USA > Louisiana > Orleans Parish > New Orleans > Standard history of New Orleans, Louisiana, giving a description of the natural advantages, natural history settlement, Indians, Creoles, municipal and military history, mercantile and commercial interests, banking, transportation, etc. > Part 67
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In 1897, Miss Lydia Winship was queen of the Twelfth Night ball. The Mithras ball gave a handsome series of tableaux. The queen was Miss Louise Joubert. The Elves of Oberon, with Miss Edith Buckner as queen, presented "Rhineland Pictures." Nereus gave views of the sea-deeps, and his queen was Miss Alys Laroussini. The Atlanteans presented "The Elements." Miss Stella De-
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moruelle was queen. This year a new organization, Consus, made its appearance, and in a very handsome ball depicted "Robin Hood, and His Merry Men." The queen was Miss Stella Demoruelle. The subject of the Rex parade was "Marine Pictures." Mr. A. B. Wheeler was king, and Miss Ethelyn Lallande queen. The sub- ject of Comus was the "Odyssey"; his queen, Miss May Schmidt. Momus gave no tableaux. The queen of this ball was Miss Lydia Finlay. Proteus chosc for his queen Miss Juanita Lallande, and for the subject of his parade, "Orlande Furioso."
In 1898, the Twelfth Night Revellers gave "Minstrels of Olden Times," Miss Julia Palfrey being queen. The Atlanteans illustrated in their tableaux, "Garden of Ircm." Their queen was Miss Erskine Kock. Mithras presented the "Sun God." His queen was Miss May Wiltz. The Elves of Oberon depicted beautifully "The Rainbow." Miss Louise Denis was queen of the ball. Nereus gavc "Pluto's Realm." His queen was Miss Annie Soria. Consus had a beautiful ball and tableaux. Rex (February 22nd) was Mr. Charles A. Farwell. His queen was Miss Noel Forsythe, and the subject of his parade, "Harvest Queens." Comus gave illustrations from Shakespeare, and his queen was Miss Isabelle Hardie. The Phunny Phortie Phellows, in 1898 (February 18th), gave their first night proces- sion. This represented "Slang Phrases," and the queen of their ball was Miss Henrietta Kahn. Momus this year gave a ball, of which Miss Kittie Eustis was queen. Burlesque presentations were the subjects of the tableaux. Proteus gave "A Trip to Wonderland," and his qucen was Miss Laure Lanaux.
In 1899 occurred the famous snow and sleet storm, of which some mention should be made, as the Carnival organizations deserve great credit for braving the weather and making a successful Mardi Gras despite all their disadvantages. Shrove Tuesday came in the very worst part of the miserable weather. This is the only really "bad" Mardi Gras on record.
In 1899, the Twelfth Night Revellers, with Miss Belinda Miles for quecn, gave a representation of "Butterflies." The Atlanteans gave "Destruction of At- lantis." Miss Mary Matthews was queen. Consus represented the "Court of Louis XVI." His queen was Miss Adele Brittin. Mithras' subject was the Persian "Sun God," and his queen, Miss Corinne Braughn. Nereus represented the "North Pole," and his queen was Miss Ethel Miller. The Elves of Oberon gave pictures of the seventeenth century. Their queen was Miss Corinne Braughn. Rex (Walter Denegre) gave, February 14th, a handsome parade representing "Reveries of Rex." The queen was Miss Perrine Kilpatrick. Comus had as subject "Jewish History"; as queen, Miss Robbie Giffen. Proteus, who postponed his parade to the following Friday, gave "States of the Union." His queen was Miss Pauline Menge.
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In 1900 the Twelfth Night Revellers presented "The Four Seasons." Miss Evelyn Penn was queen. Mithras gave "The House Boat on the Styx." The queen was Miss Sophia Rogers. The Elves of Oberon had as subject "Chance"; for queen, Miss Haydee Druillet. Consus, by some strange mischance, had the same subject as had Mithras-"The House Boat on the Styx." The queen was Miss Nannie Grant. The Atlanteans gave "Fall of the Incas." Their queen was Miss Nora Glenny. A new organization, "The Falstaffians," gave their initial ball-a beautiful affair, representing "Fallstaff's Dream in Windsor Forest." Miss Virginia Zell was queen. Nereus this year gave his first parade, which was on trolley cars instead of the old floats, and represented "The March of Civilization." The float representing "Electricity" was particularly fine. The queen of Nereus was Miss Maud Wilmot. Momus gave a very fine parade, illustrating the "Arthurian Legends," and his queen was Miss May Waters. The subject of Proteus was "Tales of Childhood." The queen was Miss Louise Ferrier. On Saturday before Mardi Gras a "Merchants" parade was held, chiefly for advertising purposes. Cap- tain Thomas J. Woodward was Rex (February 27th), whose parade represented "Terpsichorean Revels." His queen was Miss Rosa Febiger. Consus gave "Stories of the Golden Age.". His queen was Miss Marietta Laroussini. Les Mystérieuses gave another charming ball in 1900 (January 3rd), at which "Fair Women of Four Realms" were represented, and four kings chosen: John Tobin, Hunt Hen- derson, Felix Puig and Wm. F. Maginnis. The Happy Forty Friends First Carnival Association of Algiers gave a parade of nine floats on the evening of February 27th, 1900.
