February 22, 2025 • 53 mins
"Historian Jane" Delacour joins Hy and Christopher on this week’s show to talk about her book The Axe Woman Of Bourbon Street.
Bourbon Street in New Orleans was a glamorous place with a long-held reputation for a good time. While the rest of America was getting more conservative, Bourbon Street became more salacious. Burlesque dancers filled the stages as live bands played to entice tourists inside the darkened bars. Evangeline the Oyster Girl was already a headling act in 1949, rising seductively out of her oyster shell, her erotic ballet filled the seats. Evangeline's star continued to rise until a new act rolled into town. Divina the Aqua Tease also had a water theme to her act which was now going to take the spotlight off of Evangeline. Divina wanted to be the new headliner, but Evangeline had other plans.
New Orleans' own "Historian Jane" wrote this short read to showcase the amazing women who made Bourbon Street the place to be.
Delacour is a historian, tour guide, researcher, and author living in New Orleans where she shares the bad ass women who made New Orleans the cultural gem it has been for over 300 years.
Bourbon Street in New Orleans was a glamorous place with a long-held reputation for a good time. While the rest of America was getting more conservative, Bourbon Street became more salacious. Burlesque dancers filled the stages as live bands played to entice tourists inside the darkened bars. Evangeline the Oyster Girl was already a headling act in 1949, rising seductively out of her oyster shell, her erotic ballet filled the seats. Evangeline's star continued to rise until a new act rolled into town. Divina the Aqua Tease also had a water theme to her act which was now going to take the spotlight off of Evangeline. Divina wanted to be the new headliner, but Evangeline had other plans.
New Orleans' own "Historian Jane" wrote this short read to showcase the amazing women who made Bourbon Street the place to be.
Delacour is a historian, tour guide, researcher, and author living in New Orleans where she shares the bad ass women who made New Orleans the cultural gem it has been for over 300 years.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Battles the politicians.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Listener addressed the digitators and magicians. Who's to see the money?
Speaker 3 (00:13):
Then you don't.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
There's nothing to fill the holes while they are feeling
their pockets bi holes, the politicians bouncing down the road.
Everybody's wition for no moment, corruption and dysfunction. It's gone
to take divide it Avention.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
Ladies and gentlemen, a little break from politics this week
as we look at New Orleans's most famous street and
its most famous character that helped it come to be,
the Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Here on the Founders Show.
Speaker 6 (00:46):
And God bless all out there you are now listening
to the Founders Show, the voice of the Founding Fathers.
You're Founding Fathers coming to you deep within the bowels
of those mystic and cryptic alligator swamps of the that
old Crescent City, New Orleans, Louisiana, and high up on
top of that old Liberty Cypress tree way out on
(01:08):
the Eagles Branch, this is none other than your spingary
Baba of the Republic, Chaplain Hi mcenry, who, with.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
Christopher Tidmore, you roving reporter, resident radical moderate, and associate
editor of the Louisiana Weekly newspaper available at Louisiana Weekly
dot net. And ladies and gentlemen, we have a fantastic
show for you today. We're going through the depths of
Bourbon Street, taking a little break from politics at the
beginning of the show and talking about the most storied,
literally in historic street of our era, of our time,
(01:38):
and of our city. And that is the street named
not after the alcohol but after the royal family that
has so dominated the history of New Orleans. And we're
speaking about that street with a living expert on that street.
Joining us here in the Founder's Show is Jane Delacour.
She's the author of the new book The ax Woman
of Bourbon Street. It is a fantastic sort of place
(02:00):
history of New Orleans's most famous boulevard, with its personalities,
it's various figures female and male, and the progression of
this incredible street that is so defined the history of
New Orleans. And Jane Delacour, welcome to the Founder Show.
Speaker 7 (02:17):
Thank you so much, a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
Yes, Jane, it's great to have you this Chaplinhi mcnram
I love New Orleans history.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I've read a good bit about it.
Speaker 6 (02:26):
Christopher's an expert, and so we're very excited about having
you on the show and can't wait to hear your story.
Speaker 7 (02:31):
And thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (02:33):
And Jane, let's kick off with it. You're writing what
is a defandant of what I walking person's history of
Bourbon Street, so you can feel as you go down
the street. But you start off in a chapter over
the various decades of how Bourbon Street presents, and one
of the points that you make very clear is frankly,
(02:54):
most of the people who lived on Bourbon Street throughout
his history would have been rather surprised, maybe even shocked
that it is today in adult Disneyland. And we're talking
as late as the twentieth century, that for most of
its history, Bourbon Street was just kind of a residential,
kind of upscale residential boulevard at the best, the back
of town.
