana Judges (1965).

LeBLANC, Samuel A., teacher, lawyer, politician, jurist. Born, Paincourtville, Assumption Parish, La., August 29, 1886; son of Col. Joseph LeBlanc and Camille (Dugas) LeBlanc. Married Elmire Lafaye, August 7, 1912; four children. Education: degree from Jefferson College, Convent, La., 1904; law degree from Tulane University, 1908. Career: taught at Jefferson College, 1905, and at the Napoleonville, La., school, 1906; founded a private law practice in Napoleonville, 1908; appointed to fill an unexpired term on the state board of public institutions, ca. 1909. Elected to the Louisiana house of representatives, 1912; the 23rd judicial court for the state of Louisiana, 1920; the court of appeals in Baton Rouge, 1930; the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1949. Died, Napoleonville, La., July 8, 1955; interred, St. Ann’s cemetery, Napoleonville, La. J.D.W. Sources: Clippings, vertical file, Louisiana State Library, Baton Rouge, La.; Alcée Fortier, Louisiana: Comprising Sketches of Parishes, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons Arranged in Cyclopedic Form (1914).

LEBLANC DE VILLENEUFVE, Paul-Louis, soldier, trader, Indian agent, playwright. Born, Crest, in Dauphiné, France, ca. 1734; son of Balthazar Alsio LeBlanc. Arrived in Louisiana, 1750, as enseigne en pied. Sent by Governor Vaudreuil (q.v.) among the Choctaws from 1752 to 1758; learned Indian language and lore. Served during the American Revolution and took part in the action at Fort Bute, Baton Rouge, Mobile, and Pensacola. Promoted to rank of lieutenant colonel in 1795. Traded among the Indians at Natchitoches in the 1770s. Sent by Athanaze de Mézières (q.v.) to negotiate a treaty with the Nations of the North, 1771. Married Marie-Jeanne Avart, March 31, 1758. Children: Alexandre Balthazar (b. 1759); Joseph de Villeneuve (b. 1760); Valérien Valentin (b. ca. 1763); Térence; and Octave. Author of the earliest extant Louisiana play La Fête du Petit Blé ou l’Héroisme de Poucha-Houmma, a five-act classical tragedy in alexandrine, performed February 15, 1809, at the Théâtre de la Rue St. Pierre, in New Orleans; published, 1814. Died, New Orleans, May 16, 1815. M.A. Source: Mathé Allain, trans. and ed., The Festival of the Young Corn or the Heroism of Poucha-Houmma by Le Blanc de Villeneufve (1964).

LE BLOND DE LA TOUR, Louis-Pierre, engineer. Born in France. Military service during the War of the Spanish Succession: sent to Portugal as a draftsman, 1702; promoted to engineer, 1703; served in the Spanish army, 1704-1708; captured at Alcantara, 1705; exchanged, 1706. Later reentered the French army and served as a noncommissiond officer during the sieges of Marchienne, Douai, Quesnoy, Bouchain, 1712, and Freiburg, 1713. For distinguished service, he was awarded th Cross of St. Louis, 1715. After the war, he served as a reserve captain in the Piedmont regiment and then corporal of royal engineers. He was assigned to Louisiana in 1720 as chief colonial engineer and was ordered to establish a supply base for the colony along the lower Mississippi River. Opposed the development of New Orleans, founded in 1718 by Bienville (q.v.) because of town’s “perpetually unhealthy” site. Persuaded the ruling colonial council to move the capital of Louisiana from Old Biloxi (on northern shore of Biloxi Bay) to present site of Biloxi (then called New Biloxi). Supervised construction of New Biloxi, 1721. When the colony was ordered by French authorities to move the capital to New Orleans, late 1720, La Tour supervised construction of buildings erected upon the town site, 1722. Directed construction of the Balize Post and improvements made at the mouth of the Mississippi for navigation, 1722-1723. Died, New Orleans, October 14, 1723. C.A.B. Sources: Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume, 1607-1896 (1967); Dictionary of American Biography (1946); Marc de Villiers du Terrage, Histoire de la fondation de la Nouvelle-Orléans,1717-1722 (1917); Marcel Giraud, Histoire de la Louisiane française, III (1966); IV (1974).

LeBRETON, Edward F., Jr., politician. Born, New Orleans, La., August 6, 1913; son of Edward F. LeBreton, Sr., and Carmen Suarez LeBreton. Married Gladys Lodoiska Gay January 18, 1947. Three children: Edward F. III, Gladys Fenner Gay, and Robert Aime. Education: attended public schools and Tulane University in New Orleans. Served as chief botswain mate in the United States Coast Guard, 1942-46; more than two years were spent in overseas duty. Business career: partner in the Martin-LeBreton Insurance Agency, later in partnership with son Robert in the LeBreton Insurance Agency, of New Orleans; director, Jackson Homestead, Orleans Loan and Credit Corporation, Eaco, Inc., and Louisiana Warehousing Corporation in New Orleans. Civic activities: member, board of directors of the New Orleans Sports and Cultural Activities Foundation, Inc. Chairman, Affairs of the City of New Orleans Committee, the Governor’s Chep Morrison Memorial Committee, and the Joint Legislative Economy Committee. Member, Mayor’s Area Transportation Authority Study Committee, the Board of Directors of the New Orleans Area Chamber of Commerce, the New Orleans Opera House Association, the Louisiana Mosquito Control Association, the National Association of Casualty and Surety Agents, Citizens’ Conference on State Legislatures, American Judicature Society, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Louisiana Historical Society, President’s Advisory Committee on Studies of Natural Disasters, and President’s Committee for Traffic Safety during President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administrations. Member of numerous New Orleans and Baton Rouge social clubs: the Press Club of New Orleans, Kappa Alpha Alumni Association, Knights of Columbus, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion, Amvets, and the Coast Guard League. Member of the Louisiana House of Representatives from District 92, 1952-1976. By the time of his retirement LeBreton was known as “the Dean” of the legislature. He served under five governors and represented three New Orleans mayors as floor leader. During the Earl Long era, LeBreton, avidly anti-Long, worked with a group of legislators known as “Methical Club 34” to block all but one tax increase proposal. Noted for wearing white suits, he was also called “the last of the ice cream suit politicians.” He authored legislation and participated on committees that promoted the construction of the Mississippi River Bridge, a number of Inter-New Orleans highways and streets, the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, the Industrial Canal Bridge, the New Orleans Public Library, the Civic Center, Louisiana State Office Building, Supreme Court Building and several other major edifices. While in the Legislature, LeBreton served on the Ways and Means Committee and was chairman of both the Joint Legislative Committee on Sex Crimes and the New Orleans Negro Trade School Advisory Committee. President, National Association of State Legislators. Died, Convenant Home, New Orleans, La., March 16, 1984; interred Metairie Cemetery. B.S.C. Sources: J.F. Hyer, The Story of Louisiana (1960), Public Affairs Research Council, Citizen’s Guide to the 1972 Legislature (1972); New Orleans Time Picayune, July 27, 1975, and March 17, 1984.

LECHE, Richard Webster, governor. Born, New Orleans, May 17, 1898; son of Eustace Webster Leche and Stella Eloise Richard. Education: Warren Easton High School; Tulane University, 1916-1918. Left law school and volunteered for military service when U. S. declared war on Germany; assigned to officers training camp at Plattsburg, N.Y.; training interrupted by bout with influenza; subsequently transferred first to Camp Sheridan, Ill., and later to officers training program at Yale University. Armistice invoked before assignment to active duty. Following discharge entered Loyola Law School, LL.B., 1922; Université Laval (Quebec), LL.D., 1937. Married Elton Reynolds, October 12, 1927. Children: Richard Webster, Jr., and Charles Eustace. Part-time salesman while attending school, 1919-1922. Admitted to Louisiana bar, 1922. Active in Democratic party: partisan of O. H. Simpson (q.v.) before 1928; joined Long camp after 1928; legal advisor to Gov. O. K. Allen (q.v.), 1933-1934; elected governor of Louisiana, 1936; inherited sweeping executive powers granted by the legislature immediately following Huey Long’s assassination; encouraged federal spending in Louisiana; sponsored statewide one-cent sales tax to fund public welfare programs; sponsored 10-year tax exemption for new industries locating in Louisiana; in depths of Great Depression, built ornate, air-conditioned cage for LSU mascot; personally indulged in conspicuous consumption, buying yacht, country estate, and private hunting preserve on annual salary of $7,500; purchases attracted attention of federal authorities; O. John Rogge, federal prosecutor, sent to investigate rumors of corruption. Leche subsequently resigned, June, 1939, citing health reasons; was later indicted and convicted of mail fraud for taking $31,000 in kickbacks on the purchase of 233 state trucks; sentenced to ten years in Atlanta federal prison, 1940; debarred, 1943; parolled, 1945; given full pardon by President Truman, 1952. Operated a nursery at Lacombe, La., for eight years following release from prison. Readmitted to Louisiana bar, ca. 1953, and returned to legal practice in New Orleans. In 1960s, began working as lobbyist for construction firms. Member: Democratic State Central Committee, chairman; American Bar Association; Louisiana Bar Association; Delta Sigma Phi; Masonic Order. Died, February 22, 1965, after a long illness; interred Metairie Cemetery, New Orleans. C.A.B. Sources: T. Harry Williams, Huey Long (1969); The Historical Encyclopedia of Louisiana, 2 vols. (n.d.); Harnett T. Kane, Louisiana Hayride … (1941); David Zinman, “Louisiana Scandals Cut Short Career of Gov. Richard Leche,” Lake Charles American Press, May 3, 1964; Who Was Who in America with World Notables, vol. IV, 1961-1968 (1968); “Former Louisiana Gov. Leche Dies,” Lafayette Advertiser, February 22, 1965.

LE CONNIAT, Marie Madeleine, religious. Born, Plounez, France, January 26, 1817; daughter of Joseph Marie and Catherine Le Grand Le Conniat. Educated by the Daughters of the Cross of Tréguier, France; admitted to their novitiate for entrance into their order, July 13, 1839, under the name Soeur Marie Hyacinthe (her title of Soeur changed to Mère or Mother upon her appointment as superior of the house of Tréguier). During novitiate and thereafter, studied principles of classroom teaching and administration as well as tenets of religious life. Pronounced religious vows as a Daughter of the Cross, July 23, 1840; appointed superior of the house of Tréguier. Leader of ten Daughters of the Cross who established schools in Louisiana at request of Bishop Auguste Marie Martin of Natchitoches, La.. In addition to Avoyelles, founded schools in Ile Brevelle, Alexandria, Shreveport, Monroe, and Lake Providence. Established St. Vincent de Paul Motherhouse and Academy in Shreveport in 1868. Returned to France in 1882 to head Louisiana Recruiting Center for Daughters of the Cross missions in Louisiana. Died, Brest, France, October 26, 1897; interred garden chapel of her Sisters’ convent, Tréguier. D.O.M. Source: Author’s research.

LE COURT DE PRELLE, Jean Louis Mathias, soldier, planter, Indian trader/diplomat. Born, Camaret, Brittany, France, February 24, 1717; son of Joseph Le Court de Presle, a career naval officer of Normandy, and Jeanne de la Haye. Arrived in Louisiana, ca. 1746. Promoted to enseigne en second, 1750, enseigne en pied, 1754, and served additionally as clerk of Poste St. Jean-Baptiste des Natchitoches intermittently in this same period. Upon the transfer of Louisiana to Spanish control in 1763 and the removal of French armed forces, Le Court retired from active military service and acquired a large grant of land at Le Court Bluffs (now Monette’s Bluffs) near the lower juncture of present Cane and Red rivers, a tract which he rapidly developed. The censuses of the Natchitoches jurisdiction of 1766 place him in the upper six percentile in terms of agricultural production. Under the Spanish regime, recommissioned an ensign, and later lieutenant, in the reserve militia. In 1771 Commandant Athanase Christophe Fortunate Manguet de Mézières (q.v.) assigned to him the responsibility for all official commerce with San Luis de Cadodachos since he was a man “welcome to the Indians and conversant with them.” Removing subsequently to the outpost San Luis, some five hundred miles northwest of Natchitoches, Le Court was to make his residence there for some years prior to his death in 1783. The union of Le Court to Marie Jeanne Le Roy (1735-1777), daughter of Etienne Le Roy and Louise Françoise Guillot, was blessed in March 1765 by a missionary priest travelling through Rivière aux Cannes. Children: Pierre Laurens (b. 1757); Jean-Baptiste (b. 1759); Marie Antoinée (b. 1761), married Nicolas Gallien; Barthélémy (b. 1763); Athanase (b. 1766); Marie Françoise (b. 1769), married Pierre Dupré; Cécile (b. 1773), married Athanase Dupré. The plantation which Le Court and Marie Jeanne established at Rivière aux Cannes unexpectedly assumed a curious role in history. It was purchased from their heirs by the Northern-born Robert McAlpine, whom tradition identifies as the prototype of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s arch-villain, Simon Legree. A portion of the land, in the twentieth century, falls within the plantation that has been named “Little Eva” in memory of McAlpine’s (or Legree’s) fictional victim. E.S.M. Sources: Elizabeth Shown Mills, Natchitoches, 1729-1803: Abstracts of the Catholic Church Registers of the French and Spanish Post of St. Jean Baptiste des Natchitoches in Louisiana (1977); Elizabeth Shown Mills, Natchitoches Colonial Censuses, Military Rolls, and Tax Lists, 1722-1803 (1983); Herbert E. Bolton, Athanase de Mézières and the Louisiana-Texas Frontier, 1768-1780, 2 vols. (1914); Glenn R. Conrad, First Families of Louisiana, 2 vols. (1970); D. B. Corley, A Visit to Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1893); Documents 1285, 2629, Office of the Clerk of Court, Natchitoches, La.; Le Court family papers, in possession of the author.

LEDBETTER, Huddie “Leadbelly”, blues jazz musician. Born, Mooringsport, La., January 20, 1889(?). By age 16 Ledbetter was playing guitar in bars and brothels in Shreveport’s “red light district”; later traveled to Dallas and played his guitar with bands in East Texas roadhouses and Dallas’ “Deep Elm” district. Involved in several scrapes with the law in 1915-1917, was sentenced to thirty years in the Shaw State Farm in Houston in 1918 but was released in 1925 after a prison concert that impressed Gov. Pat Neff who pardoned him. He was in Angola Prison in Louisiana in 1933 when John and Alan Lomax, making recordings for the Library of Congress, pleaded with Gov. O. K. Allen (q.v.) for clemency for Ledbetter. They took him to New York City where he achieved success as a blues performer, performing with Woody Guthrie and others. He was arrested again in 1939 and served a two-year sentence in New York’s Riker’s Island Prison. He married Martha Promise, a former Shreveport laundry worker in 1935. He made a few recordings with American Record Co. and these, along with field recordings made by Lomax, are the best available examples of his voice and guitar style. Died December 6, 1949, of Lou Gehrig’s disease in New York City’s Bellevue Hospital. P.L.M. Source: Author’s research.

LEDOUX, Dewey, businessman. Born, Church Point, La., September 6, 1898; son of Amos Ledoux and Claire McBride. Active in community and church affairs. Member, Usher’s Society and the building committee of Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Prairie Ronde, La. A Fourth Degree Knight of Columbus and a member of Woodmen of the World. Member, Louisiana Sweet Potato Association and ardent supporter of the Yambilee Festival, Opelousas, La. Member, board of directors, Southwest Louisiana Membership Corporation (SLEMCO) for over two decades. Past chairman, Prairie Ronde Drainage District which serves part of St. Landry and Evangeline parishes. Director, Federal Land Bank Association of Opelousas, serving the parishes of St. Landry, Evangeline and Avoyelles. Chapter chairman, St. Landry Parish Red Cross two terms and also served on the board of directors of that group. Member, Opelousas Chamber of Commerce, the Rotary Club, St. Landry Parish Farm Bureau and Cattlemen’s Association. Cited by former President Richard Nixon for his long-time service as chairman of the St. Landry Parish Selective Service Board 60 in 1969. The Evangeline Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America honored him by conferring on him a “guardian” lifetime membership for his support of Boy Scout work in the area. The Louisiana Sweet Potato Association honored him by presenting him the 1972-1973 Distinguished Service Award for his longtime support of the Louisiana yam industry at a banquet in his honor during the Yambilee. Married Alice Andrepont, daughter of Emar Andrepont and Alice Dupré of Prairie Ronde, La., September 19, 1922. Seven children. Died, March 26, 1976. N.L. Source: Author’s research.

LEE, James A., businessman. Born, New Orleans, November 4, 1830. Removed as a young man to Franklin, La., and then to New Iberia, La., in 1857. Druggist by profession; city and parish civic leader. Married Lucinda Ray of St. Landry Parish, La., March 24, 1854. Children: Charles, Annie, Virginia, and Philip. Organized local medical services during yellow-fever epidemic, 1867. Member, Knights of Temperance, Anti-Lottery League. Unwaivering supporter of public education. Worked tirelessly to have Southwest Louisiana Industrial Institute (now University of Southwestern Louisiana) located in New Iberia. When school was located in Lafayette, La., continued his support of it. Lee Hall on USL campus named for subject. Died, January 8, 1904; interred Rosehill Cemetery, New Iberia. G.R.C. Sources: Obituary, New Iberia Enterprise, January 9, 1904; Glenn R. Conrad, New Iberia: Essays on the Town and Its People (1986).

LEEDS, Charles Jedediah, businessman, mayor of New Orleans. Born, Stonington, Conn., 1823; son of Jedediah and Mary Stanton Leeds. Family removed to New Orleans soon after subject’s birth. Father established long-prosperous Leeds Iron Foundry, 1824. Charles took over business at death of father, 1844. Married Mary Josephine Rawle, May 21, 1856. Leeds’s life remains largely obscure. His term as mayor, 1874-1876, was not successful owing to a prevailing national economic depression (1873-1878) and on-going friction between the “Radical” Republican state administration and the Democratic city administration headed by Leeds. Died, New Orleans, July 6, 1898. M.T.C. Sources: M. G. Holli and Peter d’A. Jones, eds., Biographical Dictionary of American Mayors, 1820-1980: Big City Mayors (1981); J. G. Taylor, Louisiana Reconstructed, 1863-1877 (1974).