CHAPTER XXVI.
ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF THE SUGAR INDUSTRY OF LOUISIANA.
BY DR. W. C. STUBBS.
N O HISTORY of New Orleans would be complete without a chapter upon Louis- iana's chief industry, an industry which has contributed so largely to the upbuild- ing of this great city. Starting with De Boré's first commercialcrop in 1795, grown upon the grounds of the present Audubon Park, now well within the city limits, the sugar industry of Louisiana has expanded, despite the many serious obstacles it has encountered, until to-day it occupies nearly the entire arca between Lake Ponchartrain on the east, Vermillion River on the west, Alexandria on the north, and the Gulf of Mexico on the south.
From De Boré's first crop of $12,000, the annual output has grown in value well up into the millions. If the present prospects for the crop of 1900 be realized, and the present prices for sugar be maintained, thirty-five millions of dollars will probably be required this year to market the output of our sugar houses. De Boré's small sugar house, with its horse mill and iron kettles, has been supplanted by the modern central factory, with its ponderous mills or diffusion batteries, with improved clari- fiers and vacuum effects, with immense vacuum pans and capacious centrifugals.
Once the horses and oxen propelling the mills were supported by the tops of the cane; to-day the great boilers which furnish the steam to turn the mighty rolls, and to evaporate the tons of water from the extracted juice, are fed mainly with the refuse of the cane (bagasse), which their own force has created. So great has been the change from the original sugar house, to one of our modern central factories, that De Boré himself, could he again revisit his much-loved State, would not recognize in the latter the least resemblance to the former. Even an ante-bellum planter would be strangely out of place in a modern, up-to-date sugar house. The agriculture of sugar cane has kept an even pace with its manufacture. The wooden mould board plow, and home-made harrow, have been succeeded long since by the improved turn plow and revolving harrow, and these in turn supplanted by the disc plow and harrow. Improved labor-saving cultivators have largely displaced ex-
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. pensive hoe gangs, and the cane harvester, now being evolved from the brain of genius, is everywhere awaited as the last contribution of the nineteenth century to the great sugar-cane industry of the world. Drainage is justly esteemed as the pre- requisite of large production, and irrigation is discussed by all and practiced by a few as an essential aid to uniformly good crops.
The alluvial lands of the Mississippi River and its outlying bayous were once regarded as possessing inexhaustible fertility, and any effort to increase artificially the supply of fertilizing ingredients therein, would have been looked upon as the act of the madman or the dream of a visionary ; yet the closing years of the nineteenth century find nearly every planter buying enormous quantities of tankage, cotton-seed meal, acid phosphate, etc., for application to these very soils, and to aid in the growth and development of larger crops of cane. Science has shown that properly selected fertilizers judiciously applied will enhance the acre yields even on our richest soils.
This wonderful development has been evolved from numerous and serious difficul- ties which have attended this industry from the beginning. Floods have repeatedly inundated whole sections and destroyed thousands of acres of cane. Pestilence, "that walketh in darkness," has several times smitten the sugar districts. The Civil War completely prostrated the industry, leaving so little vitality that fully fifteen years were required for partial recuperation. Low prices and unreliable labor have sometimes shorn the industry of all its profits. Unfriendly legislation has fre- quently brought the coolie-raised or bounty-fed sugars of other countries into direct competition with that grown in Louisiana. And lastly, perhaps the most potent obstacle of all, is the want of permanency in our national legislation, a defect inherent in our form of government, which gives the people the opportunity of overturning "the powers that be" every four years,
All of these have militated against the progress of our sugar industry, and yet it has been developed to such a degree of excellence that Louisiana is to-day justly esteemed as the leader of the sugar cane world, and is sending words of intelligence and experience to every tropical sugar country.