Speaker 5 (03:12):
Can you talk about that.
Speaker 7 (03:14):
Yes, definitely, even up until the early nineteen twenties, I
believe many people who worked and resided on Bourbon Street
would be shocked and maybe a little appalled at how
Bourbon Street has progressed.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
So really, yeah, I mean it's in fact you talk
about it. Let's start off with as I as I
sort of tease the beginning the most common misconception that
many tourists have, and I'd be astonished how many New
Orleanians have it as well. Bourbon Street's not named after
a drink, No, sir, it is not.
Speaker 7 (03:50):
It is named after the ruling royal family of Bourbons,
or as they say in France, Boubon's. And they ould
France for over two hundred and fifty years, and they
made quite an impression on French, American and world history.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
And who was who was the first Bourbon King?
Speaker 7 (04:12):
Oh, my personal favorite, Henry Legrand, the first Bourbon king.
He was actually the King of Navarre.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Okay, he was a fellow, wasn't he.
Speaker 7 (04:23):
Oh he was a grand fellow. Uh.
Speaker 4 (04:27):
He definitely thought Paris was worth a mass, so you know,
yes he did.
Speaker 7 (04:32):
He started out Protestant, switched teams to Catholicism, and was
finally crowned King of France after quite a bit of
war and sieging of Paris to finally relent and take
the throne.
Speaker 6 (04:50):
Yeah, he was. He was a Huguenot and he gave
that up to be the king. And then tragically they
had the what was it the Saint Bartholomew is massacre.
Speaker 7 (05:01):
Oh, the Saint Bartholomew massacre. It was more than a day.
It kind of turned into a season.
Speaker 5 (05:07):
Oh my god.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Yes, it Prince here at the time. He was only
survived because he was royalty and him and his close
friends were barricaded in a tower waiting for them to die,
and the crowd went past them and they were able
(05:29):
to make their escape.
Speaker 6 (05:30):
No wonder, the Hugonots fled France and they made they
for the country. But that's Asconauts were Baptists.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Uh well, they were Baptists, well, French Calvinists, you know,
which I guess I'm Baptist.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Would well, they.
Speaker 6 (05:44):
Actually call themselves Baptists, but anyway, they were Calvinists, that's right.
Speaker 7 (05:47):
But the most famous Bourbon king would be Louis the fourteenth,
who Louisiana is named for.
Speaker 4 (05:54):
And and that's important because going to our story, of course,
that he revokes Edigre of nonce, which is the reason
that Huguenots end up leaving and many people end up
leaving France. But he's part of the story that comes
into this before it's Louis the fourteenth who begins with
Samuel Champagne and says, find me this new empire in
(06:15):
the west. And over the course of this and the
next generation, through his five year old great grandson Louis
the fifteenth, Louisiana would be found Louisiana. But this comes
into the founding of New Orleans. Bourbon Street is called
after this, after the royal dynasty. But that's kind of
a consistent theme. You have Royal Street, you have Dauphine
Dauphin as in the sort of the Prince of Wales
(06:36):
of France, Burgundi, the royal French houses offso the Dukes
of Burgundi.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
You go through the whole thing.
Speaker 7 (06:42):
But h don't get me started on the Burgundians.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
I love that family, and so Jane Delacour we get
in this. All of these streets were named laterally as
a way for the founder of the city, Bienville, to
get in good with the monarchy, getting good with the
royal family. The Saint and others were illegitimates who had
saint and illegitimate son of the king, So Saint Bastard,
Saint Bastard and the other streets. But we've got this
(07:07):
street called Bourbon that when Bienville finds the city. It's
kind of a backwarter, isn't it, literally and figuratively.
Speaker 7 (07:15):
But literally and figuraively, it was a dirt path, it
was considered back of town, and there was almost no
residencies or buildings on that street up until almost the
eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 4 (07:31):
In fact, that something a lot of people don't realize
about the French Quarter Chain Delacorte is the fact that, well,
they were really only surviving thanks to the fires. About
seven properties that predate the American period. You can argue
parts of walls of others are, but for the most part,
the French Quarter is something that comes to formation in
its currents at the very end of the seventeen nineties,
(07:52):
in the beginning of it, and the current incarnation of
Bourbon Streets certainly is a product of the early nineteenth century.