LEGARDEUR, René Joseph, businessman, historian. Born, New Orleans, January 22, 1893; son of René Joseph LeGardeur, Sr., and Marie Henriette Vergnes. Education: graduate of Tulane University. Before retirement was president of Southport Manufacturing Company, Inc. Before his association with the firm, he worked as a certified public accountant. Known as an authority on Louisiana history. Wrote numerous articles, the most noted being “The First New Orleans Theatre, 1792-1803”, and belonged to many historical and cultural associations. Married, September 15, 1920, Mary Ryland Buchanan. Children: René III and Daniel B. At the time of death, was actively engaged in research in the West Indies, and was compiling the names and other data on refugees from Saint-Domingue, who came to Louisiana. Died, July 3, 1973. A.D.F. Source: Genealogical Research Society of New Orleans; New Orleans States-Item, July 4, 1973.

LEGRAND, Julia, see Julia Ellen Legrand WAITZ

LEHMANN, Emile Jacques, journalist, civic leader, city secretary. Born, Morgan City, La., March 26, 1910; son of Meyer Lehmann and Theresa Freund; grandson of Jacques Lehmann of Alsace-Lorraine, who settled in Brashear (now Morgan City) in 1870. Education: local schools and Tulane University. Went to work as advertising manager for Morgan City Review which he later co-edited with his wife. Married, January 26, 1937, Lela King. One son, Meyer King Lehmann (b. 1947). Lehmann enlisted in 1942 in U. S. Navy and served aboard a destroyer and at a blimp base in Brazil for four years. In 1946 he was appointed city secretary by the late Mayor Maurice D. Shannon (q.v.), was reappointed by Shannon’s successor, Mayor C. R. Brownell (q.v.), in 1951, and served in that post more than thirty years until forced to resign by ill health. Succeeded his father-in-law, Charles E. King as president of King-Hannaford Co., Inc., printing-bookbinding concern. Charter member and past president of Morgan City Rotary Club; past commander of Atchafalaya Post #96, American Legion; officer and director, Morgan City Chamber of Commerce; charter member board of commissioners of Municipal Auditorium; charter member, Atchafalaya Chapter, American Petroleum Institute; twenty-five-year member Doric Lodge #205, F. & A.M., member of Temple Shaare Zedek. Died, November 8, 1977; interred Morgan City Cemetery. L.K.L. Sources: Lehmann family papers, Morgan City Archives; Morgan City Daily Review, November 8, 9, 1977.

LEIGH, Thomas Watkins, attorney. Born, Winnsboro, La., April 8, 1904; son of Benjamin Watkins Leigh and Olive Buckingham. Family removed to Monroe, La., 1907. Education: Monroe schools; Louisiana State University, LL. B., 1924. Sworn in before Louisiana Supreme Court, November 1924. Practiced law, 1925-1927; later became associated with firm of Theus, Grisham & Davis. Firm became, 1929 Theus, Grisham, Davis & Leigh. Military service: volunteer during World War II. Upon release from active duty, 1945, promoted to rank of lieutenant commander, United States Naval Reserve. Member: Fourth District, Louisiana, and American bar associations, worked with innumerable committees of these associations, and in 1954 selected as president of Louisiana Bar Association. Served as representative from Louisiana in house of delegates of American Bar Association, 1958-1983. Served on board of governors of American Bar Association, 1975-1978. Member, Louisiana State University Board of Supervisors, 1940-1960, chairman, 1948-1950; member, Commission to Administer Higher Education Facilities; chairman, Louisiana State Mineral Board, 1966-1972; served with special team of attorneys to represent Louisiana in handling the tidelands litigation; twice a delegate to a Louisiana constitutional convention, 1956 and 1973. Member, Order of the Coif; Omicron Delta Kappa, a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation; a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, a fellow of the American College of Probate Counsel; a member of the American Law Institute and of the American Judicature Society; and a member of the Council of the Louisiana State Law Institute; director, First National Bank of West Monroe. Member: Grace Episcopal Church. Married, Louise Grisham Kellogg, 1942. Died, Monroe, La., August 7, 1983. L.D.S. Source: Authors’ research.

LEJEUNE, Angelas, Cajun musician (accordion), singer. Born, May 21, 1900, Pointe Noire, Acadia Parish, La. Recorded from 1928 through 1934, usually with fiddler Dennis McGee; instrumental in developing contemporary Cajun music repertoire; influenced his nephew Iry Lejeune (q.v.). Died, Pointe Noire, June 12, 1974. B.J.A. Source: Author’s research.

LEJEUNE, David, pioneer. Born, Terras, Picardy, France, 1739(?); said to have arrived in Feliciana during British rule. Mercenary in Waldeck Regiment. Married (1) Anne Ducros (d. 1803), a native of Long Island, N. Y. Married (2) Constance Beauvais (d. 1832), native of Saint-Domingue. Served as alcalde, Third Division, New Feliciana, 1795-1804; planter and storekeeper, 17(??)-1816. Died, 1816; interred Pointe Coupée Parish, La. E.K.D. Sources: West Feliciana Parish Records; American State Papers.

LEJEUNE, Iry, Cajun musician (accordion), singer, bandleader, composer. Born, Pointe Noire, Acadia Parish, La., October 27, 1928. Influenced by Amédé Ardoin (q.v.). Recorded “La Valse du Pont d’Amour” in 1948 to lead off the Cajun music revival after World War II; continued to record extensively until his death in 1955; influenced an entire generation of contemporary Cajun musicians. Died, near Eunice, La., October 8, 1955. B.J.A. Source: Author’s research.

LEJEUNE, John Archer, soldier. Born, Old Hickory Plantation, Pointe Coupée Parish, La., January 10, 1863. Education: at home; attended Louisiana State University, 1881-1883; U. S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, graduated 1888. Served aboard U. S. S. Vandalia during Samoan crisis, 1889. Commissioned second lieutenant of Marines, July 1, 1890; promoted first lieutenant, February 26, 1892. Married Ellie Murdaugh, October 23, 1895. On duty aboard cruiser Cincinnati during Spanish-American War. As a major kept order in Panama during the rebellion against Columbia, 1903-1904. Commanded an expeditionary brigade in the Philippines, 1907-1909. Attended Army War College, 1909-1910. Promoted lieutenant colonel, May 13, 1908; led expeditions to Cuba and Vera Cruz, 1914. Promoted colonel, February 19, 1914; promoted to rank of brigadier general, 1916. Commanded Fourth Marine Brigade in France, 1917. Promoted to rank of major general, 1918; commanded Second Infantry Division until end of World War I. Commandant, U. S. Marine Corps, 1920-1929; modernized the corps and initiated the development of amphibious warfare training. President, Virginia Military Institute, 1929-1937. Died, Baltimore, Md., November 20, 1942; interred Arlington National Cemetery. A.W.B. Sources: Joe A. Simon, “The Life and Career of General John Archer Lejeune: The Greatest Leatherneck of Them All” (M.A. thesis, Louisiana State University, 1967); “John Archer Lejeune,” Dictionary of American Biogrpahy, Supplement 3, 1941-1945.

LE KINTREK, Jean-Joseph dit Dupont, pioneer. Migrated to Louisiana from France in 1716. Served as jailer at the New Orleans prison in 1738. On December 11, 1738, entered into partnership with Joseph Blanpain to engage in fur trade with Attakapas and Opelousas Indians. Partnership was dissolved in 1744. Was perhaps the first European settler in the Opelousas post. Died in 1753. C.A.B. Sources: Vincent H. Cassidy and Mathé Allain, “The Attakapas Territory, 1727-1747,” Attakapas Gazette, III (1968); “Records of the Superior Council,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, VI (1923); X (1927); XXII (1939).

LEMANN, Solene “Lucy” Benjamin, civic leader and activist. Born, New Orleans, 1899. Graduated from Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Mass., 1920. Tired of staging performances by orchestras from other places, Lemann led a group of six individuals that founded the New Orleans Symphony in 1936; also helped start the New Orleans chapter of American Women’s Volunteer Services in 1942. During the 1940s, Lemann helped finance The Louisiana Story; directed by Robert Flaherty, this film showed the effects of the oil industry on the lives of Louisiana Cajuns. Moved to New York, 1957. During the 1960s Lemann, a longtime benefactor of environmental causes and the anti-nuclear movement, commissioned and funded the documentary film Hirshima/Nagasaki: August 1945, which utilized film from the United States and Japanese governments to vividly detail the atomic bombing of the two cities. Died, New York, November 11, 1988. J.D.W. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, November 14, 1988.

LE MOYNE, Antoine, see CHATEAUGUE, Antoine Le Moyne de

LE MOYNE, Jean-Baptiste, see BIENVILLE, Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de

LE MOYNE, Joseph, see SERIGNY ET DE LOIRE, Joseph Le Moyne de

LE MOYNE, Pierre, see IBERVILLE, Pierre Le Moyne d’

LENNAN, Francis, clergyman. Born in Ireland. Education: Irish College of the University of Salamanca, Spain. Sent to West Florida to be priest at Natchez, 1791; harsh practices caused unpopularity among citizens; sent to be priest at mouth of Bayou Sara, New Feliciana, 1798; engaged in land speculation, 1799-1806; departed with Spanish authorities after Rebellion of 1810. Died, 1813. E.K.D. Sources: Jack D. L. Holmes, Gayoso (1965); Stanley Clisby Arthur, The Story of the West Florida Rebellion (1935); West Feliciana Parish Records.

LENOIR, Aguinaldo Alphonse, attorney, academic. Born, De Ridder, La., September 21, 1918; son of York Alonzo Lenoir and Ivy Anita Darensbourge. Education: local schools; Xavier University, A. B.,1939; Lincoln University Law School, LL. B., 1942. United States Army, June 1944 to January 1946, Philippine Islands and Japan, highest rank, corporal QMC, honorable discharge. Resumed law practice, St. Louis, Mo., 1946-1947; returned to Louisiana, 1947; faculty, Southern University School of Law, 1947-1970. Married, June 11, 1941, Estella Ruth Collins of Jefferson City, Mo. Eight children. Active in Democratic party; member, National Bar Association; Istrouma Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America; American Judicature Society; Louisiana Education Association; YMCA; Pi Gamma Mu National Social Science Honor Society; Alpha Kappa Mu National Service Fraternity; Alpha Phi Alpha; Sigma Pi Phi. Service Honors, Scouting Silver Beaver, 1960; director, Catholic Council on Human Relations; vice-president, Southern Teachers and Parents Federal Credit Union; editor, National Bar Association Journal; National Negro College Fund; member, Research Team, Louisiana Criminal Procedure Revision Committee; board member of Louisiana Labor Mediation Commission; Legislative Drafting Committee of Louisiana; Commisison on Law Enforcement and Administration of Criminal Justice; Distinguished Visiting Professor, Howard University, 1968-1969. Named in Who’s Who in Catholic America; Who’s Who in Colored America; Who’s Who in South and Southwest. Died, Washington, D. C., July 7, 1976; interred Southern Memorial Cemetery, Baton Rouge. G.W.B. Sources: Charles Vincent, A Centennial History of Southern University (1981); personal interview with Mrs. Lenoir.

LE NORMANT DE MESI (sometimes rendered LE NORMAND DE MEZY), Sébastien-François-Ange, administrator. Born, Dunkirk, France, 1702; son of Jacques Ange Le Normant de Mési, commissaire-ordonnateur and subdelegate at Ile Royale (Cape Breton Island), 1718-1733, and Anne-Marie Debrier. Went with father to Louisbourg, Ile Royale, 1719. Appointed écrivain ordinaire at Ile Royale, January 1, 1722; promoted to commis principal at Ile Royale, June 18, 1728; acting ordonnateur (administrative chief) of Ile Royale during his father’s absence from the colony from May 1, 1729, to 1733; commissioned commissaire-ordinaire at Ile Royale, January 1, 1733; named commissaire-ordonnateur, subdelegate, and first councillor of the Superior Council at Ile Royale, March 23, 1735; appointed ordonnateur at Cap Français, Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti), April 1, 1739; promoted to commissaire-général at Cap Français, 1744; appointed commissaire-ordonnateur of Louisiana, April 30, 1744; registered his commission with the Louisiana Superior Council, October 15, 1744. During his four-year adminstration, attempted to recall the paper currency (governmental script) circulating in Louisiana and to replace it with hard Spanish currency; was consistently at odds with Governor Vaudreuil (q.v.); subject’s refusal to support Vaudreuil’s Indian policies credited as major cause of Choctaw uprising (1746); departed New Orleans for France, March 1748. Later returned to Cap Français; assumed duties of intendant at Rochefort, France, May 1750. In Paris as a special consultant to Minister of Marine Rouillé, 1751 and 1753; promoted to intendant des armées navales, 1754; through influence of his relative Mme de Pompadour named intendant général (under secretary) of the Bureau of Marine and the Colonies, 1758; dismissed, October 1758, as result of French military reverses, but given large annual pension. Married (1) Elisabeth Letellier (d. 1754), of Cap Français, January 1744. Married (2) Marie-Louise-Augustine de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon. No known children. Died, Paris, France, February 3, 1791. C.A.B. Sources: Alphabet Laffilard, folio 466; Marc de Villiers du Terrage, The Last Years of French Louisiana , trans. by Hosea Phillips, ed. by Carl A. Brasseaux and Glenn R. Conrad (1982); Guy Frégault, Le Grand Marquis: Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil et la Louisiane (1952); T. A. Crowley, “Le Normant de Mézy, Jacques-Ange,” Dictionnaire biographique du Canada, III (1974); James S. Pritchard, “Le Normant de Mézy, Sébastien-François-Ange,” Dictionnaire biographique du Canada, III (1980).

LEON, Count, religious mystic, utopian. Born Maximilian Bernhard Mueller, March 21, 1788, in Kostheim, near Mainz, Germany; son of Helen Balzer and Adam Mueller. Claimed to be the messiah ordained to found the New Jerusalem. Marriage to Elizabeth Heuser, “Countess De Leon” (q.v.), was never recorded. Their three children, Johanna, Joseph and Anna, were given the surname of De Leon’s secretary, Dr. Goentgen (q.v.). Leader of an millenial group in Offenbach, Germany, in 1827; left Germany and sailed to America, 1831, to avoid imprisonment; joined George Rapp’s Harmony Society in Economy, Pa.; established a commune called The New Philadelphia Society in Philipsburg, Pa., March 21, 1832; group left for Louisiana in 1833; settled at Grand Ecore, near Natchitoches, February 4, 1834. Died there on August 29, 1834. Followers founded the colony of Germantown, near the present city of Minden, in 1835. K.J.R.A. & J.B.C. Sources: Karl J. R. Arndt, “The Genesis of Germantown, Louisiana: or The Mysterious Past of Louisiana’s Mystic, Count De Leon,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly , XXIV (1941); Manuscript collection of Karl J. R. Arndt. See also Arndt, Economy on the Ohio, 1826-1834 (1984).

LEON, Elisa Leon (Countess Leon), leader of Germantown communal colony. Born, Frankfurt, Germany, 1798; daughter of Johann and Anna Maria Heuser. Claimed to have married Bernhard Mueller of Frankfurt, Germany, also known as Count Leon (q.v.), date unknown. Three children, Johanna Schardt, Joseph Maximilian and Anna Stahl. Subject came to America, 1831, with group led by husband, a religious mystic. Joined Rappite colony in Pennsylvania. Two years later, after split with Rappites, left for Louisiana to establish a New Jerusalem near Natchitoches. Count Leon and other relatives soon died of cholera, leaving subject in charge. Moved colony away from Red River to new site a few miles above future town of Minden, present Webster Parish, 1835. Communal colony flourished until after Civil War, then declined and was abandoned, 1871. Subject especially remembered for perpetuating old world grace and culture in Northwest Louisiana. Date of death unknown, probably died in Hot Springs, Ark. P.C.C. Sources: Pauline Jennings, “Elisa Leon: First Lady of the Germantown Colony,” North Louisiana Historical Association Journal, VIII, No. 2 (Winter, 1977); Rita Moore Krouse, Fragments of a Dream: The Story of Germantown (1962).

LEONARD, John Edwards, attorney, planter, jurist, congressman. Born near Fairville, Chester County, Pa., September 22, 1845; only child of John E. and Mary H. Leonard. Education: local public schools; Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter, N.H., graduated, 1863; Harvard University, graduated 1867; studied law in Germany and attended the University of Paris; returned to study law at Harvard, 1869. Admitted to bar, Massachusetts. Removed to Louisiana in 1870, purchased land, and became a planter. Admitted to the bar and practiced in Monroe, La.. District attorney of the Thirteenth Judicial District, 1871-1872. Married in 1874. Elected associate justice of the state supreme court, 1876; elected as a Republican to the House of Representatives, 1876; served on the Committee for the Revision of the Laws of the United States; served from March 4, 1877, until his death in Havana, Cuba, March 15, 1878; interred Friends’ (Hicksite) Cemetery of the Middletown Meeting House, Middletown Township, Delaware County, Pa. J.B.C. Sources: Appleton’s Cyclopedia of American Biography, III (1900); Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1949 (1950); The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, VI (1929).