This progress, wonderful as it has been in the aggregate, has been achieved through much suffering, large expenditures of money and unceasing activity; at times moving with almost imperceptible gradations, at others with leaps and bounds. It may be truly said, that nearly every dollar made by the sugar planters of this State since the war has been expended in the improvement of their estates and the enlargement of their sugar houses, until to-day they, together, represent an in- vestment exceeding 100,000,000 of dollars.
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EFFECT ON THE CITY.
While the development of this great industry was going on in the country, New Orleans, the emporium of trade in the Mississippi Valley, was receiving and distributing its products, erecting immense sheds and warehouses, furnishing factors and brokers, returning supplies and moneys. It became, and continues, the headquarters of the sugar planter, where every want of field and factory could be supplied, and where the products of his toil could be exchanged for every luxury or necessity. Foundries and machine shops, capable of turning out the largest and best equipments of a complete sugar house, have found permanent locations in New Orleans and give employment to thousands of skilled mechanics. Cooper shops, of enormous capacity, for the manufacture of hogsheads, and sugar and molasses barrels, are found in almost every ward of the city. Enormous sugar refineries, located within the heart of the city, hard by the sugar sheds, stand ready to buy the raw sugars and transform them quickly into snowy crystals.
The Sugar Exchange furnishes a market place for all sugars and molasses, and by its rules so regulates trade as to insure honest weights, prompt payment and quick sales.
The implement men, the mule dealers, the coal sellers, the fertilizer agents, "et id omne genus," have all concentrated in New Orleans, and from their offices either by personal interviews or correspondence, effect sales with the planters.
Hence, New Orleans, the pride and boast of every sugar planter, is inseparably connected with Louisiana's greatest industry.
HISTORY OF THE SUGAR INDUSTRY.
It is said that Iberville, "coming to the deserted village of the Quinipissas, made a plantation of sugar cane there from seed he had brought from St. Domingo, but the seed, being already yellow and sour, came to naught."
Whether the above statement be true or not, does not affect the well-established fact that the Jesuits brought into the colony in 1751 sugar cane and planted it on the plantation of the reverend fathers, which was immediately above Canal street. It is recorded that two French ships, conveying troops to Louisiana, stopped for a short while at Port au Prince, St. Domingo. While there, the Jesuits of that island obtained permission to put on board some sugar cane and a few negroes who were acquainted with the cultivation of this plant. Both sugar canes and negroes reached Louisiana in safety, and in accordance with instructions the latter planted the former in the gardens of the above mentioned plantation The Jesuits' Church, on Baronne street, marks the location of this plantation.
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The cane introduced was the Malabar or Bengal variety, subsequently known all over the world as Creole cane.
This experiment gave no immediate results, but it served to introduce sugar cane into the colony which has been grown ever since, albeit the manufacture of sugar thereform was delayed for nearly fifty years thereafter. It was grown for "chewing" purposes, and found a ready sale in the markets of the town.
Gayarré says: "The colonists, however, were striving to increase their re- sources and to ameliorate their condition by engaging with more perseverance, zeal and skill in agricultural pursuits. Dubreuil, one of the richest men of the colony, whose means enabled him to make experiments and who owned that tract of land where now is Esplanade street, sceing that canes introduced by the Jesuits in 1751 had grown to maturity and had ever since been cultivated with success, as an article of luxury which was retailed in the New Orleans market, built (1759) a sugar mill and attempted to make sugar. But the attempt proved to be a complete failure." The Chevalier de Mazan, who lived on the right bank of the river near the city, also undertook to manufacture sugar in 1764, but failed. Again, in 1765, several planters, among them Destrehan, then treasurer of the King of France in the colony, put up works similar to those of Dubreuil, below the city on the left bank of the river. The small quantity of bad sugar made by them and consumed in the country "looked like marmalade or guava jelly." In the same year a vessel which sailed to France took out a number of barrels of the article to complete her cargo, but it was so inferior that it all leaked out before rear1 ing port.
Up to this time neither the judicious use of lime, nor the proper point of co- centration for striking, were known-two essential factors for successful sug ?- manufacture.
These failures, the cession of Louisiana by France to Spain, and doubtless other causes, seemed to have checked further efforts at making sugar, but many farmers continued to grow the canes to supply the markets of the city and to manu- facture "tafia."