Speaker 7 (07:59):
Definitely, the fires sent the tone for the city to
rebuild and how they were going to rebuild, And just
by serendipity, so many factors came together in a very
short period of time that completely changed how New Orleans
(08:19):
lived and functioned. We went from being a French Spanish
colony to being an American colony, and once the Americans
started coming into town. They brought their money with them
and that really spurred development. We now have steam engines,
(08:40):
and that is what really changed the path of New
Orleans forever, was the ability to take goods not just
down the river, but back up the river.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
And Subourbon Street's going to become the street of people
who are making fortunes on this intercontinental trade and in
the sugar industry. These grand mansions are going to be
built on Bourbon Street, and sooner cotton and cotton because
the largest cotton exchange is going to be Saint Louis Hotel,
and that's going to spawn a lot of things being
built on Bourbon Street, including an opera house.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Yes, when the Americans started coming into town and started
building their big, beautiful mansions uptown, the French felt like
they needed to have something that was French, and that
is when the French opera House was built and the
Saint Louis Hotel, which would later become our Bourbon Orleans.
Speaker 5 (09:38):
Now are the Royal Islands.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
And of course that you know, was the largest exchange,
the Saint Louis Exchange Hotel, the largest commodities exchange, the
largest slave exchange in the in the world. All of
this is happening on this street. Bourbon's creating its identity
at the end of Exchange Place in the beginning of
the and the beginning of the century as the French
(10:02):
removing sort of downriver. But Bourbon Street itself is going
to develop its character Jane Delacour in the decades really
as we know it, not only after the Civil War,
but really after the late nineteenth century. So walk us through,
if you would, how Bourbon Street became what we think
(10:23):
about it, and tell us a little bit about another Presbyterian,
a man by the name of Albert Sidney's story.
Speaker 7 (10:31):
Oh good old story. Yes, the dawn of the twentieth
century brought new winds of change. The old ways, the
old South was definitely on its last legs. And we're
now having a newness coming into the city. And we're
(10:52):
having all this trade happening with the Port of Orleans.
We've got the military Navy base year well before the
Naviies came in, and we have all of this happening,
and prostitution is thriving to the point it's a nuisance.
And New Orleans has had a problem with prostitution since
(11:15):
the eighteen hundreds, we had Loretta X where we had
to have licenses for what they would call lewd and
abandoned women. And finally, what they considered the street harassment
of the prostitutes was so bad that the city got
(11:36):
together and sent a wonderful man by the name of
a story to go to Europe to study how European
cities dealt with their prostitution. And that's when he comes back,
hopefully with receipts saying that these cities in Europe have
(11:56):
districts where the women can work fleet out of And.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
Certainly he was a man of the church, if you.
Speaker 7 (12:04):
Will, and uh he was an alderman, yes.
Speaker 6 (12:07):
Yes, and and and wanted his life, his career to
be a great testimony of Christianity in the church.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
And tragically his name.
Speaker 6 (12:14):
Was it was the advertised prostitution, the one guy we.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Know for a fact, never we know for a fact,
never patrinized happy.
Speaker 7 (12:26):
Yeah, the women were not happy at being corralled and
forced to work in this district, and so as a
lure they took his name on for the district. Now
what was your wife could not show her face in public?
Speaker 4 (12:39):
What was now? What was Storyville? Storyville was not Bourbon Street.
This is a common misconception.
Speaker 7 (12:44):
Correct. Storyville was outside of the French quarter on by
you know Basin Street, conveniently located next to the train.
Speaker 5 (12:54):
Station, which have you ever seen Basin Street station?
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Basically that was one of the ends of story All
the others it would go towards Black.
Speaker 5 (13:02):
Storyville would be about where the Little Gem Saloon was.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
So it was a seventy block area that was huge,
but it was it was the best zontain that.
Speaker 6 (13:09):
Was probably near Tremay, which was a very exclusive black neighborhood,
the first one we had in New Orleans, I mean
in America.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
And it was, you know, the first neighborhood free people
of color. But of course this is the late this
is at this point. Tree has been around for close
to one hundred.
Speaker 6 (13:23):
Years, right oh yeah, yeah, So I'm saying, yeah, you're
saying the portion for the African America.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
Was Actually it was right, it was on the other side.