LE PAGE DU PRATZ, (Antoine Simon?), chronicler of colonial Louisiana. Born in either 1689 or 1690. Considered himself French although some historians speculate that he was from The Netherlands. He was a graduate of the “cours de Mathématiques,” a professional architect, and was interested in hydraulic engineering; fought in Louis XIV’s dragoons in the German campaign of the War of the Spanish Succession. In May 1718, sailed from La Rochelle for Louisiana under John Law’s Company, first granted land on Bayou St. John, but in January 1720, established himself further north on a private concession of land near the Natchez Indians whom he befriended. In 1728 returned to New Orleans to take on the direction of a Company of the Indies plantation. He questioned the necessity of the 1729 massacre of the Natchez. In 1731 he lost his job when the Company of the Indies surrendered their charter and on May 10, 1734, he left Louisiana. In 1751 he began his account of Louisiana with the intention of correcting misinformation about this land; published it in the form of a series of articles in the Journal Oeconomique de Paris. The articles were expanded in 1758 to form his Histoire de la Louisiane, an English edition of this book appeared in 1774; Le Page du Pratz’s account is most useful for his description of the Natchez and is the principal source for the anthropology and archaeology of these Indians. Died, 1775. S.L. Sources: Allen Johnson and Dumas Malone, eds., Dictionary of American Biography, V (1930); Le Page du Pratz, The History of Louisiana, ed. and intro. by Joseph G. Tregle, Jr. (1975); Joseph F. Michaud, Biographie universelle, XXXIV (n.d.); Nouvelle Biographie, XXXIX (1865); Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, II (1900).

LE PETIT, Mathurin, missionary. Born, Vannes, France, February 6, 1693. Entered the Jesuit order at age 19. Came to Louisiana in 1726. Missionary among the Choctaw. In 1728, appointed superior of the Louisiana mission in replacement of Father Nicolas Ignace de Beaubois (q.v.). Unlike Beaubois, got along well with colonial officials. Died, New Orleans, October 18, 1739. M.A. Sources: Reuben Gold Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, LXVII (1959); Charles E. O’Neill, Church and State in French Colonial Louisiana (1966).

LÉPINAY, Jean-Michel, seigneur de Lépinay et de la Longueville, governor. Born, Fougères, Brittany, France, ca. 1665. Joined the French navy in 1683 and accompanied French forces to Canada in 1687. Promoted to rank of ensign and later lieutenant. Served as honorary port captain of Quebec. Returned to France and was assigned to Rochefort. November 1, 1705, he was promoted to rank of lieutenant commander. Through patronage of comte de Toulouse, head of the Conseil de la Marine, secured appointment as governor of Louisiana on March 16, 1716. On October 21, 1716, while awaiting departure he was awarded the Cross of St. Louis. Left France in December 1716, reached Mobile March 9, 1717, and immediately took over his duties as governor. Short term in office met with almost constant wrangling among various royal officials. Because of this, following the transfer of the colony’s trading rights to the Company of the West in late 1717 he was recalled on February 9, 1718. Shortly before leaving Mobile for France he was notified of his nomination as governor of Grenada. Before accepting his new position he was forced to defend himself against charges of corruption and malfeasance in office. Exonerated of all charges he sailed from France May 18, 1720, for Grenada, reaching there on June 28, 1720. Died, January 3, 1721, while visiting the governor of the French West Indies in Martinique. B.C. Sources: Marcel Giraud, Histoire de la Louisiane française, II (1958), III (1966); Emile Lauvrière, Histoire de Louisiane française (1940); Dictionary of Canadian Biography, II (1969).

LERAY, Francis Xavier, clergyman, prelate. Born, Châteaugiron, Ile-et-Vilaine, France, April 20, 1825; son of René Leray and Marie Roncin. Education: College of Rennes, France; Spring Hill College, Mobile; and St. Mary Seminary, Baltimore. Ordained to priesthood at Natchez, Miss., March 19, 1852. Pastor in Mississippi, 1852-1877; vicar general of Diocese of Natchez, 1871-1877; chaplain to Army of Tennessee, 1862-1865. Consecrated bishop of Natchitoches at Rennes, France, April 22, 1877; named titular bishop of Janopolis, coadjutor bishop of New Orleans, administrator of Diocese of Natchitoches, 1879-1885, and administrator of temporal affairs of Archdiocese of New Orleans, October 23, 1879. Became archbishop of New Orleans, December 27, 1883. Tenure in New Orleans centered around reduction of large debt incurred by Archbishop Napoléon Perche (q.v.). Died at Châteaugiron, France, September 23, 1887; interred there. C.E.N. Sources: Francis Xavier Leray Papers in Archives of the Archdiocese of New Orleans; Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana (1939); Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in North Louisiana (1953); Joseph Code, Dictionary of the American Hierarchy, 1789-1964 (1964).

LERCH, Otto, physician. Born, Prenzlau, Germany, 1855; son of Frank Lerch and Augusta Bradendique. Education: local schools; University of Berlin, M. A. degree; University of Rostock, Ph. D. in Chemistry and Geology Immigrated to Texas, 1883; read law in office of Judge William Wallace; practiced law, Midland and San Angelo, Tex. Removed to Louisiana, 1890, to assume position of state geologist. Attended Tulane Medical School, 1891-1894; practiced medicine, Livingston Parish, La., and New Orleans. Appointed to chair of Clinical Medicine at New Orleans Polyclinic, Post Graduate School of Medicine, later Post Graduate School of Tulane University; resigned, 1919. Honorary member, Orleans Parish Medical Society and Louisiana State Medical Society. First to practice internal medicine exclusively as a specialty in New Orleans. First to introduce Wasserman Test to New Orleans. Prolific writer of articles on chemistry, geology, medicine; only book Rational Therapy (1919). A watercolorist and pianist. Married twice: (1) Elizabeth Torey; (2) Katherine Wren. No children. Died, April 4, 1948. G.R.C. Sources: A. E. Fossier, “Dr. Otto Lerch, 1855-1948,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXXIII (1950); New Orleans Times-Picayune, April 5, 1948.

LESASSIER, Jean Charles, merchant, planter, government official, militia officer, church warden. Born, Guibray (Falaise), France, ca. 1719; son of Charles LeSassier and Françoise Jouven. In Louisiana ca. 1741. Married Geneviève Gallard de Chamilly, New Orleans, January 18, 1744 (contract). Children: Charles, Ann Geneviève, Alexis, Julien, Vincent Joseph, Charles André, Gaudefroy, Alexandre Louis, Charlotte Céleste, Alexandre, Rose, Victoire and Constance. Received royal grant in 1762 to 1,300 arpents situated below New Orleans near Bayou Terre aux Boeufs in present-day St. Bernard Parish. Officer of the militia, 1750, warden of the parish church, 1755, councillor assessor on the Superior Council from August 7, 1762, to October 27, 1768. Nominated by Nicolas de La Frénière, fils (q.v.) as senior assessor councillor of the Superior Council on December 27, 1768. Deputized by the Council along with Saintelette in November, 1768, to present the petition of the colonists and merchants to the French court urging revocation of treaty of cession and the retention of Louisiana by France. After a problem-filled voyage of three months, he presented the documents to the duke of Choiseul, minister of the king. They were rejected and LeSassier returned to Louisiana, where he was banished from the colony by Alejandro O’Reilly (q.v.) in 1769. Settled in Port-au-Prince, Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti), 1769; was appointed squire councillor of the Superior Council there, a post he held until his death there on June 4, 1779; interred parish cemetery, Port-au-Prince. C.B.H. Sources: Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XII (1929); Marc de Villiers du Ter­rage, “The Last Years of French Louisiana,” trans. by Henri Delville de Sinclair (manuscript, Survey of Federal Archives in Louisiana, New Orleans, 1937-1938); Register of Baptisms, Marriages and Funerals, Archdiocese of New Orleans Archives, St. Louis Cathedral; LeSassier family papers, Tulane University; Records of the Superior Council, Louisiana State Museum; Notarial Acts of Gerard Lepine in Saint-Domingue, National Archives, Overseas Section, Paris, France.

LE SIEUR, D. A., journalist, post-Civil War redeemer. Established pro-Southern newspaper, Red River Watchman, in 1874, just seven days before the outbreak of the Coushatta Riots. Publication was believed to be partly instrumental in eliminating local carpetbaggers and scalawags, thereby reasserting white supremacy. T.F.R. Source: “Louisiana Papers,” E. L. Tinker Collection, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass.

LESLIE, Mrs. Frank, publisher, editor, author. Born Miriam Florence Folline, New Orleans, ca. 1836; daughter of Charles and Susan Danforth Follin. She apparently changed the spelling of her maiden name and later took the title of “Baroness of Bazus” which she claimed had been conferred on her ancestors by Louis IX. She was well educated and was fluent in French, Spanish, and Italian. Married (1) David Charles Peacock, 1854-1856; (2) Ephraim George Squier, 1858-1873; (3) Frank Leslie, 1874-1880; (4) William C. Kingsbury Wilde (a brother of Oscar Wilde), 1891-1893. No children. She was a contributor to the periodicals of artist-publisher Frank Leslie and was probably an assistant in the publisher’s office in New York City in the late 1860s. Became manager and editor of the business after Leslie’s death in 1880. Legally changed her name to Frank Leslie in 1882 to prevent other heirs from taking control of Leslie publishing business. She was a close friend of Eliza Jane Nicholson (q.v.). She came to New Orleans often to attend Mardi Gras balls and visit friends. Her writings include Travels in Central America from the French of Arthur Morelet (1871); California: A Pleasure Trip from Gotham to the Golden Gate (1877); Beautiful Women of Twelve Epochs (1890); Are Men Gay Deceivers? (1893); and A Social Mirage (1890). An ardent feminist and a vice-president of the Women’s Press Club. Died, New York City, September 18, 1914; interred Woodlawn Cemetery. She willed the bulk of her fortune to the cause of woman’s suffrage. J.B.C. Sources: Dictionary of American Biography, XI (1946); The National Cyclopedia of American Biography, XXV (1936); New Orleans Daily Picayune, July 31, 1898; September 20, 1914; New York Times, September 19, 21, 1914.

LESTER, Willie D., physician, author. Born, November 18, 1883; son of William D. and Ellen Coburn Lester. Education: Fort Jesup (La.) High School; graduated from the Memphis, Tenn., School of Medicine. Began his medical practice in Many, La., 1912. The author of many religious tracts and several books. Served as coroner of Sabine Parish. Member of the First Baptist Church of Many; known for his deep religious beliefs and generosity to churches and the poor. Died, May 16, 1952; interred Fort Jesup Cemetery, Many, La. J.H.P. Source: Sabine Index, obituary, May 11, 1952; family papers.

LE SUEUR, Pierre, explorer, trader. Born, Artois, France, ca. 1657. Removed to Canada ca. 1679 as a servant for the Jesuit missionaries at Sault Ste. Marie, although by ca. 1681 he had abandoned the religious life for the fur trade. One of the most enterprising of the coureurs de bois, Le Sueur was active throughout the upper Mississippi Valley and western Great Lakes region, where he established numerous trading posts and achieved a genuine diplomatic coup in 1695, when he negotiated a treaty between the Dakota and Ojibway Indians. Journeyed to France to seek a concession for a copper mine he allegedly had discovered near the headwaters of the St. Pierre (Minnesota River): some French officials regarded the mine as nothing more than a pretext for a monopoly of the upper Mississipi Valley fur trade. He joined Iberville (q.v.) in Louisiana, whence in April, 1700, he set out on his most ambitous expedition, ascending the Mississippi River to the present site of Mankato, Minn., where he built Fort l’Huillier near his mine; the ore turned out to be just colored clay, and pressure from the Indians forced the abandonment of Fort l’Huillier. Married Marguerite Messier. Several children, one of whom was Marguerite, who married Nicolas Chauvin de La Frénière, père (q.v.). Le Sueur returned to France in 1702; en route back to Louisiana ca. 1705 he died on board ship. His journals and reports provided colonial authorities with detailed information on the geography of the Mississippi Valley and influenced policy decisions on trade and Indian affairs. R.C.V. Sources: Bénard de La Harpe, Journal historique de l’établissement des Français à la Louisiane (1831); “Relation de Pénicaut” in Pierre Margry, ed., Découvertes et établissements des Français dans l’ouest et dans le sud de l’Amérique septentrionale (1614-1754) (1886); Richebourg Gaillard McWilliams, trans. and ed., Fleur de Lys and Calumet, Being the Pénicaut Narrative of French Adventure in Louisiana (1953); Jacqueline Olivier Vidrine, Love’s Legacy: The Mobile Marriages … (1984).

LEVEQUE, Joseph Mark, journalist, playwright. Born, Natchitoches, La., August 26, 1868; son of Dr. Joseph A. Lévêque and Theresa Kirkland, both of West Baton Rouge Parish. Education: Collegiate Institute, Baton Rouge; attended schools of English, Latin and Greek, Vanderbilt University; taught at Hubbard College, Overton, Tex. Married Emily Rosaline Hill, Natchitoches, June 1894. One daughter, Marie Lucie Celeste. Entered newspaper work in New York City in 1890 as reporter on Pulitzer’s New York World, then the Evening Mail, Ft. Worth, Tex. In 1891 became city editor on the Waco (Tex.) Day, and later the Fort Worth Gazette; 1892-1893 was on New York Morning Advertiser; 1894-1895, served in Austin, Tex. as legislative reporter for the Fort Worth Gazette and the Houston Post. Began his New Orleans journalistic career on the Daily Picayune in 1896, and on the Times-Democrat in 1898. June 28, 1899, founded and was editor-owner of the Harlequin, a Progressive weekly journal of literary and political comment and opinion. With other shareholders also owned and was editor-in-chief of the New Orleans Morning World which failed June 1908, partly because of the Panic of 1907. 1909-1910, edited Woman’s Magazine in St. Louis. Edited the official fair book of the New Orleans Industrial Exposition in 1900. Controversial Police Inspector Edward S. Whitaker attempted to assassinate him January 16, 1908, resulting in Whitaker’s dismissal and conviction of attempted murder. Short story, the “Maclin-Doré Duel” published in Godey’s, 1893; also wrote short stories for the Daily Picayune, Harlequin, and the Morning World. Wrote musical comedies including Mr. Jacob’s Delicatessen, Billy Bing: Bachelor from Birmingham, Great Jupiter, King Capital, and The Swimming Girl; the latter two were presented in New Orleans and other major cities of Louisiana and Texas, 1901-1903. Died, New York City, December 30, 1911, while in production for a musical, La Belle Creole, to be staged by John Cort. E.T.S. Sources: Who’s Who in America; John Wilds, Afternoon Story (1976); John R. Kemp, Martin Behrman of New Orleans (1981); J. Fair Hardin, Northwestern Louisiana (1939); Leveque family papers, NSU Archives.

LEVY, Benjamin, printer, publisher, bookseller. Born, New York City, 1786; son of Simeon and Katty Levy. Trained as bookbinder. Opened book and stationery store, New Orleans, 1811; entered publishing field, 1817; began printing business, specializing in law books, 1822; founded the New Orleans Price-Current and Commercial Intelligencer, the city’s first business journal, 1822. Declared bankruptcy, 1843, because of heavy debts and banking crisis of 1837. Headed successor firm, Alexander Levy & Co., which used son’s name legally and publicly; it too went bankrupt, 1858. One of the first Jews to settle in New Orleans; described as the first important Jewish printer-publisher in the South, probably in the nation. Married Emilie Prieur (1799-1851) of New Orleans, daughter of Prosper Prieur and Marie Jeanne Casenauve, December 6, 1817. Children: Alexander Levy (1818-1866); Isabel Mathilda Levy Ainsworth (1820-1852), known as Mathilde. Died, New Orleans, January 11, 1860; interred Girod Street Cemetery; reinterred Hope Mausoleum, New Orleans, 1957. F.M.J. Sources: Bertram Wallace Korn, Benjamin Levy: New Orleans Printer and Publisher (1961); Bertram Wallace Korn, “Additional Benjamin and Alexander Levy Imprints,” Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, LXII (second quarter of 1968); Bertram Wallace Korn, The Early Jews of New Orleans (1969); Leonard V. Huber and Guy F. Bernard, To Glorious Immortality (1961); Charles R. Maduell, Jr., New Orleans Marriage Contracts, 1804-1820 (1977).

LEVY, Flora, educator, social worker. Born, January 17, 1904; daughter of Moses Levy and Gussie Plonsky; granddaughter of Lazarus Levy who came to America in 1853, joined the Confederate Army, and was wounded at the Battle of Shiloh. Education: graduated from Sophie Newcomb College, New Orleans, majoring in Mathemetics and Physics; later graduate work at George Peabody College. Taught in Lafayette Parish school system. Established the Flora Levy Lecture in the Humanities for the English Department of the University of Southwestern Louisiana, and also funded the literary journal Exploration, dedicated to the memory of the psychoanalytic critic, Lionel Trilling. Also endowed Lafayette Animal Aid with the Abe Plonsky Animal Shelter Fund. Died, Lafayette, La., September 2, 1981; interred Hebrew Rest Cemetery M.D.* Source: Author’s research.

LEVY, Lee Craig Ragan, civic leader. Born, Clarence, La., October 21, 1896; daughter of William A. Ragan and Lee Craig Ragan. Education: graduate from Normal College (now Northwestern State University), 1915. Teacher in Coushatta Elementary School, 1917-1920. Married (1) John H. Graham of Lake End, La., January 3, 1920; married (2) Samuel Levy, a Natchitoches, La., banker, 1929. Home demonstration agent in Natchitoches Parish, 1926-1929. Became actively involved with General Federation of Women’s Clubs on local, state, and national levels. Served as treasurer and extension chairman of the Louisiana Federation of Women’s Clubs in the 1930s; president and coordinator of the Natchitoches Women’s Club in 1938; president of the Louisiana Federation of Women’s Clubs, 1946-1949. Involvement in statewide health and nursing programs earned her the Axsom-Choppin Award in 1952 for outstanding service in public health. President of the South-Central GFWC. Advocated reforestation projects, forestry education programs, soil conservation policies, forestry, Show-Me Trips, Keep Louisiana Green campaign, the Stockman’s bill, Woods Hogs bill, Bald Cypress bill, and the Brown Pelican bill. For conservation, awarded Smokey Bear Award in 1953. Outstanding Conservationist Award (1964) given her by Louisiana Writers’ Association. Died, Natchitoches, April 4, 1979. M.L.W-B. Source: Lee Craig Levy Collection, Camie C. Henry Room, Eugene P. Watson Memorial Library, Northwestern State University of Louisiana, Natchitoches; Mary Linn Wernet, “Lee Craig Ragan Levy: The Study of a Clubwoman’s Participation in the Policy of Conservation after World War II” (M. A. thesis, Northwestern State University, 1985); Mary Linn Wernet, “Conservation Through Mutual Cooperation: A History of Mrs. Lee Craig Levy’s Work with the Louisiana Forestry Commission,” North Louisiana Historical Association Journal, XVI (1985).