It is certainly true that considerable quantities of cane were, prior to this time (1764), used for the manufacture of a rum called tafia, since on the 7th of June, 1764, D'Abbadie, in his official report to his government, mentions the immoralities of his people and says, "The immoderate use of tafia has stupefied the whole population." Gayarre says : "The manufacture of sugar has been abandoned since 1766 as being unsuited to the climate, and only a few individuals continued
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to plant canes in the neighborhood of New Orleans to be sold in the market of that town. It is true that two Spaniards, Mendez and Solis, had lately given more extension to the planting of that reed, but they had never succeeded in manu- facturing sugar. One of them boiled its juice into syrup and the other distilled it into a spirituous liquor of a very indifferent quality, called tafia,"
But the descendants of Mendez in this city indignantly deny that Mendez failed to manufacture sugar, and offer in evidence the following from their family records : "Don Antonio Mendez (b. 1750, d. 1829), Procureur du Roi of Spanish government in Louisiana, married Donna Feliciana Ducros, and lived in St. Bernard Parish. In 1791 he bought out Solis, a refugee from St. Domingo, who had striven in vain to make sugar from sugar cane, and then having secured the services of a sugar maker from Cuba, by name of Morin, made sugar for the first time in Louisiana in 1791, and continued to make it afterwards." In an old copy of Louisiana Sentinelle de Thibodeaux, a correspondent signing himself J. B. A. (J. B. Avequin, of whom we will have more to say later), says: "In 1790, a Spaniard named Solis, in Terre aux Boeufs, nine or ten miles below New Orleans, was per- haps the only one who cultivated cane, but with the purpose of converting the juice into tafia or rum. The numerous experiments in sugar manufacture which had been made in this section had been unsuccessful. The lands owned by Solis are now a part of the Olivier plantation.
"In 1791, Antonio Mendez, of New Orleans, bought from Solis his distilling outfit, the land and the canes, with the firm resolution of devoting himself to sugar manufacture and to conquer all difficulties. For this purpose Mendez employed Morin, who has passed many years in St. Domingo, for the purpose of studying cane culture and sugar manufacture. But whether it was that Mendez did not have the means of installing a sugar factory like those of St. Domingo, or whether he still doubted of complete success, he made but a few small barrels of sugar, and it is certain that he experimented also in refining them, for in 1792 Mendez presented to Don Rendon, who was then Intendant of Louisiana for Spain, some small loaves of sugar refined by him. It required one of these little loaves to sweeten two cups of coffee. In a grand dinner he gave that year to the authorities of the city of New Orleans, Intendant Rendon called the attention of his guests to this sugar during the dessert, presenting it to them as a Louisiana product made by Antonio Mendez. Up to this time, it is thus seen, Mendez and Morin had manufac- tured but a very small quantity of sugar, since it was still presented as an object of curiosity."
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The above, as well as other authorities which space prevents us from quoting, substantiate the claim that Mendez made the first sugar in Louisiana, and was also the first to refine it, but evidence is wanting that he ever made it in large and paying quantities.
The first crop of sugar large enough to influence the future of Louisiana and profitable enough to justify others to embark in the enterprise, was made by Etienne De Boré in 1794-95-96, near the present site of the Sugar Experiment Station on Audubon Park.
Mr. Gayarré, the historian, the grandson of De Boré, gives a graphic descrip- tion of the situation at that time in Louisiana, and the circumstances which drove Mr. De Boré to his bold adventure. Hc purchased a "quantity of canes from Men- dez and Solis, and began to plant them in 1794 and make all other preparations for manufacture, and in 1795 he made a crop of sugar which sold for twelve thousand dollars-a good price at that time."
Mr. Gayarré describes the excitement prevailing in the community and the intense interest manifested by the planters, during the preparation and trial of this bold adventure. An immense crowd waited with eager impatience the concen- tration of the juice to the granulating point, and stood with breathless silence to catch the first announcement, "It granulates." When announced, "the wonderful tidings flowed from mouth to mouth and went dying in the distance as if a hundred glad echoes were telling it to one another."
De Boré was "overwhelmed with congratulations," and was called the "Saviour of Louisiana." The sugar maker who watched the cooking of the juice up to the moment of granulation was Mr. Antoine Morin, according to the evidence of Mr. Charles Le Breton (a descendant of Bore's, who has recently died in New Orleans), the same one associated with Mendez in his trials.
It may be mentioned here, that Mr. De Boré from this time on redoubled his energy and greatly increased his wealth, which at his death exceeded $300,000, all made in sugar.
It may not be out of place here to state that Etienne De Bore was born in 1740, in Kaskaskia, the Illinois district of Louisiana, and married the daughter of Des- trehan, the ex-treasurer of Louisiana, and settled on his wife's plantation, then six miles above New Orleans (now Audubon Park). Many of his descendants still live in and around New Orleans, prominent among them being Judge Emile Rost, the distinguished president of the Sugar Planters' Association, and the owner and manager of his ancestral plantation known still as "Destrehan." Other descendants have already been mentioned.