It was actually closer to what would it was close
to the worst part of town, a place called Poydras Street,
which it was.
Speaker 5 (13:41):
It was, that was it.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
But the point is that this is an area where
prostitution is neither legal nor illegal where there is a
code where it's it's they've kind of corraled it. And then,
and as it usually does, the federal government screws everything up.
Speaker 5 (13:53):
Jane can talk about that.
Speaker 7 (13:55):
Oh, yes, we're at the point of World War One
and the Navy has decided that New Orleans needs a
Navy base. The Navy has a very unusual law on
the books there cannot be a legal house of ill
(14:15):
repute within five miles of a Navy base.
Speaker 5 (14:20):
And guess what's within five miles of a Navy base.
Speaker 7 (14:22):
Oh, our beautiful Navy base.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
City.
Speaker 7 (14:26):
The city begged the Navy secretary to build five miles
in either direction, and the Navy refused, and they closed
down Storyville. But as we know, sex doesn't stop selling,
It just changes the address.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
Now, this is what's important. What's important here is not
only by this point has Storyville been a center of prostitution.
When things became legal, you needed a way to draw
people into these houses. And frankly, we're one of the
few places in America because slaves have Sunday afternoons off,
they were able to maintain a little bit of the
(15:02):
African culture, very small amount, but part of it was
their musical traditions. We also are the place where they
had the highest free people of color because of our
manumission policies who were training classical music. And yet after
the Civil War, our sort of caste system where we
had multiple shades of this gets into white and black.
We go from one of the more open places in
the South to one of the most repressive. But a
(15:24):
lot of these musicians are able to get jobs in
these bordellos as ways of drawing it, and they're coming
up with a new form of music jazz.
Speaker 5 (15:34):
Actually, that would be.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Wrong high it was that that would be the wrong
name because it was we can't say what the real
name was, but let's just say it's something very close
to jazz that you would not want to put on
the front of the Times picking you you.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Know jazz mains. You know a jazz mains.
Speaker 5 (15:50):
It means it's it's a delta euphemism for sex.
Speaker 6 (15:53):
And it's it's it was a streight term and it
meant the male seed.
Speaker 5 (15:58):
Yeah, and that's and that it's literally what the original
name for this music was. It was sex music.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
But now definitely and now Jane Delacour, the author of
the ex Woman of Bourbon Street. This new book on
the history of Bourbon Street. This, this is how we're
getting into our story here. So Bourbon Street is this
affluent street. It's got the Saint Louis Exchange Hotel, it's
got the Grand Opera House.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
It's this exfluent street.
Speaker 4 (16:22):
Suddenly Storyville, this area behind the View Core is shut down,
and these musicians and frankly, these horse have to go.
Speaker 7 (16:30):
Somewhere exactly, And they just basically crossed the street and
the first couple of blocks were known as the Tango Belt,
and then Bourbon Street just became known as Harlot's Row.
Speaker 6 (16:44):
Wow, and you know, you know it's starting this all off.
As you mentioned that there were prostitutes were spread out
all over the city, and some of them had their
own homes, of course, and how's the prostitution And they
was actually one in the Garden district and it was
a very exclusive one. It was known as a sporting club.
(17:07):
And you know, do you know where that was? That
was Commander's Palace.
Speaker 7 (17:12):
I thought, so if you go upstairs.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
You'll see the naked statues at Women's Statue.
Speaker 7 (17:19):
Pallas had a colorful history, including girlfriends, dining, upstairs, wives
and family dining downstairs.
Speaker 6 (17:31):
I can just imagine seeing our so our silk stocking
ancestors saying, well, dear, I think this evening, I'll go
meet my friends over at the Sporting Club. Watch how
you play Blackjack tonight, James.
Speaker 4 (17:50):
This is the Garden Room had a totally different meeting
in those days, and that that gets us into what
we're talking about. Part of the reason Storyville was created
was the fact that there was no zoning, and that
means somebody could literally move into the neighborhood next to you.
I mean the Garden District being at this time as
is today, the most affluent neighborhood in New Orleans, and
yet you could somebody could move in and basically start
(18:10):
up a bordello.
Speaker 5 (18:11):
They could start.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Anything, and that becomes the battle of what becomes Bourbon Street.
And joining us here on the Founder Show with Hi
mckenry and Christopher tied Moore is Jane Delacorcey's the author
of the new book The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
It's a comprehensive history of the street and we'll get
to who the Axe Woman was in a second. But Jane,
of course, the idea of Bourbon Street becoming the Harlot's
(18:35):
Row didn't happen overnight. There was a bit of a
fight for this to happen.