LEVY, William Mallory, attorney, journalist, congressman, jurist. Born, Isle of Wight County, Va., October 31, 1827; son of Emeline Butt and John B. Levy. Education: completed preparatory studies; was graduated from William and Mary College, 1844. Served in the Mexican War as second lieutenant in Company F, First Regiment, Virginia Volunteers. Studied law; admitted to the bar in 1851 and practiced in Norfolk, Va. Removed to Natchitoches, La., in 1852 and continued the practice of law; editor of the Natchitoches Chronicle newspaper in 1860; member of the state house of representatives 1850-1861; presidential elector on the Democratic ticket of Douglas and Johnson in 1860; served in the Confederate Army during the Civil War; subsequently served as a major in the adjutant general’s department. Served as a Democrat in Congress, 1875-1877; unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1876. Member, state constitutional convention, 1879. Appointed associate justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court in 1879 and served until death. Died, Saratoga, N.Y., August 10, 1882; survived by wife and daughter; interred American Cemetery, Natchitoches. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Northwest Louisiana (1890); Walter Prichard, ed., “A Tourist’s Description of Louisiana in 1860,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXI (1938); Andrew B. Booth, comp., Records of Louisiana Confederate Soldiers and Commands, III (1920); New Orleans Daily Picayune , obituary, August 11, 1882.

LEWIS, Daniel Smith, clergyman. Born, Falmouth, Mass., April 11, 1811. Education: Union College, Schenectady, N. Y., and General Theological Seminary, New York City. After ordination to diaconate, sent to Mobile, Ala. In 1805 only regularly employed Episcopal clergyman in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana. Participated in consecration of first Grace Church building, February 15, 1838; called as rector, 1839. Married Harriet Collins of Lafourche. Ordained priest in Grace Church, 1840, by Leonidas Polk (q.v.); member, Standing Committee, Diocese of Louisiana, 1843-1846; 1868-1871; deputy to General Convention Episcopal Church, 1841, 1843, 1847-1852, 1854-1857. Pursued vigorous ministry to slave population, West Feliciana Parish, 1840-1861; protested shelling of Grace Church, 1863-1864; buried Federal gunboat commander in church cemetery, 1863. Removed to New Orleans, 1865; assistant and supply clergyman, Christ Church Cathedral, 1865; priest, Calvary Church, New Orleans, 1866-1871; president, Dioscesan Standing Committee, 1870. Died, Pass Christian, Miss., January 19, 1886; interred Grace Church Cemetery, St. Francisville. E.K.D. Sources: Hodding and Betty Werlein Carter, So Great a Good (1955); Parish Register, Grace Church; West Feliciana Parish Records.

LEWIS, Edward Taylor, politician, congressman, jurist. Born, St. Landry Parish, La., October 26, 1834; son of Judge William B. Lewis and Ellen Taylor. Education: private tutors, including C. A. Frazee; Weselyan University, Deleware, Ohio. Later studied law, admitted to Louisiana bar, 1859; practiced law in Opelousas. Civil War service: enlisted 1861 as private, rose to rank of captain. Was a leader of white forces in Opelousas riot of 1868. Helped organize the Opelousas chapter of the White League, and local branch of Knights of White Camelia. Married (1) Alphonsine Lastrapes. Children: Julia (Mrs. Jos. M. Boagni), Corinne (Mrs. W. R. Lastrapes), and Edward L. (died in adolelscence). Married (2) Georgia Postlethwait; no children. Political career: active in Democratic party; state representative, 1865; U. S. congressman, 1883-1885; judge, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, 1886-1888; judge, Louisiana Court of Appeals, Thirty-fourth circuit, 1894-1896; parish assessor, St. Landry Parish, 1896?-1900?; judge, Sixteenth District Court, 1900-1908. Died, Opelousas, April 26, 1927; interred Myrtle Grove Cemetery. C.A.B. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1949 (1950); Claude F. Oubre, “The Opelousas Riot of 1868,” Attakapas Gazette, VIII (1973); H. Oscar Lestage, Jr., “The White League in Louisiana and Its Participation in Reconstruction Riots,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XVIII (1935); Opelousas Clarion-Progress, April 29, 1927; Ruth Fontenot et al., Some History of St. Landry Parish from the 1690s (1955).

LEWIS, George (christened George Joseph Francis Zeno), jazz clarinetist. Born, New Orleans, Louisiana, July 13, 1900, fourth and only surviving child of Alice Williams and Henry Louis Zeno. Delivered by his great-grandmother, Zaier, when she was 100, Lewis was reared frugally by his mother, grand­mother Urania, and Zaier. Frail, slightly built, Lewis evinced musical interest at age five, influenced by play­ers at Hopes Hall near his home. At age seven, with pay from odd jobs, he bought a fife and taught himself to play. Three years later he bought a second-hand clarinet. As a truant school boy, but obsessive practicer, he learned self-discipline after a year at Professor Nelson’s School. At fourteen he joined and toured for two years with the Black Eagles, a Mandeville band. Despite a few formal lessons, he did not read music. Married (1) Emma Johnson, 1918; five children: Mildred, Mary, Hilda, William, and Joseph. Married (2) Jeanette Stokes, c. 1932; one daughter: Shirley. Married (3) one “Valletta,” c. 1960. Joined Eureka Brass Band, 1919; Buddy Petit’s Black and Tan Band, 1922; worked at odd jobs in Mandeville and New Orleans, though plagued with ill health. In mid-20s joined Chris Kelly’s group; managed his own band 1923-24. Made first recording 1926. In 1920s and 30s played with Kid Rena, Louis Fritz, Olympia Band, and Evan Thomas. Did dock work, meanwhile playing parades, funerals, society dances, river­boat events, picnics. Successful tour and recordings with Bunk Johnson’s band early to mid-40s in New York; in late 40s toured west coast during Dixieland revival and had own band at Manny’s in New Orleans. Moved to Algiers, Louisiana, 1952. Between illnesses toured England, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, 1956-57; New Port Jazz Festival, 1957; back to Europe 1961; Japan, 1963-65; England, 1966-67. Left noticeable influence on European clar­inetists and young revivalists. Received favorable publicity in 1960s from Jazz Journal, Downbeat, Variety, Jazz Monthly, Melody Maker, Inter-American Musical Research, Footnote, Modern Music, The New Yorker, The New Republic, New York Times, London Daily Mail. Biographer Tom Bethell has compiled Lewis’ definitive discography, 1942-67, including over two dozen albums made with his own groups, including the “George Lewis Quartet” and “G. L. Trio.” Most memo­rable tunes: “Climax Rag,”: “Deep Bayou Blues,” “Tiger Rag,” “Tishomingo Blues,” “You Always Hurt the One You Love,” and his own “Burgundy Street Blues” and “St. Philip Street Breakdown.” Labels: American Music, Blue Note, Decca, Good Time Jazz, Climax, Riverside, Jazz Man, Pax, and for Verve the 1956 classic, “The New Orleans Jazz of George Lewis.” Performed intermit­tently at Preservation Hall from its opening in 1961 until two weeks before his death. Noted for rapid filigree and seamless registral crossing, Lewis used Albert clarinet system for deeper tone. Though criticized for crudity of style, unpolished technique, and faulty into­nation, his passionate, energetic play­ing made him the most celebrated New Orleans jazz traditionalist. Died at New Orleans, December 31, 1968. Four bands and a chorus performed at the funeral. Interred in McDonogh Cemetery, New Orleans. A.K.S. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, January 2, 1969; Tom Bethell, George Lewis: A Jazzman from New Orleans (1977); Ann Fairbairn, Call Him George (1969); Noel Rockmore, Preservation Hall Portraits (1968); Samuel B. Charters, Jazz New Orleans, 1885-1963 (1963); George Lewis, “Play Number Nine” (oral history), in Art Hodes and Chadwick Hansen, Selections from the Gutter (1977); Barry Kernfeld, ed., New Grove Dictionary of Jazz (1988), vol. 2; William Carter, Preservation Hall Music from the Heart (1991).

LEWIS, Henry, painter, panoramist. Born, Scarborough or Newport, England, January 12, 1819; son of Thomas and Elizabeth Garrison Lewis. Immigrated to the U. S. with father and brothers after the death of his mother; lived in Boston, then St. Louis, where, in 1845, he first advertised as an artist. Began sketches along the Mississippi River for his panorama, which was exhibited in the United States, Canada, and Europe, 1849-1853; many scenes in the panorama border on Louisiana and were taken from sketches made by one of Lewis’s assistants, Charles Rogers. Eventually settled in Dusseldorf, Germany, where some of the sketches for the panorama were published in his Das Illustrirte Mississippithal (1854-1857). Died, Dusseldorf, September 16, 1904. J.A.M. Sources: The Historic New Orleans Collection, Encyclopaedia of New Orleans Artists, 1718-1918 (1987); Joseph Earl Arrington, “Henry Lewis’ Moving Panorama of the Mississippi River,” Louisiana History, VI (1965).

LEWIS, James, soldier, politician. Born, Woodville, Miss., September 11, 1833. Married Josephine B. Joubert. Began working on riverboats at age fifteen; was a steward on the Confederate transport steamer, De Soto; made his way to New Orleans after hearing news of emancipation; recruited Negro troops for Union Army’s Company K, Louisiana Volunteers, September 1862; commissioned captain, and later colonel, of the company; resigned his commission, March 8, 1864, during Gen. Nathaniel Banks’ (q.v.) purge of Negro officers. Delegate to convention held in New Orleans, September 1865, which marks the official birth of the Republican party in Louisiana; appointed by the Freedman’s Bureau to organize free state schools for Negroes, 1865-1872; was one of the founders of the Louisiana Educational Relief Association which established or supported church schools, 1866-1867; appointed inspector of customs at New Orleans, 1865-1869; was sergeant, and later captain, of the Metropolitan Police; appointed colonel of the second regiment of state police and elected administrator of police, 1870. Chairman of Louisiana delegation to the National Republican Convention in Philadelphia, 1872; served as city council commissioner of police and public improvements; was the sole Republican in the city administration in 1873; appointed naval officer of the port of New Orleans, 1877-1880; was superintendent of the United States bonded warehouses in New Orleans; surveyor general of Louisiana, 1884. A Free Mason, became grand master of Louisiana, sovereign grand inspector general of the southern jurisdiction of colored members, and attained the Thirty-third Degree in the Scottish Rite; was commander of the Grand Army of the Republic in Louisiana and Mississippi. Died, New Orleans, July 11, 1914; interred Greenwood Cemetery. The James Lewis Public School opened September 15, 1915. J.B.C. Sources: Robert Mayer, Jr., Names Over New Orleans Public Schools (1975); John W. Blassingame, Black New Orleans, 1860-1880 (1973); Charles Vincent, Black Legislators in Louisiana during Reconstruction (1976); William J. Simmons, Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising (1891); New Orleans Daily Picayune, obituary, July 12, 1914.

LEWIS, James Jackson, “Jimmie”, businessman, banker. Born, Opelousas, La., 1870; son of Thomas Hardeman Lewis, Opelousas attorney, and Josephine Williams. Removed to Eunice, 1894, entered partnership with Gustave Fusilier (q.v.), merchant and developer. Married, April 19, 1898, Marie Celeste Baillio, of Alexandria, daughter of Sosthene Auguste Baillio, Jr., Grant Parish planter, and Emma Moore Baillio. One child (adopted): Ann Elizabeth (Nancy). Founded, with Gustave Fusilier and others, Eunice State Bank, 1901. Founded, with Fusilier and Louis Burk, town of Basile about 1905. Removed to Elton, 1920, associated with Louisiana State Rice Milling Co. Member: Harmony Lodge #410, F. & A.M., Eunice. Died, Elton, January 15, 1931; interred Opelousas. J.L.F. Sources: Emma F. Philastre, The True Story of Eunice, Louisiana (1973); Robert Gahn, A History of Evangeline Parish (1972); Louise T. Pharr, The Ancestors and Descendants of the Honorable Seth Lewis and His Wife Nancy Hardeman (19??); Catherine B. Futch, The Baillio Family (1961); Opelousas Daily World, November 3, 1955; Eunice New Era, obituary, January 23, 1931.

LEWIS, John Gideon, fraternal executive. Born, Natchitoches, La., December 9, 1903; son of John G. Lewis and Virginia Thompson. Education: major portion of early education in Nashville, Tenn.; Fisk University; Central State College, Doctor of Humanities. Married Amelia Jones. Most Worshipful Grand Master, Prince Hall Masons of Louisiana, 1941-1979; Grand Commander, United Supreme Council Thirty-third Degree Ancient and Accepted Rite of Freemasonry, Southern Jurisdiction, U.S.A., Prince Hall Affiliation, 1961-1979. Member, YMCA, Kiwanis International; board of directors, Flint-Goodridge Hospital of New Orleans; Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Sigma Pi Phi Fraternity, National Board of NAACP, Grand United Order of Odd Fellows. Life member, Louisiana Education Association; national member of the Smithsonian Associates; Prince Hall Youth Fund of Louisiana; Southern University Foundation, contributing member; Council for a Better Louisiana; executive board, Society of Christians and Jews; past member of board of trustees, National Urban League; president of Scotland Loan and Mortgage Company; editor of the Plum Line; chairman of Trustee Board and treasurer, Mt. Zion First Baptist Church. Died, April 1, 1979; interred Southern Memorial Gardens. R.E.M. Sources: William C. Matney, ed., Who’s Who Among Black Americans (1982); New Orleans Times-Picayune, April 13, 1979.

LEWIS, John Lawson, politician, soldier, mayor of New Orleans. Born, Lexington, Ky., March 26, 1800; son of Orleans Territory supreme court justice Joshua Lewis (q.v.) and America Lawson. Removed to New Orleans with family, 1803. Education: academy of the Rev. James F. Hull, Episcopalian; studied law under his father. Served as assistant clerk, First Judicial District Court; appointed clerk, 1826. Married a Miss DeFerrier, 1827; three children. Wife and children perished in the scarlet-fever epidemic of 1833. Remarried (wife’s name unknown, date of second marriage unknown); six children, three boys: Alfred, John, and Thomas. Elected commanding general, First Division, Louisiana Militia, 1842. Elected sheriff, Orleans Parish, 1845. Elected, state senate, 1852. Mayor, New Orleans, 1854-1856. Commander, Louisiana State Militia, 1861-1862. Volunteer aide to Gen. Henry Gray, Battle of Mansfield, April 8, 1864, wounded in action. Returned to New Orleans after war. Died, May 15, 1886, New Orleans; interred St. Vincent de Paul Cemetery. A.W.B. Sources: Edwin L. Jewell, Jewell’s Crescent City Illustrated (1873); John S. Kendall, History of New Orleans, 3 vols. (1922); New Orleans Daily Picayune, May 16, 1886.

LEWIS, Joshua, jurist. Born, Bedford County, Va., 1774; son of Gen. Andrew Lewis, who had a conspicuous career in the French and Indian War and the early years of the American Revolution. As young man, removed to Lexington, Ky. Married America Lawson of Virginia, daughter of Gen. Robert Lawson of Revolutionary War fame. Several children, among whom were Theodore, J. H., Algernon, George Washington and John Lawson (q.v.). Appointed, 1805, by President Jefferson Land Claims Commissioner to the Eastern District of Orleans Territory. Removed to New Orleans with family via a keelboat trip down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. While continuing to serve as a land claims commissioner, appointed, 1807, by President Jefferson to be one of the three superior court justices of the Orleans Territory. Took his seat on the court, April 14, 1807. Served in that capacity until Constitution of 1812 promulgated. Thereafter served as judge of the First District Court until death. Candidate of the American faction for governor, 1816; lost to Jacques Villeré by less than 200 popular votes. Remained closely connected with Louisiana politics until death. Died, New Orleans, June 4, 1833; interred on his estate on north shore of Lake Pontchartrain. G.R.C. Sources: Wilson and Fiske, eds., Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, III (1900); Clarence Carter, Territorial Papers of the United States, IX (1940); Joseph T. Hatfield, William Claiborne: Jeffersonian Centurion in the American Southwest (1976); Louisiana Courier, June 5, 1833.

LEWIS, Meriwether, explorer, soldier, administrator. Born, Albermarle County, Va., August 18, 1774; son of Lucy Meriwether and William Lewis. Education: privately tutored; attended a Latin school, 1787-1792; managed family farm, 1792-1794. Enlisted in state militia, 1794; promoted captain in 1797 and was paymaster of First United States Infantry. Private secretary to President Jefferson, 1801-1803. Pursued course in natural sciences and astronomical observations in preparation for western exploration; commanded expedtion across Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Coast with William Clark (q.v.), 1804-1805; journal of their discoveries was published in 1814. March 3, 1807, Jefferson appointed him governor of the Territory of Louisiana for a three-year term, commander in chief of militia, and superintendent of Indian Affairs. Arrived St. Louis, March 8, 1808; negotiated a peace treaty with the Osage Indians, constructed forts, trading posts, and a road leading from St. Louis to neighboring settlements. Financed and wrote articles for newspaper, Missouri Gazette. Founder and master of first Masonic lodge in the West. Died, en route to Washington, D. C., October 11, 1809, near Hohenwald, Tenn.; a memorial was erected there in 1848. J.B.C. Sources: Dictionary of American Biography, II; Richard Dillon, Meriwether Lewis, A Biography (1965); The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, VI (1904).