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It may also be apropos here to mention the fitting centennial celebration of the above event a few years since by the Audubon Sugar School, with the graduation of its first class. Hon. John Dymond, a leader among the sugar plan- ters, presided, and Hon. Theodore S. Wilkinson, a distinguished scion of famous ancestry, himself a large and successful planter, delivered the centennial address. The meeting was largely attended, and fully described at the time by the New Or- leans dailies and sugar journals.
The successful results of De Boré's adventures stimulated scores of planters to follow his example. Among the first were the Piseros, the Caverets, the Riggios and the MacCarthys (names no longer on our roll of sugar planters). Each succeeding year added new names to the list of sugar planters and all of them rapidly accumu- lated wealth.
VARIETIES OF CANE IN LOUISIANA.
The Malabar, Bengal or Creole variety has already been mentioned. It was from this variety that De Bore made his first crop of sugar. It was this variety, now deemed unworthy of cultivation, that gave origin to that mighty industry which has occupied the lower valley of the Mississippi, "planted the highest civilization in Louisiana and laid broad the foundations of a commonwealth, at once the most picturesque and most steadfast in its elements, to be found in America."
The Tahiti variety was introduced about 1797, but by whom has not been recorded in any history available to the writer. With the Creole, it furnished the cane for the planters up to the introduction of the striped and purple varieties by Mr. John J. Coiron, in 1817 and 1825. The introduction of these varieties gave an additional impulse to the sugar industry of Louisiana. They soon supplanted everywhere in field culture the Creole and Tahiti canes, and are to-day the chief varieties found throughout the sugar belt. They are natives of Java and are known there as the Batavian Striped and Black Java. They were first introduced about the middle of the last century into the Island of St. Eustatius by the Dutch. In 1814, a vessel brought some packages of these canes from St. Eustatius to Savannah, Georgia, and they were planted by Mr. King on the Island of St. Simon. They grew well, and Mr. King manufactured sugar from them.
Mr. Coiron, who had formerly resided in Savannah, but now a planter of Louisiana, secured some of these canes and planted them in his garden, in 1817, at St. Sophie plantation. Pleased with their growth, he later, in 1825, brought a schooner load of them and planted them on his plantation. From this plantation they have scattered over the entire State and gave a new ardor to sugar culture.
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Its ability to withstand greater cold enabled planters to open new plantations further north, and thus greatly enlarge the area of cane growing in Louisiana.
Mr. Coiron died ignorant of the immense benefit he had conferred upon the State of his adoption, and the planters owe to his memory the erection of some statue or monument to commemorate their grateful appreciation of his invaluable services. Miss Emile Coiron, a daughter of Louisiana's benefactor, is still living in New Orleans, and Mr. Charles Janvier, president of Sun Insurance Company, is his grandson.
Georgia was thus an early contributor to Louisiana's prosperity. She was then a rival in the sugar industry, with Savannah as its center. Recently Louisiana has reciprocated by the cordial reception and generous courtesies extended to the delegation of Georgians, headed by that large-hearted, public-spirited citizen of Savannah, Captain D. G. Purse, which was seeking information by which the large syrup industry of that State might be more profitably converted into sugar. It is hoped that Louisiana may be able to confer on Georgia a benefaction equal to that received years ago.
SUGAR CANE EXPEDITIONS.
In 1856, Congress appropriated $10,000 for the purpose of obtaining cuttings of sugar cane of such varieties best suited to the climate of the Southern States. On account of the partial failure for several years of the Louisiana crop of cane, it was currently believed that the varieties cultivated in Louisiana had "run out," and should be renewed. It was in response to this general belief that this appro- priation was made. The Commissioner of Patents was authorized to superintend the expeditions which were to procure the seed cane, and the Secretary of the Navy was directed to furnish the ships. One expedition went to the Straits Settle- ments and brought back the Salangore variety, which was so badly rotted on arrival that no results were obtained. A rather full account is given of the other expedition, which also was without known results. The United States brig "Re- lease," under the command of Captain Simms, was detailed for the expedition. Mr. Townsend Glover, the entomologist, was detailed to accompany the expedi- tion and make the proper selection of the canes. The following instructions were given Mr. Glover by Mr. Brown: "As arrangements have been made by the Com- missioner of Patents for you to go to South America in the United States brig 'Release,' now waiting for sailing orders at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, for the purpose of obtaining a supply of cuttings of sugar cane, I am directed to confer with you as to the best means of procuring said cuttings, the varieties suited to the
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