LEWIS, Seth, jurist. Born in Massachusetts, October 14, 1764; son of Ethan Lewis and Sybil Parmelee. Education: apprenticed as a tanner and shoemaker; in 1790 read law in the office of Andrew Jackson (q.v.) in Nashville, Tenn. Married, 1793, Nancy Hardeman, daughter of Col. Thomas and Mary (Perkins) Hardeman. Several children, one of whom was William B. (b. 1798). Appointed by President John Adams chief justice of the Mississippi Territory in 1800. Appointed by Louisiana governor William C. C. Claiborne as judge of the Attakapas County in 1810. On May 3, 1813, secured appointment as judge of the Fifth Judicial District of Louisiana, the first district judge of the state to take office; served as district judge until 1840 when he retired and entered private practice in Opelousas. His appointment as territorial judge by the Federalist Adams caused considerable controversy with the Jeffersonians until he was forced to resign in 1803; during the codification mania in 1820-1825, he attacked the penal code proposed by Edward Livingston (q.v.) and caused its rejection. Member: Masonic order, first master of a lodge in Mississippi. Died, Opelousas, November 15, 1858; interred Opelousas Cemetery. M.S.L. Sources: Edwin Adams Davis, The Story of Louisiana, II (1960); Dunbar Rowland, ed., Mississippi: Comprising Sketches of Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form, II (1907); Seth Lewis Family Memoirs, Mississippi Department of Archives and History; Autobiographical Memoir of Seth Lewis, Louisiana State University Library, Baton Rouge.

LEWIS, Spencer Breard, physician, scholar, author, poet, international authority on handicapped physicians. Born, Monroe, La., February 8, 1948; son of Brunner Lewis and Zola Hicks. Education: Grambling High School; Southern University, Baton Rouge, La., B. S. degree, cum laude, 1969; Harvard University Medical School, M. D. degree, 1973; Medical Board Certification following residency in family practice, 1976, Rockford School of Medicine, University of Illinois. Professional and scholarly organizations: American Academy of Family Physicians, Alpha Epsilon Society, Beta Beta Beta Society, founder and first president of the American Society of Handicapped Physicians. Married, November 17, 1978, Mary Kagan, C.N.M., M.S., of Spring Grove, Ill., daughter of Louis Kagan and Catherine Hoffman. Children: Judith Mary (b. 1979), Sarah Irene (b. 1980), Spencer David (b. 1981). Medical director, Crusader Clinic, Rockford, Ill., 1976-1977; medical director, Madison-Yazoo Leake Family Health Center, Canton, Miss., 1978-1979; university physician, Grambling State University, and private practice, Grambling, La., until his death. Diabetic retinophathy destroyed Dr. Lewis’ eyesight in 1980 at the age of 32. He continued to care for more that 2,000 patients, write, and direct the American Society of Handicapped Physicians, which he founded in 1981. Published: “New Developments in a Society for Handicapped Physicians,” American Society of Handicapped Physicians (September 1981); “Wanted: Empathy for Disabled Physicians,” Patient Care (December 15, 1981); “Disabled Physician’s News,” Society for Handicapped Physicians (Spring, 1982); “The Physically Handicapped Physician,” Physician Stress, ed. by John Callan, M.D.; poems published in 1976 and 1978 issues of New Voices in American Poetry. Member: St. Benedict Catholic Church. Died, Grambling, La., April 6, 1982; interred Mt. Harmony Baptist Church Cemetery. S.F. Sources: “Society Formed for Handicapped MDs,” American Medical Association News (September 24, 1982); “The Society of Handicapped Physicians,” Diversion (July, 1982); “Blind Doctor’s Vision Lights Others’ Way,” News-Star-World (May 3, 1982); obituary, April 10, 1982; Mary Lewis family papers.

LIDDELL, St. John Richardson, planter, soldier. Born, Elmsby Plantation, Woodville, Miss., December 6, 1815; son of Moses Liddell and Bethia Frances Richardson. Education: attended the United States Military Academy, West Point, 1833; expelled after wounding a fellow cadet in a duel. Married, 1841, Mary Roper of Natchez, Miss. Eight children. Became a planter in Catahoula Parish, La. Appointed colonel and volunteer aide-de-camp on the staff of Brig. Gen. William J. Hardee, 1861-1862. Served as a courier to Richmond, Va., for Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston. Promoted to rank of brigadier general, July 12, 1862. Led a brigade at Corinth, Miss.; Perryville, Ky.; and Stones’ River, Tenn. Commanded a division of the Army of Tennessee at the Battle of Chickamauga, Ga., September 19-20, 1863. Assigned to command the Sub-District of North Louisiana in late 1863. Fought in several skirmishes during the Red River Campaign of 1864. Assigned to command of the District of Southwest Mississippi and East Louisiana, August 2, 1864. Assumed command of the Eastern Division, District of the Gulf, in late August 1864. Commanded the defense of Fort Blakely, Ala., March and April 1865; captured April 9, 1865. Resumed plantation work after the war. Fatally shot by Col. Charles Jones aboard a steamer on Black River, February 14, 1870; interred on his plantation, Catahoula Parish. A.W.B. Sources: Moses Liddell family papers, Louisiana State University Department of Archives and Manuscripts; Ezra J. Warner, Generals in Gray (1959); Mark M. Boatner III, The Civil War Dictionary (1959); Clement A. Evans, Confederate Military History, 13 vols. (1899); Nathaniel C. Hughes, ed., Liddell’s Record (1985); Paul Everett Postell, “John Hampden Randolph, A Louisiana Planter,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXV (1942).

LILLY, Octave, insurance executive, poet, short story writer. Born, New Iberia, La., April 28, 1908; son of Octave Lilly, Sr., and Emma Hayes. Education: local schools, New Iberia; New Orleans University (now Dillard University), A. B., 1932. Writer with the Federal Writers’ Project under Lyle Saxon, 1936; People Life Insurance Company, agent, director of agencies, 1938-1974; author of “Cathedral in the Ghetto” and other poems published in various black journals; short story published in Screenland magazine while in grammar school. Married, Lillian M. Mack, July 4, 1933. Memberships: secretary, “Friends of Amistad,” Amistad Research Center; Dryades Street Y.M.C.A.; Urban League; Dillard University Alumni Association; Louisiana Education Association; Frontiers International; Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity; St. Peter African Methodist Episcopal Church in New Orleans; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Religious affiliation: Methodist, lay-leader, Trinity U.M.E. Church. Died, May 6, 1975. C.T. Sources: New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 8, 1975; Letter from Mrs. Lillian M. Lilly (wife), November 28, 1983, to Carole R. Taylor.

LINDSEY, Isaac Coleman, attorney, jurist, politician, lieutenant governor. Born, Dry Creek, Calcasieu (now Allen) Parish, La., October 2, 1892; son of Rufus B. Lindsey and Lydia Ellen Hamilton. Reared by grandparents Rev. Isaac Hamilton and Lydia Eliza Simmons Hamilton. Education: rural schools of Calcasieu Parish; Oakdale High School; Louisiana State University, LL.D., 1921. Teacher; clerk of Allen Parish Police Jury; state senator from Bossier and Webster parishes, 1924-1928, 1932-1940. Floor leader of senate under Huey P. Long (q.v.), president pro-tem of senate, chief deputy banking commissioner for Louisiana, 1936-1940; judge, Nineteenth Judicial District of Louisiana, Division D, 1950-1968; presiding judge for Nineteenth Judicial District of Louisiana, Division D, 1960-1968, lieutenant governor 1939. Member of 1921 Louisiana constitutional convention. Active member of Baptist church; St. James Lodge No. 47 AF&AM; East Baton Rouge Bar Association. Married: Cora Herring (b. 1894) of Rosebud, Tex., October 21, 1914. Children: Rufus Jason (b. 1916), Douglas Hamilton (b. 1919), Lewis Hughes (b. 1922), James Hall (b. 1925), David (b. 1928). Died, November 7, 1968. Interred Resthaven Mausoleum, Baton Rouge. S.H.M. Sources: Family papers; obituary, Baton Rouge Morning Advocate, November 8, 1968.

LINK, Grant, politician, civic leader. Born, Richard, Acadia Parish, La., December 7, 1917; son of Newton Link and Lucille Mouton. Married Delia Bonin of Richard, La.; four children, only Mark and Lucille survived to adulthood. Education: attended Church Point, La., High School and Louisiana State University. Worked for the Bank of Commerce of Rayne, La., and the Pure Oil Company of Beaumont, Tex., before World War II. Military service: first sergeant, 89th Division; saw action under General George Patton in Europe. Following the war, Link returned to Richard, La. Managed the Link and Merritt Farm for thirty-seven years. Served on the Acadia Parish School Board for twenty-nine years. Member, Rice Promotion Board, Louisiana Farm Bureau; 4-H Livestock Show and Sales Committee; Acadia Parish Rice Growers Association; Louisiana Warehouse Committee; Habibi Temple; Evangeline Shrine Club; Acadia Shrine Club; American Legion Post 225 of Church Point; Post 9903, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Church Point; 89th Division Society; Louisiana State University Alumni Association; Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church; and the Richard Volunteer Fire Department. Master, Masonic Lodge; chairman, Community advisory board, Louisiana State University at Eunice; chairman, ASCS County Committee. Member, board of directors, Church Point Bank and Trust Company; chairman for eight years. Died, Lafayette General Hospital, Lafayette, La., September 18, 1997; interred Pilgrim Rest Cemetery. C.A.B. Sources: Lafayette Daily Advertiser, September 20, 1997.

LION, Jules, portrait and miniature painter, lithographer, daguerreotypist. Born, France, 1816, a free man of color. Presented an exhibition of daguerreotypes in New Orleans in 1840, a year after Daguerre announced his invention. Continued his work in New Orleans during 1840s and perhaps longer. Died, New Orleans, 1866. D.D.C. Sources: Martin and Margaret Wiesendanger, comps., 19th Century Louisiana Painters and Paintings (1971); Margaret Smith, “Checklist of Photographers Working in New Orleans, 1840-1865,” Louisiana History, XX (1979).

LISA, Manuel, fur trader. Born, New Orleans, September 8, 1772; son of Christopher de Lisa and María Rodriguez de Lisa. Married (1) Mary Charles, date unknown; (2) Mitain (Native American), 1814; (3) Mary Hempstead Keeney, 1819. Five children. Career: became a fur trader in Saint Louis, Mo., ca. 1790; secured a protected monopoly from the Spanish government to trade with the Osage Indians; formed the St. Louis, Missouri, Fur Company with three partners, 1802; led a forty-two man expedition up the Missouri River, establishing several trading posts and built a fort (first called Fort Raymond and later known as Fort Manuel) at the mouth of the Big Horn River, 1807-1808; led a 350 man expedition further up the Missouri River. Built Fort Lisa twelve miles above the mouth of the Big Knife River, 1809; credited with persuading Mississippi Valley Indians not to join the British in the War of 1812; appointed subagent for Indian affairs in a certain part of the Missouri territory, 1814. Died August 12, 1820; interred in what is now the Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, Mo. J.D.W. Sources: Various clippings, vertical file, Louisiana State Library, Baton Rouge, La.

LITTON, Alfred, farmer, businessman, politician. Born near Mitchell, Sabine Parish, La., December 31, 1859; son of Alfred Litton, Sr., and Lourana Chambliss. Education: attended rural public schools. Member of Sabine Parish School Board, Louisiana house of representatives from Sabine Parish, 1908-1916. Married Sarah Oscar Tatum (b. 1861 in Union Parish) daughter of Peter Lafayette Tatum and Sarah Ann Wright. Children: Lillie Pearl (b. 1884), Oscar Buford (b. 1886), Dr. Amos L. (b. 1890), Dr. William A. (b. 1892), Henry Kyle (b. 1893), Esther (b. 1897), and Mattie Evaline (b. 1900). Died, Lafayette, La., January 28, 1944; interred Oakgrove Cemetery, Mitchell, La. S.H.M. Sources: Family papers; John G. Belisle, History of Sabine Parish, Louisiana (1912).

LIVAUDAIS, Jacques François Esnould de, sailor, administrator. Born, St. Malo, France, 1696(?); son of Jacques Esnould de Livaudais and Marie Guillette le Jaloux. Embarked with his uncle, Lavigne Voisin, a corsair, as an apprentice seaman. Gained a position on a ship of the Company of the Indies and in 1720 was made a first lieutenant on La Découverte. After twelve years success with the Company of the Indies, he was transferred to Louisiana and given the important position of pilot of the port of New Orleans. In 1734, Bienville (q.v.), governor of Louisiana, recommended him for the position of captain of the ports. At the order of Gov. Kerlérec (q.v.) in 1760, he accompanied an armed transport vessel, the Opal, carrying powder for the colony. British vessels harassed his ship, but he outran them and daringly navigated his ship through the passes at the mouth of the Mississippi River at night. Married Marie Geneviève de la Source, January 3, 1733. Several children, eldest sons: François Esnould de Livaudais (b. 1736), Joseph Esnould de Livaudais. Died, 1773(?). P.D.A. Sources: Grace King, Creole Families of New Orleans (1921; reprint ed., 1971); Charles R. Maduell, Jr., Marriage Contracts, Wills, and Testaments of the Spanish Colonial Period in New Orleans, 1770-1804 (1969).

LIVINGSTON, Edward, attorney, politician, U. S. senator, diplomat. Born at the family home Clermont, Columbia County, N. Y., May 28, 1764; son of Robert R. Livingston and Margaret Beekman. Education: local schools; the School of Dominie Doll at Esopus; College of New Jersey (Princeton); law studies in Albany in the office of John Lansing. Married (1), April 10, 1788, Mary McEvers (b. 1801) of New York City, daughter of Charles McEvers, New York merchant. Married (2), June 3, 1805, to Louise Moreau de Lassy, daughter of Jean D’Avezac, a planter from Saint-Domingue and widow of a French officer and planter of that island. Three children by the first marriage, one by the second, Cora (b. 1806). An active Jeffersonian republican, Livingston first entered Congress in 1794 after having practiced at the New York bar for nine years. In his first term as a congressman Livingston proposed a major reform of the federal penal code. His plan was rejected but reform of the penal laws was to remain a major interest. In 1800 Livingston was simultaneously given the post of United States attorney for the District of New York and also appointed mayor of that city. In the summer of 1803, recovered from a bout of yellow fever only to discover that one of his employees had absconded with customshouse funds. Livingston resigned at once and pledged to repay the entire amount taken by the agent. He decided to move to New Orleans to recoup his losses, arriving in February 1804. During the British advance on New Orleans in 1814-1815, Livingston served as chairman of the committee on public defense in which capacity he was instrumental in securing the aid of the Laffite brothers. During the campaign itself Livingston served as Andrew Jackson’s aide-de-camp, advisor, and interpreter. Livingston is well known for his involvement in the legal battle over the Batture, an unimproved area along the river which many felt to be public property but which was, in fact, privately owned. The fight dragged on for years with Livingston finally being awarded a portion of the Batture in 1826. The settlement allowed him to buy off the balance for debts, a sum which amounted to just over $100,000. Livingston is perhaps best known for his attempts to revise the penal code of Louisiana. This project was begun in 1821, Livingston having been elected the previous year to the Louisiana legislature. His extensive reforms of the penal code were not adopted, but his work nevertheless brought him a great deal of recognition on the local, national, and even international level. From 1828 to 1831 he represented Louisiana in the United States Senate. A firm Jacksonian, he was chosen by the president to serve as his secretary of state in the spring of 1831. In 1833 he resigned from that post to accept the appointment of ambassador to France. Livingston’s tenure in that position was spent attempting to negotiate a settlement of American claims against France for actions dating back to the Napoleonic wars. The matter was eventually settled to the mutual satisfaction of both nations, but in the meanwhile Livingston had resigned his post and returned home. Livingston soon retired from public life. Member: New York and Louisiana Masonic lodges. Died, May 21, 1836; interred family vault, Clermont. M.W. Sources: William B. Hatcher, Edward Livingston (1940); George Dargo, Jefferson’s Louisiana (1975); Dictionary of American Biography, XI.

LOBDELL, John Little, attorney. Born, Johnstown, N. Y., May 7, 1791; son of Abijah and (?) Lobdell. Commissioned ensign, promoted to rank of captain, New York militia. Arrived West Feliciana Parish, La., 1821. Married Ann Mathilda Stirling, daughter Lewis Stirling, December 18, 1828. Defense counsel for parish judge, Thomas W. Chinn (q.v.) in impeachment proceedings by Louisiana legislature, 1828; incorporator of Grace Episcopal Church, 1827; member Feliciana Lodge #31 Free and Accepted Masons. Removed to West Baton Rouge Parish, 1842, engaged in sugar planting. Removed to Natchitoches, La., and Smith County, Tex., during Civil War; returned to West Baton Rouge, 1865. Died, September 5, 1867. E.K.D. Sources: Elrie Robinson, Early Feliciana Politics (1936); Stirling family papers.

LOCKETT, Samuel H., engineer, educator, soldier. Born, Mecklenburg County, Va., July 7, 1837; with family removed to Alabama. Education: Howard College, Alabama, graduated 1853; United States Military Academy, graduated second in class of 1859. Military service: commissioned a brevet second lieutenant in Corps of Engineers, U. S. Army, but assigned to Academy as assistant professor of Natural Philosophy and assistant professor of Spanish; made assistant to Col. W. H. C. Whiting in 1860 and engaged in engineering work in the Eighth Lighthouse District, where he supervised construction of a fort on the Florida coast; submitted resignation January 13, 1861; turned over post, February 1, 1861. Civil War service: captain and engineer on staff of Maj. Gen. Braxton Bragg (q.v.), assisted in fortifying Pensacola, Fla., and Corinth, Miss.; fought at Battle of Shiloh; ordered to report to Brig. Gen. Martin Luther Smith as his chief engineer June 20, 1862, Lockett designed and constructed the defenses of Vicksburg, Miss.; became chief engineer of the Department of Mississippi and East Louisiana, November 1, and in addition to Vicksburg he supervised the fortification of Port Hudson, La., and Jackson, Miss. Captured at Vicksburg, July 4, 1863; exchanged and placed in charge of the defenses of Mobile, Ala.; rose to rank of colonel; became chief engineer of the Department of Alabama, Mississippi, and East Louisiana. After war, professor of Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Fine Arts at Judson Institute, Marion, Ala., 1865-1868; professor of Engineering and Commandant of Cadets, Louisiana State Seminary, near Alexandria, 1868-1873; prepared “Topographical Survey and Map of Louisiana”; wrote “Louisiana As It Is” (1873); resigned for economic reasons and moved to Jacksonville, Ala., July 1837, where he owned and operated Calhoun College and “The Female Academy of Jacksonville”; economics forced the closure of both schools during summer of 1874; almost immediately acquired a new school, Hamner Hall, in Montgomery, Ala.; en route from Jacksonville to Montgomery, the train carrying the family fell through a fifty-five foot bridge, badly injuring Mrs. Lockett and inflicting minor injuries on Samuel and their five children. Hamner Hall failed and Lockett moved his family to Egypt, July-August 1875, where he was commissioned a colonel in the corps of engineers in the army of the khedive. Lockett’s construction of defenses during Egyptian retreat from their near annihilation at the Plain of Dura was commendable, as was his survey of the region between Massawa and the Abyssinian Plateau. Following collapse of the Egyptian economy, returned to the United States during the summer of 1877. That fall Lockett served as professor of Engineering and Mathematics at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Prior to his leaving the university, ca. 1881-1883, Lockett also assumed the duties of commandant of the cadet corps. On July 4, 1878, he delivered the commencement address at Louisiana State University. In 1880 he declined the presidency of Louisiana State University. After 1883, Lockett successfully engaged in private enterprise as an engineer and continued to seek a publisher for his “Topographical Survey and Map of Louisiana.” He was principal assistant engineer to Gen. C. P. Stone in the placing of the Bartholdi Statue of Liberty. While returning from an engineering assignment in South America, he came down with fever and died at Bogota, Columbia, on October 12, 1891. Samuel H. Lockett Hall at Louisiana State University named for him. An edited version of his Louisiana As It Is: A Geographical and Topographical Description of the State was published in 1969. L.L.H. Sources: Lauren C. Post, “Samuel Henry Lockett (1837-1891): A Sketch of His Life and Work,” Louisiana History, V (1964); Lauren C. Post, ed., Louisiana As It Is: A Geographical and Topographical Description of the State (1969).

LOEBER, Edith, see BALLARD, Edith Loeber

LOEBER, Florence, attorney, woman’s suffrage advocate. Born, New Orleans; daughter of Caroline K. Humbrecht and Dr. Frederick Loeber, who was associated with Touro Infirmary for over thirty years. Her sisters, Drs. Maud Loeber and Edith Loeber Ballard (q.v.), were among the first women admitted to the New Orleans Parish Medical Society. Education: St. Simeon Parochial School and Newcomb College, New Orleans; studied law at Cornell University for two years; Tulane University, LL. B. degree. Was among the first women to be admitted to a Louisiana law school; was one of only four women practicing law in New Orleans in the early 1900s; aided in organizing the Milne Home for Girls and the Catholic Women’s Club; worked with Dr. Otto Joachim to develop the Louisiana League for the Hard of Hearing and served on its board of directors; was involved in the International Peace Conference movement; a director of the Community Chest; chaired the church campaign in the National Recovery Act consumer’s drive; member, New Orleans Court Commission; advocate of woman’s suffrage; delegate to the National American Woman’s Association convention, 1915. Charter member, New Orleans and Era clubs; president, state’s Woman’s Suffrage Association. Died, New Orleans, September 27, 1933; interred Lafayette Cemetery I. J.B.C. Sources: Carmen Lindig, The Path from the Parlor (1986); John Smith Kendall, History of New Orleans, 3 vols. (1922); New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, September 28, 1933.

LOMAX, John Avery, anthropologist, folklorist, ethnomusicologist. Born, Goodman, Miss., September 23, 1867; son of James Avery Lomax and Susan Frances (Cooper) Lomax. Education: University of Texas, B. A., 1897; University of Texas, M. A. (literature), 1906; Harvard, M. A. (literature), 1907. Married (1) Bess Baumann Brown, 1904. Children: Shirley, John Avery, Alan, Bess. Married (2) Ruby Terrill, 1934. President of American Folklore Society, 1912-1913; published several books on American folk song tradition: Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910), Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp (1919), American Ballads and Folk Songs (1934), Negro Folk Songs as Sung by Lead Belly (1936), Our Singing Country (1941), Adventures of a Ballad Hunter (1947). Collected more than 10,000 recordings of American folk songs for the Library of Congress Archive of American Folk Song (many with his son Alan), including several hundred recordings from Louisiana made primarily between 1934 and 1937 and covering a wide range of Louisiana styles, including early Cajun and Creole ballads and dance tunes, early jazz, blues and Negro spirituals, and Anglo ballads and instrumentals; recorded extensively several important Louisiana musicians, including Huddie “Leadbelly” Ledbetter (q.v.), “Jelly Roll” Morton (q.v.). Died, January 26, 1948; interred Austin, Tex. B.J.A. Sources: Author’s research; Dictionary of American Biography, Supplement 4.

LONG, Earl Kemp, politician, governor. Born, Winnfield, La., August 26, 1895; son of Huey Pierce Long, Sr., and Caledonia Tison. Attended Loyola (New Orleans), 1926; passed the Louisiana bar, 1926. Salesman from 1913-1928; held many selling jobs; greatest, Dyanshine, Texas Territory (including Louisiana), 1919-1928. Campaigned for brother Huey (q.v.) in 1918, 1924, 1928, while a salesman. Political appointments: attorney, Inheritance Tax Collector, 1928-1932; assistant state counsel, Home Owners Loan Corp., 1932-1934. Private law pracice and lobbying, 1934-1936. Married Blanche Revere, August 17, 1932. No children. Loyal and active in state and national Democratic party, held numerous offices: ran for lieutenant governor, 1932, defeated; served as lieutenant governor, 1936-1939; governor from June 26, 1939 to May 4, 1940 (Gov. Richard Leche [q.v.] resigned); defeated for governor, 1940, by Sam H. Jones (q.v.); candidate, lieutenant governor, Lewis Morgan ticket, 1944, defeated; elected governor second term, 1948 (defeated Sam H. Jones); cattleman and farmer, 1944-1948; elected governor for third term in first primary, 1956; served several terms as member of Democratic party state committee, delegate to party conventions from 1936-1956; candidate for Congress from Eighth District, 1960, elected but died before taking office. Member: First Baptist Church, Baton Rouge, 1955-1960; Elks Club. Famous as humorist and name caller. Nicknames “Wizard of Winnfield”; “Common Gazabo”; “Last of the Red Hot Papas”; “Ole Earl”; “Uncle Earl”; “Daddy of the Old Age Pension”; “Daddy of the Free Hot Lunch Program”; Earl “Unkempt” Long; “Kangaroo Long”. Some outstanding ac­complish­ments: first to serve as governor of Louisiana three terms; free hot lunch program; minimum and equal teacher pay act; old age pension increase; highway improvement (paved country roads); bonus World War II veterans, established University of New Orleans; sound financial fiscal control of state monies; first candidate for governor since Reconstruction to seek the black vote, 1948, 1956, 1959, 1960; loyal to family, friends and Louisiana State University (without interference). Died, Alexandria hospital, September 5, 1960; interred Earl Long Memorial State Park, Winnfield. M.P. Sources: Richard B. McCaughan, Socks on a Rooster (1967); A. J. Leibling, The Earl of Louisiana (1961); Huey P. Long, Every Man a King: The Autobiography of Huey P. Long (1933); Thomas Martin, Dynasty: The Longs of Louisiana (1960); Stan Opotowsky, The Longs of Louisiana (1960); T. Harry Williams, Huey Long (1969); Perry H. Howard, Political Tendencies in Louisiana; Morgan D. Peoples, “Earl Kemp Long: The Man from Pea Patch Farm,” Louisiana History, XVII (1976); Personal interviews, Mrs. Lucille Long Hunt, Ruston, La.; Current Biography Yearbook (1960); Harley B. Bozeman, “Winn Parish as I Have Known It,” Winn Parish Enterprise-News-American, October 6, 1956-February 27, 1964; Concordia Sentinel, July 30, 1975; Baton Rouge Morning Advocate/State-Times; New Orleans Times-Picayune; Interview, Michael Kurtz, Hammond, La.

LONG, George Shannon, educator, attorney, congressman. Born, Tunica, West Feliciana Parish, La., September 11, 1883; son of Huey Pierce Long, Sr., and Caledonia Tison; brother of Huey P. Long (q.v.) and Earl K. Long (q.v.), brother-in-law of Rose McConnell Long (q.v.), cousin of Gillis W. Long (q.v.), and uncle of former U. S. Senator Russell B. Long. Removed with parents to Winnfield, La. Attended the public schools and Mt. Lebanon College (now Louisiana College), 1897-1899. Taught school in Winn and Grant parishes; studied dentistry in Oklahoma. During the First World War was in Officer’s Training School at Waco, Tex., when peace was declared. Married (1) Mary Katherine Shindel (d. 1950). Studied law; admitted to the Oklahoma bar in 1923; member of the Oklahoma house of representative, 1920-1922. Practiced dentistry in Monroe, La., 1935-1940, and Pineville, La., 1948-1950. Superintendent of Louisiana Colony and Training School, 1948-1950; institutional inspector, 1950-1952; delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1948; unsuccessful for the Democratic nomination for Congress in 1948 and 1950. Member, Baptist church, Kiwanians, Shriners, and Masons. Elected to U. S. Congress, November 4, 1952. Married (2) Jewell Tyson of Pineville, La., May 11, 1953; reelected to Congress; member of the Veterans Affairs Committee; helped organize the prayer room off the Capitol rotunda. Served in Congress from January 3, 1953, until his death in the Naval Hospital at Bethesda, Md., March 22, 1958; interred Greenwood Memorial Park, Pineville. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Congressional Directory, 83rd Congress (1954); New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, March 23, 1958; T. Harry Williams, Huey Long (1969).

LONG, Gillis William, attorney, businessman, congressman. Born, Winnfield, La., May 4, 1923; son of Floyd H. Long, Sr., and Birdie Shumake; cousin of George S. Long (q.v.), Huey P. Long (q.v.), Earl K. Long (q.v.), and former U. S. Senator Russell B. Long. Education: attended public schools in Winnfield and Alexandria, La., graduated from Louisiana State University, B. A., 1949; J. D., 1951. Admitted to practice before the state supreme court in 1951 and before the Supreme Court of the United States in 1954. Combat veteran, World War II (infantry); enlisted as a private, 1942, awarded Bronze Star and Purple Heart; served at Nuremberg War Trials; discharged as captain, 1947. Legal counsel to the Senate Select Committee on Small Business, 1951-1952; chief counsel, Special House Committees on Campaign Expenditures (elections), 1952-1954 and 1956; elected as a Democrat to the Eighty-eighth Congress (January 3, 1963-January 3, 1965). Unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination for governor of Louisiana in 1963 and for renomination to Congress. Assistant director, Office of Economic Opportunity (federal anti-poverty agency), 1965-1966; legislative counsel, Special Committee on Historic Preservation, 1965; counsel, National Commission on Urban Growth Policy, 1968-1969; private law practice specializing in investment banking, 1970-1972; chairman of task force creating Louisiana Deepwater Offshore Port, and first president of the Offshore Terminal Authority, 1972; president, Lower Mississippi Valley Flood Control Association, 1973-1974; soybean farmer. Member: Alexandria, American, and Louisiana bar associations; American Legion, VFW; Delta Kappa Epsilon; LSU Alumni Association; National Trust for Historic Preservation; and others; board of directors, Mainstream, Inc.; cofounder, Congressional Rural Caucus, 1973. Married Mary Catherine Small, 1947. Children: George Harrison and Janis Catherine. Elected to Congress, 1972 and five succeeding Congresses; member: House Committee on Rules (subcommittee chairman); chairman: House Democratic Caucus and Joint Economic Committee. Established the Gillis Long Scholarship Fund at LSU. Died, Washington, D. C., January 20, 1985; military funeral held at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Alexandria, La.; interred National Cemetery, Pineville, La. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Congressional Directory, 88th Congress (1963); Congressional Directory, 98th Congress (1983); Baton Rouge Morning Advocate, obituary, January 22, 1984.

LONG, Huey Pierce, governor, U. S. senator. Born, Winnfield, La., August 30, 1893; son of Huey Pierce Long, Sr., and Caledonia Tison. Education: University of Oklahoma (dropped out for financial reasons); Tulane University, special student for law studies, audited courses; read law and worked with tutor preparatory to passing the bar examination. Admitted to the Louisiana bar, May 15, 1915. Married, April 12, 1913, Rose McConnell (q.v.). Children: Rose Lolita, Russell Billieu, and Palmer Reid. Opened law practice in Winnfield, specialized in workmen’s Compensation cases, land titles, oil and gas, and timber sales. Won election to the Louisiana Railroad Commission (later Public Service Commission), 1918. Moved law practice to Shreveport. Served on Commission, 1918-1928, chairman, 1921-1928. While a member of the Commission oil company pipelines were placed under the regulatory authority of the Commission; the Cumberland Telegraph and Telephone Co., ordered to refund almost one-half million dollars to telephone users in the state; streetcar fares were lowered in Shreveport; natural gas prices for Louisiana consumers reduced while severance taxes raised. Ran unsuccessfully for governor, 1924. Elected governor, 1928, in contested race against incumbent O. H. Simpson (q.v.) and Congressman Riley J. Wilson (q.v.). During his administration from May 21, 1928, to January 25, 1932, state massively increased expenditures for public education and raised appropriations to the state university. A medical school was established. Prisons were reformed and improved. A highway-building program added 2,500 miles of paved roads, 1,308 miles of asphalt roads, and 9,000 miles of gravel roads. Major bridges built across the Mississippi and other large Louisiana rivers. Free textbooks, charity hospitals, old-age pensions, free night schools for adults, sales taxes and higher gasoline, corporate, franchise, and severance taxes were approved by the legislature. Political oppostion grew amid charges of demagoguery and dictatorship, misconduct, blackmail, and usurpation of authority. Impeachment efforts failed, 1929. Won election to U. S. Senate, 1930, but remained governor of Louisiana until January 25, 1932, when he took his Senate seat, after securing victory for the “Long” candidates to state office, headed by Gov. Oscar K. Allen (q.v.). Became a major factor in national elections of 1932 as a supporter of Franklin D. Roosevelt, but thereafter became a vigorous opponent of the New Deal. Developed as the Share-Our-Wealth Program which would have eliminated personal fortunes in excess of $3 million, provided every family with $5,000 with which to buy a house, car, and radio, provided for old-age pensions, minimum annual incomes, veterans bonuses, and government-paid college educations. This program caused friction with New Deal. Long actively opposed New Deal candidates for public office, and Roosevelt supporters actively opposed Long candidates in Louisiana. Internal Revenue Service investigations attempted to undermine and discredit Long and his partisans. Career came to an end on September 8, 1935, when shot by Dr. Carl A. Weiss, Jr. (q.v.), in the state capitol. Long’s political influence, however, extended for many decades as state politics became divided between “Long” and “Anti-Long” factions. His brother, Earl K. Long (q.v.) served as lieutenant governor, 1939-1940, and as governor, 1948-1952, 1956-1960. His son, Russell B. Long (q.v.) served as U. S. senator for nearly forty years. Died, Baton Rouge, September 10, 1935; interred capitol grounds. H.C.D. Sources: Harnett T. Kane, Louisiana Hayride: America’s Rehearsal for Dictatorship (1941); Robert Penn Warren, All the King’s Men (1946); and T. Harry Williams, Huey Long (1969); Henry C. Dethloff, ed., Huey P. Long: Southern Demagugue or American Democrat (1976).

LONG, Rose McConnell, first woman U. S. senator from Louisiana. Born, Greensburg, Ind., April 8, 1892; daughter of Sallie Armitage Billieu of Thibodaux, La., and Peter Martin McConnell of Greensburg; widow of Huey P. Long (q.v.), mother of former U. S. Senator Russell B. Long, and sister-in-law of George S. Long (q.v.) and Earl K. Long (q.v.). Removed to Shreveport, La., in 1901 with her parents. Education: attended the public schools and a secretarial school in Shreveport; worked as a stenographer. Married Huey Pierce Long, Jr., in Memphis, Tenn., April 12, 1913. Children: Rose Lolita, Russell Billieu, and Palmer Reid. Helped in her husband’s early struggles as a lawyer and politician, but after he rose to national prominence devoted more time to the children and took little part in his political and social life. Appointed and subsequently elected as Democrat to the U. S. Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the death of her husband. Served from January 31, 1936, to January 3, 1937; was not a candidate for reelection. Retired from public life and maintained the family home in Shreveport for thirty-five years. When son, Russell B., was elected to the Senate in 1948, he became the first senator in history whose father and mother had also served in the Senate. Member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and the Methodist church. Died, Boulder, Colo., May 27, 1970, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. O. W. McFarland; interred Forrest Park Cemetery, Shreveport, La. J.B.C. Sources: Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1971 (1971); Congressional Directory, 74th Congress, 2d Session (1936); Baton Rouge, Morning Advocate, obituary, May 29, 1970; Lafayette Daily Advertiser, obituary, May 28, 1970.

LONG, William Jennings, journalist, sculptor, preservationist. Born, Cleveland, Ohio, August 14, 1899; son of Thomas Marshall Long and Grace Eleanor Martin. Education: local schools, Oberlin College, Western Reserve University, Ohio; University of Chicago. War service: U. S. Army, World Wars I and II. High school teacher, Cleveland, Ohio; set and costume designer, New York, 1921; assistant art director, Le Petit Théâtre, New Orleans, 1922; editor of New Orleans Journal of Commerce, 1922-1927; chief editorial writer, Chicago Journal of Commerce, 1929-1938, 1944; press relations executive, Museum of Science & Industry, Chicago, 1940-1943; director, Research Public Relations, United States Steel Corp., 1944-1945; editor and publisher of Vieux Carré Courier, New Orleans, 1961-1969. Sculptor, wood and ivory works exhibited in one-man shows in San Antonio, Tex.; Milwaukee, Wis.; Des Moines, Iowa; New York, and Cleveland Museum of Art; awarded one of five equal prizes, First International Ivory Sculpture Exhibition, New York, 1953. Well-known preservationist, played a prominent role in the defeat of the proposed riverfront expressway in the French Quarter. Married Edith Elliott, March 8, 1952. No children. Member: New Orleans Arts Association, Pittsburgh Association of Artists, Pittsburgh Society of Sculptors, Public Relations Society of America, National Association of Science Writers, Overseas Press Club, National Science Teachers’ Association, Manufacturing Chemists’ Association, Landmarks, Vieux Carré Property Owners and Associates, Patio Planters, Louisiana Council for the Vieux Carré. Died, New Orleans, January 22, 1970; cremated, Houston, Texas. B.R.O. Sources: “For New Orleans: An Industrial Museum,” a proposal by William J. Long to New Orleans city officials, n.d.; New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 20, 1958; May 19, 1963; obituary, January 23, 1970; New Orleans Vieux Carré Courier, obituary, January 23, 1970; Preservation, obituary, May, 1970; Who’s Who in the South and Southwest (1956).

LONGE, George, educator. Born, New Orleans, 1897; son of Eugenie Gardier and George Longe, Sr. Education: local schools; Straight University (now Dillard), M. A. degree. Married Louise Folse. Child: Cherrie. Taught at McDonogh #35; was principal at Fisk, McDonogh #36, Albert Wicker, Macarty, and Alfred Lawless schools; served in the Louisiana Colored Teachers’ Assocation as an executive committee member, as editor of its journal for twelve years, vice president for two terms, and president, 1939-1941; chairman of the Colored Division of the New Orleans Community Chest, 1935; a founder of the local Urban League, 1938; chairman of the local War Finance Committee, 1943-1945. Member, Bunch Club, president, 1960-1961; Masons, supreme commander, 1939-1917; Colored Educational Alliance of New Orleans; National Advisory Committee for Negroes; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; Social Security Board; Times-Picayune Christmas Gift Fund; Negro Doll and Toy Fund; Pan-Hellenic Council of New Orleans; Omega Psi Phi fraternity. Died, July 22, 1985, New Orleans; interred St. Louis Cemetery III. His papers donated to the Amistad Research Center, New Orleans. J.B.C. Sources: Amistad Log, (August, 1985), 10; New Orleans Times-Picayune, obituary, July 25, 1985.

LONGSTREET, James, soldier, civil servant. Born, Edgefield District, S. C., January 8, 1821; son of James Longstreet, a planter, and Mary Anne Dent; the fifth child in a large family descended from Dutch settlers (Langestraet) of New York and New Jersey. Education: largely from mother and uncle, Augustus Baldwin Longstreet, the jurist, educator, and author; private academy at Augusta, Ga.; West Point, 1838-1842. Spent most of childhood in Gainesville and Augusta, Ga. Removed to Morgan County, Ala., to qualify for appointment to West Point. Antebellum military service in Missouri, Louisiana (at Natchitoches, 1844-1845), Florida, Texas, New York, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, and Kansas. Won brevet promotion to captain and major in Mexican War; wounded at Chapultepec. Resigned as major from U. S. Army effective June 1, 1861. Civil War service as lieutenant general of infantry with Army of Northern Virginia, except September 1863 to April 1864, when attached to Army of Tennessee. Settled in New Orleans September 1865. Formed cotton brokerage firm of Longstreet, Owen & Company, 1866-1867, with three New Orleans brothers; president of Great Southern & Western Life & Accident Insurance Company of New Orleans, 1866-1867. Promoted construction of a railroad from New Orleans to Mexico. Longstreet understood the importance of rapid sectional reconciliation for Southern economic and political stability. Working for what he considered the South’s best interests, he was among the first and most prominent ex-Confederates to accept political favors from Republicans. Supported U. S. Grant (a cousin and long-time friend) for president in 1868. Later served as state adjutant general, 1870-1872; major general of state militia, 1872-1874; state levee commission of engineers, 1872-1877; state returning board, 1872-1874; board of directors of New Orleans schools, 1870s; chairman of committee on school commercial purchases, 1870s; ex-officio administrator of University of Louisiana, 1877-1878. Longstreet’s political role in Reconstruction is vague. He was a trusted lieutenant of Henry C. Warmoth (q.v.) and was associated with Warmoth in two business ventures (sugar and railroads), but he did not profit materially from Republican rule. Upset by Grant’s efforts to oust Warmoth, he resigned his federal and state offices in 1872. Yet he remained loyal to Grant, later using the New Orleans police (attached to his militia) in “Battle of the Cabildo”, March 5, 1873, and White League riots, September 1874, to keep William P. Kellogg (q.v.) in power. As Democrats regained political control of Louisiana, expediency and poor health dictated that Longstreet return to Georgia, where he earned a number of federal and state patronage positions, 1878-1902, by serving the Republican party. Between 1884 and 1898 he devoted much time to writing his memoirs and magazine articles about the war. Longstreet remains a controversial military figure, especially for his actions at Gettysburg. He is usually regarded as a competent tactician but a poor strategist, unfitted for independent command. However, much Southern criticism of his war record stems from his postwar political affiliations. Author of From Manasses to Appomattox (1896). Married (1), March 8, 1848, Maria Louisa Garland (d. 1889), of Lynchburg, Va., daughter of Gen. John Garland and Harriet Smith. Ten children: John Garland (b. 1848) Augustus Baldwin (b. 1850), William Dent (b. 1853), Harriet Margaret (b. 1856), James (b. 1857), Mary Anne (b. 1860), Robert Lee (b. 1863), James (b. 1865), Fitz Randolph (b. 1869), Maria Louisa (b. 1872). Married (2), September 8, 1897, Helen Dortch, of North Carolina. No issue. Converted to Catholicism, 1877. Died, Gainesville, Ga., January 2, 1904, of pneumonia; interred Ata Vieta Cemetery. D.S.* Sources: Donald B. Sanger and Thomas R. Hay, James Longstreet (1952); William L. Richter, “James Longstreet: From Rebel to Scalawag,” Louisiana History, XI (1970); James Longstreet, From Manassas to Appomattox, 2nd ed. (1908); Dictionary of American Biography; William Garrett Piston, Lee’s Tarnished Lieutenant: James Longstreet and His Place in Southern History (1987).

LOONEY, Ben Earl, artist, writer. Born, Yellow Pine, La., June 2, 1904; son of Julian A. Looney and Mollie McKinney. Education: Louisiana State University School of Journalism; Centenary College; Corcoran Art School, Washington, D. C.; Eastport, Me., Summer School of Art; Arts Students’ League, New York; studied watercolor under George Ennis. First head of art department of LSU; taught art, Sarastoa, Fla., New York City, Weston, Mass., Bremerton, Wash., Greensboro, N.C. His subject matter was provided by 45 of the 50 states, Canada and Mexico; 45 of his paintings and articles were published in Ford Times; one is in the Smithsonian Institution magazine. In later life made home in Lafayette, La. Never married. Published works include Beau Séjour, watercolors of Louisiana plantation houses; Water Colors of Dixie; Cajun Country, pen and ink sketches of the Acadian country; Drawings of the Vieux Carré, captions written in both English and French; Cajun Vignettes, short stories and poems; Looney Plants Grow Wild, drawings, paintings, whimsical horticultural definitions. Died, Lafayette, May 25, 1981; willed his body to Louisiana State University School of Medicine. M.A.F. Sources: Lafayette Daily Advertiser, May 27, 1981; book jackets, Looney Plants Grow Wild, Cajun Country; interviews: Perry Guidry, his heir; Mrs. R. D. Moseley, Sr., his sister.

LOONEY, Frank J., attorney, public speaker. Born, Shreveport, June 4, 1873; son of Jeremiah Francis Looney and Isabelle Irene O’Neill Looney. Education: private family instruction, primarily from three aunts (members of the Daughters of the Cross), then, at Thatcher Military Institute, Shreveport, through college preparatory; began study of law at Tulane University, then, with Judge T. F. Bell, Sr. (q.v.), in Shreveport, and graduated from law school of Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va., where he served as class president. Admitted to practice, first in New York, then in Louisiana, in 1894. Spanish-American War service: captain in Hood’s Immunes. After army service, resumed practice of law in Shreveport until reaching the age of seventy-five. Married, April 22, 1903, Adeline Leonard, daughter of Fred A. Leonard, clerk of Caddo District Court, and Josephine Wilder Leonard. Children: Josephine (b. 1904), Frank O. (b. 1906), Fred Leonard (b. 1908), William Edward (b. 1913), Isabel and Charles G. (twins b. 1915), Patrick Wilder (b. 1917), Jeremiah Leonard (b. 1918), Reginald Marie (b. 1920), and Adeline Margaret (b. 1922). Active in Democratic party; long-time member of parish, area, and state central committees. Twice chairman of state central committee. Delegate to Louisiana constitutional convention of 1921. Acting national committeeman from Louisiana at 1924 Democratic National Convention. Recognized authority on state and federal law, and, particular, on constitutional law. Outstanding Catholic layman. Member of St. John Berchmans Catholic Church, Shreveport; two-term Grand Knight, Knights of Columbus Council 1108, Shreveport; Knight of St. Gregory. Died, Shreveport, February 17, 1968; interred St. Joseph’s Cemetery. F.O.L. Sources: Shreveport Times, editorial, February 20, 1968; Funeral Mass Homily, St. John’s Church, February 19, 1968; Louisiana State Bar Association Resolution, October 7, 1968; personal and family papers.

LOPEZ, Narciso, filibuster. Born in Venezuela in 1798 or 1799; son of a large landowner whose estates were destroyed in the rebellion led by Simón Bolívar. Joined the Spanish Army in 1814; rose to rank of colonel and received the rare military honor of the Cross of San Fernando. Married, while in Cuba in 1823, into the noble and wealthy de Frías family; developed the properties brought to him by his wife. Lived in Spain, 1833-1843. Served as aide-de-camp to Commander in Chief Valdez; became a senator in the Cortes from the city of Seville; returned to Cuba in 1843; served as governor of Trinidad, commander in chief of the central department, and president of the executive military commission; deprived of positions by change in administration. Embittered by loss of wealth and position, began plotting against interests of Spain; led failed Cuban-based revolt of June 1848; fled the island, arriving in New York, July 1848; mounted expedition to invade Cuba in 1849 but was thwarted by United States Navy; transferred base of operations to New Orleans; sailed for Cuba with volunteer force in 1850; expedition failed; arrested in New Orleans on June 7, 1850, and charged with violating United States neutrality laws; freed when three separate juries failed to convict. Raised a third expedition and sailed from New Orleans on August 3, 1851, aboard the ship Pampero with 450 American volunteers; landed near Havana and was defeated by Spanish forces; taken prisoner and executed along with fifty of his men. When news of execution reached New Orleans on August 21, angry crowds, seeking revenge, destroyed the office of the Spanish-language newspaper, La Union; also looted and pillaged in the Spanish business area, causing Spanish consul to flee the city; the federal government was compelled to make reparation to Spain in 1853. J.B.C. Sources: Robert Granville Caldwell, The Lopez Expeditions to Cuba, 1848-1851 (1915); Charles H. Brown, Agents of Manifest Destiny (1980); John S. Kendall, History of New Orleans (1922); Tom Reilly, “A Spanish-Language Voice of Dissent in Antebellum New Orleans,” Louisiana History, XXIII (1982).

LOVELL, Mansfield, soldier, engineer. Born, Washington, D. C., October 20, 1822; son of Dr. Joseph Lovell, a distinguished Bostonian, surgeon-general of the army (1818-1836), and Margaret Mansfield. Education: ordinary public schooling, entered West Point, 1838; upon graduating in 1842 commissioned second lieutenant in Fourth Artillery. Mexican War service: commissioned first lieutenant in February 1847; brevetted captain for gallantry at Chapultepec in September; twice wounded, severely at Belen Gate. After war saw service on the frontier and in New York; resigned in 1854; employed by Cooper & Hewitt’s Iron Works, Trenton, N. J.; became superintendent of street improvements for New York City in April 1858, and deputy street commissioner in November under Gustavus W. Smith; trained the City Guard, a select militia unit, to handle the cannon of Fort Hamilton (1859-1861); resigned September 1861. Civil War service: appointed major general in Confederate Army, October 7, 1861, and assigned to command at New Orleans; his long-time association with Gustavus W. Smith, who also sided with the Confederacy, may have determined his decision to cast his lot with the South; inadequate resources and the divided command of land and sea forces prevented a successful defense of New Orleans and he had to evacuate the city in April 1862. Despite the fact that Gen. Robert E. Lee commended his dispositions, he did not occupy another position of responsibility until he commanded the I Corps at the Battle of Corinth, October 3-4; following the Confederate defeat at Coffeeville on October 5, he skillfully commanded the rearguard. Hard feelings having arisen over the loss of New Orleans resulted in his being relieved in December; he was absolved of any blame regarding New Orleans by a military court of inquiry in November 1863. Gens. Joseph E. Johnston (in January 1864) and John B. Hood (in July) requested his services as corps commander, but to no avail; he served as a volunteer on Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s staff that summer; apparently in response to a further request by Johnston on March 23, 1865, Lovell was ordered by the secretary of war to report to General Lee for assignment; he was presumably en route to Johnston’s army when hostilities ceased; he was included in Johnston’s surrender on April 26, 1865, but his personal parole has never been located. After war, returned to New York; later undertook rice-planting venture on the Savannah River, and when it failed he once more returned to New York, where he remained and worked as a civil engineer and surveyor; involved in removing the East River obstructions at Hell Gate. Married, 1849, Emily, daughter of Col. Joseph Plympton, U. S. Infantry. Died, New York, June 1, 1884; interred Woodlawn Cemetery. L.L.H. Sources: Ezra J. Warner, Generals in Gray: Lives of the Confederate Commanders (1959); Dictionary of American Biography, XI.

LOWERY, George H., Jr., ornithologist, natural historian, founder and director of the Louisiana State University Museum of Natural Science. Born, Monroe, La., October 2, 1913. Education: Louisiana State University, B. S., 1934; M. S., 1936; University of Kansas, Ph. D., 1947. In 1936 founded the Louisiana State University Museum of Zoology and was appointed assistant curator, later the facility expanded into the Museum of Natural Science and he became its director in 1951. President, American Ornithologists Union, 1959-1961. Developed a unique procedure for telescopic observation of nocturnal migrations of birds across the face of the moon. Published over 60 scientific articles and two books, Louisiana Birds and The Mammals of Louisiana and Its Adjacent Waters, for each of which he won the Louisiana Literary Award (1955 and 1974); received the Brewster Award (American Ornithologists Union, 1956) for research on nocturnal migration of birds, the Outstanding Conservationist of the Year Award (Outdoor Writers Association, 1965) and named Conservation Educator of the Year (Louisiana Wildlife Federation, 1975) for his emphasis on wise resource use in his teaching. Died, Baton Rouge, January 19, 1978. E.B. Source: Author’s research.

LUCK, William Henry, millwright, machinist, mechanic. Born, Rosston, Ark., October 12, 1869; son of Alfred B. Luck and Mary A. Jackson. Education: rural schools. Worked on the family farm in Arkansas, until moving to Springhill, La., prior to 1900. Between 1900 and 1918 worked at various lumber companies in Webster Parish as a millwright. Married, June 6, 1900, Sarah Hanna (Anna) Peabody of Minden, La., daughter of Albert Peabody, Minden cabinetmaker, and Sarah Jane Cole. Children: Miriam (b. 1904), Ruth (b. 1907), William, Jr. (b. 1911), John (b. 1918). Member, Democratic party and of the Baptist church. Founded Luck’s Blacksmith Shop 1919 (later Luck Manufacturing Company), and in 1919-1920 built the first school bus bodies (known as school trucks) used in either Webster Parish or in Louisiana, and among the first built in South. Bodies were constructed of oak and placed on Ford, Dodge, or other truck chassis. By 1938, when construction ceased, over 1,000 produced, most of which were in Louisiana, East Texas, and southern Arkansas. Luck’s bus bodies were one of the factors enabling the Webster Parish School District to be in vanguard of school consolidation. Died, March 8, 1951; interred Minden Cemetery. K.D. Sources: Webster Signal, March 16, 1922; Minden Signal-Tribune, Centennial Historical Edition, December 31, 1934; Ardis Cawthon et al., History of Webster Parish Schools (1935); Interviews (January 5, 1983) with Miriam Luck Hutchison, William Luck, Jr., John Luck, and Harry M. Campbell, superintendent of Webster Parish Schools and Darrell Mitchell, transportation supervisor for Webster Parish Schools; Webster Parish School Board Minutes, 1919-1926; Luck family photographs.

LUDELING, John Theodore, attorney, jurist. Born, New Orleans, January 27, 1827; son of John Ludeling, a French emigrant, and Françoise Lorette de Salnavo, who at five years of age came as a refugee from Saint-Domingue with her family. After the death of his father, his mother’s remarriage caused the family’s removal to Monroe. Education: from 1839 to 1843 he attended St. Louis University in Missouri and afterwards studied law in the office of Isaiah Garrett of Monroe. Before the Civil War, married Maria Cooley, a native of New York. Opposed secession, and although two of his brothers fought for the Confederacy, he refused to aid the Southern cause. After the war, he identified with the Republican party and supported congressional reconstruction. In 1867, elected to the state constitutional convention, where he voted with the more conservative delegates in his party. In 1868, named chief justice of Louisiana by Gov. Henry C. Warmoth (q.v.), an office he retained until January 1877. Following this, resumed his Monroe law practice, forming a partnership with Talbot Stillman. Also helped found the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad Company, serving as its first president. Died on his plantation near Monroe, January 21, 1890; interred City Cemetery, Monroe. J.A.B. Sources: Dictionary of American Biography; Manuscript Census Returns, Ouachita Parish, 1860; Richard L. Hume, “The ‘Black and Tan’ Constitutional Conventions of 1867-1869” (Ph. D. dissertation, University of Washington, 1969); Alcée Fortier, A History of Louisiana (1904).

LUDLOW, Noah Miller, theatre manager, actor. Born, New York, July 3, 1795. One of the pioneer actor-managers of the American theatre. A member of the first professional American acting troupe west of the Alleghenies, managed by Samuel Drake, 1815-1817. Formed his own company, in partnership with Aaron J. Philips, Henry Vaughn and Thomas Morgan, May 1817. Although professional French theatre had existed in New Orleans since 1791, and there had been sporadic productions of English language drama there since 1806, Ludlow’s troupe was in his own words the first “regularly organized” company of players to appear in the Deep South, opening at the St. Philip Street Theatre, New Orleans, with a play entitled “The Honey Moon” on January 13, 1818. First professional company to tour Alabama, fall 1818; established first professional theatre in St. Louis, 1819. Entered into partnership with Sol Smith (q.v.), 1835, managing theatres in St. Louis, Mobile, and later New Orleans, 1840. After a period of intense competition with James Caldwell ([q.v.] 1840-1842), Ludlow and Smith became the dominant theatre managers in New Orleans until Ludlow retired in 1853. Engaged many stars for performances in New Orleans, including William Charles Macready, Charles Kean, John E. Owens, Charlotte Cushman (q.v.), Junius Brutus Booth, the young Joseph Jefferson, III (q.v.), and Jenny Lind. Author of the important, but not always reliable Dramatic Life as I Have Found It (1880). Died, St. Louis, January 9, 1886. L.I.W. Sources: Phyllis Hartnoll, The Oxford Companion to the Theatre, 4th ed. (1983); Bernard Hewitt, Theatre U.S.A., 1668-1957 (1959); John S. Kendall, The Golden Age of the New Orleans Theatre (1952); Noah Ludlow, Dramatic Life as I Have Found It (1880).

LUMSDEN, Francis Asbury, journalist. Born, Raleigh, N. C., 1800. Education: apprenticed at an early age to noted journalist Joseph Gales of the Raleigh Register who subsequently went to Washington, D. C., and conducted the National Intelligencer; Lumsden accompanied Gales and worked nine years for that newspaper. Met George Wilkins Kendall (q.v.) there. In 1835 Lumsden and Kendall moved to New Orleans. On January 25, 1837, they began publishing the Daily Picayune. Lumsden generally handled the newspaper’s business and editorial affairs but did contribute extensively to its reading matter under several pseudonyms. Mexican War service: organized a company in New Orleans but then elected captain of a Georgia company, the Gaines Rangers; went to Matamoras where company was disbanded and Lumsden returned to New Orleans; he was later appointed aide on staff of Gen. James Shields, serving at Tampico and then Vera Cruz; also gathered information for newspaper. In the 1850s, Lumsden and Kendall did not actively participate in the management of the Daily Picayune. Lumsden traveled a great deal and sent back occasional letters to the newspaper. In 1851, Lumsden elected to state legislature on Whig ticket and was re-elected several times. In 1852, he became first of Picayune staff to cover a political convention—the Democratic in Baltimore. Held several civic offices in New Orleans at different times: member of the city’s municipal council; the board of administrators of the public schools and the House of Refuge; held commissions in various New Orleans’ military companies including the famed Continental Guards being one of its founding members; also served as an aide to the governor of Louisiana and received honorary title of “colonel.” Lumsden was twice married, his first wife dying soon after he reached New Orleans; second wife, Blanche, was daughter of Capt. Spedden. Children: Frank and an adopted daughter. Lumsden and all his family and several hundred other persons were drowned in Lake Michigan after their steamer, Lady Elgin, collided with lumber schooner, Augusta, during an intense storm and sank at approximately 2 a.m., September 8, 1860. Lumsden’s body was recovered and interred Girod Street Cemetery, New Orleans. K.H. Sources: New Orleans Daily Picayune, September 16, 1860; January 25, 1887; January 25, 1937; National Cyclopedia of American Biography, XIII (1906); Thomas Ewing Dabney, One Hundred Great Years: The Story of the Times-Picayune from Its Founding to 1940 (1944); Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana, II (1892; reprint ed., 1975).

LUSHER, Robert Mills, educator. Born, Charleston, S. C., May 17, 1823; son of George Lusher and Sarah Mills. Civil War service consisted of clerk of Confederate States District Court and chief tax collector for the Louisiana government. Married (1) 1851, Auguetz Malomeu and (2) 1861, Alice Lambertee. Two children: son by the first marriage and a daughter by the second. Taught in New Orleans, 1850. Elected by city council to board of directors of the New Orleans Public Schools. State superintendent of education, 1856, and 1876 until the 1879 constitution. Along with professor W. O. Rogers established the Louisiana Journal of Education. Died, New Orleans, November 22, 1890. A.E.D. Sources: “Death of R. M. Lusher,” New Orleans Daily Picayune, November 23, 1890; Robert Meyer, Jr., Names Over New Orleans Schools (1975).

LUXEMBOURG, Philippe de (1696-1739), and LUXEMBOURG, Pierre de (1696-1753), early Capuchin missionaries in French Louisiana. Striking similarities in their lives: both born in Luxembourg the same year; studied together in same places, St-Dizier and Verdun; ordained same year at Trèves, September 1720; missioned to and supervised same churches in Louisiana; both died in New Orleans and were buried there. Philippe’s name figures in the records of the priory of Thionville, 1725-1727. In 1728, he was ministering at St. John’s Chapel on the German Coast (right descending bank of the Mississippi River). Upon the death of Fr. Raphaël de Luxembourg, superior, Philippe succeeded him as head of the friars in Louisiana, taking over at the same time pastoral duties at the church of St. Louis, New Orleans. Along with governmental appointees, he directed St. John’s Hospital for the poor. On June 8, 1739, he was named vicar general but died shortly after his appointment.
Pierre de Luxembourg was stationed at Sarrelouis in 1726 and, from 1728 to 1730, at Thionville. In May, 1736, Fr. Pierre signed the records at Pointe Coupée as pastor. During his stay, he made a notable archival contribution by collecting and collating the records of previous transient missionaries who had made entries on feuilles volantes or loose scraps of paper. Upon the death of Fr. Philippe, Pierre became the local Capuchin superior and vicar general, continuing in the posts until 1742. During his tenure, Fr. Pierre undertook the revival of the boys’ school founded in New Orleans by Fr. Raphaël de Luxembourg in 1725 but closed before 1740. Despite Pierre’s efforts to have plans drawn for a new structure, the contract for it was annulled in 1744. After serving at Des Allemands, 1744, and at Mobile, 1747-1753, Pierre returned to Pointe Coupée. Died in Louisiana, September 13, 1753; interred near Philippe in a crypt under the church of St. Louis, New Orleans. H.C.B. Sources: Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana (1939); Pierre Hamer, Raphaël de Luxembourg (1966); Archives of the Louisiana Historical Society and of the Archdiocese of New Orleans.

LUXEMBOURG, Raphael de, missionary. Early colonial pastor and administrator. Born in Luxembourg, 1662 or 1663. Entered Capuchin Order ca. 1685; studied at Capuchin Monastery in Trier; ordained to priesthood at Trier, December 12, 1692. Early assignments included Luxembourg, Metz, Sarrelouis, and Thionville. Arrived in New Orleans, April 8, 1723, as superior of recently established Capuchin mission in Louisiana and as vicar general of bishop of Quebec. Established at New Orleans boys’ school—the first school in Louisiana colony, 1725; blessed New Orleans’ first permanent church, April 24, 1727; organized and expanded Capuchin mission in Louisiana by appointment of first pastors at Pointe Coupée, 1728, Natchitoches, 1728 or 1729, and Chapitoulas, 1729, as well as construction of new chapels on German Coast, 1723 and at La Balize, 1729. Vigorously encouraged religious faith and practice in the colony; defended Capuchin jurisdiction. Died, New Orleans, February 15, 1734; interred St. Louis Cathedral. C.E.N. Sources: Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana (1939); Pierre Hamer, Raphael de Luxembourg: Une Contribution Luxembourgeoise à la colonisation de la Louisiane (1966); Charles E. Nolan, A Southern Catholic Heritage: Volume 1, Colonial Period (1704-1813) (1976); Charles E. O’Neill, Church and State in French Colonial Louisiana, Policy and Politics to 1732 (1966), passim; Claude L. Vogel, The Capuchins in French Louisiana (1722-1766) (1928), passim; Samuel Wilson, Jr., The Capuchin School in New Orleans, 1725, the First School in Louisiana (1961); Records of the American Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia, X (1899).

LUZENBERG, Charles Aloysius, physician. Born, Verona, Italy, July 31, 1805; son of Joseph Godfrey Luzenberg and Marie Madeleine Bessiere. Education: public school of Landau, Alsace, and city college of Weissemberg, Alsace. With family, emigrated to Philadelphia; attended there Jefferson Medical College, graduating with honors. Removed to New Orleans, 1828 because of lifelong interest in tropical fevers, particularly yellow fever; appointed house surgeon at Charity Hospital. March, 1832, married Mary Clement, daughter of Henry Clement, a New York banker and merchant. Children: one son and two daughters. After marriage, undertook extended tour of medical centers in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the Netherlands. Returned to New Orleans in 1834. Founded, 1835, with municipal support, Franklin Infirmary. Later, with Dr. Thomas Hunt (q.v.), and others, founded Medical College of Louisiana, forerunner of Tulane Medical School; served as dean of the college, 1836-1839. In 1836 appointed an administrator of Charity Hospital; introduced the surgical amphitheatre. Largely responsible for organization of Louisiana Medico-Chirurgical Society, 1843; elected first president. Also founder, Society of Natural History and Sciences; president, Philharmonic Society; alderman (elected 1838) of First Municipality; director, 1841, New Orleans Drainage Company. Although renowned for various types of surgery, specialty was removal of cataracts. A man of strong character—quite outspoken—he was frequently criticized and often maligned. Once sued for malpractice, the case went to Louisiana Supreme Court where charges were dismissed. After long experiencing symptoms of cardiac disease, in spring, 1848, he decided to rest and recuperate at Red Sulphur Springs, Va., but died in Cincinnati, Ohio, July 15, 1848, while en route to Virginia. Remains returned to New Orleans and interred Girod Street Cemetery. G.R.C. Sources: A. E. Fossier, “Charles Aloysius Luzenberg, 1805-1848: A History of Medicine in New Orleans during the Years 1830 to 1848,” Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXVI (1943); R. F. Stone, Biography of Eminent American Physicians and Surgeons (1894); Thomas M. Logan, “Biography of C. A. Luzenberg,” in Samuel D. Gross, ed., Lives of Eminent American Physicians and Surgeons of the Nineteenth Century (1861).

LYNCH, John J., biologist, botanist, preservationist. Born, Newport, R. I., October 17, 1914; son of John Michael Lynch and Honora Elizabeth Fenton of Ireland. U.S. biologist, Atlantic Coast, 1935; Gulf Coast research, U. S. fish and wildlife biologist, 1940; U. S. biological survey in Canadian Artic, 1943-1946; U. S. Navy, World War II, taught survival procedures for downed Navy airmen; conducted research into water hyacinth and alligator weed control, 1949-1959; U. S. fish and wildlife flyway biologist, surveying geese, brant, and swans, 1956; survey in Canadian Artic of whooping crane habits, 1958; U. S. winter survey of geese, swan, and brant nesting places in Artic region, North America, and Asia. Aviculturist work with cranes and rare birds, 1969; Louisiana conservationist award, 1970; horticultural award, 1979; whooping crane conservation association honor award. Married Mary Zoe Sagrera, February 23, 1941. Children: John Semmes, Charles Richard, Honora Zoe, Mary Catherine, Laelia Ann, Michael Dennis. Died, Lafayette, La., August 20, 1983; interred Calvary Cemetery. A.S.H. Sources: John J. Lynch documents published and unpublished; interview by Amanda Hanks; Lafayette Daily Advertiser; New Orleans Times-Picayune; History of Vermilion Parish, Louisiana (1983).

LYON, James, printer, journalist. Arrived in New Orleans, December 1803; founded the Federalist weekly Union: or, New Orleans Advertiser and Price Current, first New Orleans English-language newspaper, December 13, 1803. Left New Orleans by September, 1804; sold the Union to James M. Bradford, December 1804. Probably published A Republican Magazine, Fairhaven, Vt., 1798; National Magazine, Richmond, Va., 1799-1800; The Cabinet, Georgetown, D. C., 1801; Georgia Republican, Savannah, Ga., 1802-1805. F.M.J. Sources: Douglas C. McMurtrie, Early Printing in New Orleans, 1764-1810 (1929); Pierre Clément de Laussat, Memoirs of My Life (1978).

LYONS, Charlton Havard, attorney, oil and gas producer, politician. Born, Abbeville, La., September 3, 1894; son of Joyce Havard and Ernest J. Lyons. Educated, public schools, Melville, La.; attended Louisiana State University, Tulane University, B. A., LL. B. Taught school in Rapides and Grant parishes. Served in U. S. Army, World War I. Married Marjorie Gladys Hall, daughter of the H. P. Halls of Chippewa Falls, Wis., 1917. Children: Charlton H., Jr., Hall McCord, and Mrs. T. H. Logan. Practiced law in Winnfield, La.; moved practice to Shreveport, 1921; senior partner in law firm of Lyons and Prentiss. Entered petroleum producing business, ca. 1830. Formerly a Democrat, he joined the Republican party, 1960; ran unsuccessfully for the U. S. House of Representatives; was Republican candidate for governor of Louisiana, 1963; polled forty percent of the vote while losing to John McKeithen (q.v.). Claimed his primary purpose was to reinvigorate the Republican party in Louisiana; state chairman of the Republican party until 1967 and known as “Mr. Republican.” President, Independent Petroleum Association of America, General, and Louisiana-Arkansas Mid-Continent Oil and Gas associations; director, National Petroleum Council and National Association of Manufacturers. Member: Kappa Alpha and Phi Delta Phi fraternities, Shreveport Country Club, Masons, and American Legion. Died, Shreveport, August 8, 1973. P.L.M. & J.B.C. Source: J. Fair Hardin, Northwestern Louisiana (1939); Lafayette Daily Advertiser, obituary, August 9, 1973.

LYONS, Henry A., attorney, jurist. Born, Philadelphia, October 5, 1809. Arrived, West Feliciana Parish, La., ca. 1834. Private tutor, 1836; established law practice. Married, New Orleans, 1841, Eliza Pirrie Barrow Bowman. Resided at Oakley Plantation; three daughters. Served in Mexican War; rose to rank of colonel. Joined California gold rush, June, 1849; unsuccessful candidate for California senate, 1849. Named justice, California Supreme Court, December 26, 1849; named chief justice, 1852; resigned same year. Returned to Louisiana to settle wife’s estate, 1852; sojourned in Europe, 1856-1860; returned to Louisiana and remained there until after Civil War. Returned to California after war and amassed a fortune in San Francisco real estate. Died, July 27, 1872; interred Lone Mountain Cemetery, San Francisco. Daughter Cora married Richard S. Floyd, noted astronomer. Much of Lyons’ fortune donated for building Lick Observatory, Mt. Hamilton, Calif. E.K.D. Sources: Helen Wright, James Lick’s Monument (1986); West Feliciana Parish Records; Bowman family papers.

LYONS, Samuel Madison, physician, politician. Born near Edgerly, Calcasieu Parish, La., December 27, 1868; son of Oscar Fitzallen Lyons and Tabitha Lyons. Education: local and private schools, Louisiana State University, B.S., 1889; Tulane University, M. D., 1891. Married Dellie Broussard, daughter, Jerison Broussard, merchant and cattleman, living on the Calcasieu River. Children: Samuel, Shirley, Keith, Velma, Lyle (b. 1904), Lucius. Practiced in Vincent Settlement on Calcasieu River; removed to Sulphur, La. Active in Democratic party; member and president, Calcasieu Parish Police Jury; during tenure as president a million dollar bond issue for roads was passed, first bridge over Calcasieu River and courthouse in Lake Charles built. Parish tax assessor, 1920-1924; parish health officer, 1920-1924. Member, state house of representatives until his death. Member: Baptist church; Louisiana State Medical Society. Died, Sulphur, June 19, 1930; interred Big Woods Cemetery, Edgerly, La. G.S.P. Sources: Erbon W. Wise, Brimstone! The History of Sulphur, Louisiana (1981); Lyons family papers.

LYTLE, Andrew David, photographer. Born, Deerfield, Warren Co., Ohio, April 4, 1834. Removed to Cincinnati with mother by 1850. Married Mary Ann Lundy, June 20, 1855. Apprentice to photographer in Cincinnati; became a daguerreotypist in 1856. Removed to Baton Rouge in 1857. Became leading photographer in Baton Rouge. Famed for numerous images of Union campsites, Union vessels, soldiers, and sailors during the Civil War. Said to have been a Confederate “spy” or agent who passed photographs and information to Confederate officers at Port Hudson. Died, Baton Rouge, June 8, 1917. A.W.B. Sources: Charles East, “A Yankee in Dixie: Baton Rouge Photographer A. D. Lytle,” in William C. Davis, ed., Touched By Fire: A Photographic Portrait of the Civil War, I (Boston, 1985); Baton Rouge State-Times, June 9, 1917.

LYTTON, L. Rogers, actor. Born, New Orleans, La., 1867. Appeared in thirty motion pictures between 1912 and 1924. Died, August 9, 1924. C.A.B. Sources: Evelyn Mack Truitt, ed., Who Was Who on Screen:: Illustrated Edition (1984).