Speaker 7 (18:39):
It was Bourbon Street was a mix of high end
residential coffee houses and restaurants that were all catering to
the upscale crowd that was going to the Opera House.
And then it all comes crashing down. On a cold
December night nineteen nineteen. What happened a restaurant fire across
(19:05):
the street from the French Opera House, and the embers
from the restaurant crossed the street and caught the French
Opera House. Now, while the outside of the Opera House
was brick, the inside was wood, and it went up
in just a matter of almost minutes.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
Now, it's not it's hard to underestimate how critical the
French Opera House was to the culture and history of
New Orleans. It's hard for us to contemplate it. But basically,
modern marti gros developed and grew out of the French
Opera House. The first balls were held there, the first
debutante presentations what would become the first carnival organizations from
comas Momas Proteus were there. This was the center of
(19:49):
New Orleans culture. So when it was lost in this fire,
it was more than a gaping hole in a block.
It was a gaping hole in what would become Bourbon Street.
It sort of threw everything a skew.
Speaker 7 (20:00):
It really did, because the Saint Louis Hotel was now
a crumbling, open air junkyard. It had collapsed during a storm,
and then the French Opera House went down, and now
there is what we consider the French Quarter had lost
(20:21):
its French identity at that moment. Anything that was properly
French is now really gone. And what year was that,
Jane nineteen nineteen, and in.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Fact the French Court at that point we just heard
in the newspapers. Of course that a classic French Quarter location,
Matassa's Matassa's grocery store, is closing down. But it's kind
of one of the last windows to what the French
Quarter was in those days, which was an Italian neighborhood.
Speaker 5 (20:50):
It was a safe it.
Speaker 7 (20:51):
Was as it was known as the Latin Quarter.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Right.
Speaker 6 (20:54):
The way I remembered was that as the city grew,
the wealthy mainly again to move out of the French Quarter,
go out Esplanade, I mean at least esplanade down to
the I mean up to the Garden district lower Garden
district and whatnot. And so it was being vacated and
probably because of all the other things going, it was
(21:15):
becoming a blighted area. At that time, the poor Italian
immigrants were coming in and it.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
Was cheap property for him.
Speaker 6 (21:22):
So now the French quarter is pretty much half the
French car is probably only by Italians to.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
This day, is that troop?
Speaker 7 (21:27):
It is basically true, correct, Yeah, And at the jackpot
and well and joining us of course, Jane Delacour, the
author of the new book The ax Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
We are getting to that, folks. She's joining us for
most of the hour here. But before we get into
that and all this, we're gonna have to take a
quick commercial break. We'll do that, Jane, and be back
after these important messages.
Speaker 5 (21:46):
Stay tuned.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
We'll also give you information when we come back on
how to get the ax Woman of Bourbon Street. Remember
you can always hear the Founder Show Ladies and Gentlemen
every Sunday from eight to nine am on Wrno. Nine
nine five FM. Every Monday one seen Friday Friday, Monday
and Wednesday on WSLA ninety three point nine FM fifteen
sixty AM twenty four to seven three sixty five on
(22:07):
the iHeartMedia app. We highly recommend it's better than Pandora
for the music choices, but you can also download it,
type in the Founder's Show and follow us and get
the updates of our show on it, or you can
always go to the Foundershow dot com or listen to
a streamed at Rattlesteak Radio, the Foundershow dot Com being
the easiest way to always get the program. Jane Delacour,
author of The Actual and Bourbon Street, Hima Kenny, Christopher
tim Or back up to these important messages.
Speaker 5 (22:29):
Stay tuned.
Speaker 4 (22:33):
Give the gift of flowers from Villari's Florist for any occasion.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's never a bad idea Villaries Florist
with locations on the South Shore in the North Shore.
Tell them you heard it on The Founder's Show for
their expert great rate twelve dozen roses, cash and carry.
But if you want Villaries for any other occasion, their
gift baskets are unbelievable. For any holiday occasion, their floral
(22:55):
arrangements are unspeakably beautiful. Ladies and gentlemen. Don't trust what
I'm saying. Check Mount online at the Villariesflorist dot com
or call them at one eight hundred VI L L
E R or Villariesflorist dot com for all of your
floral needs. And if you want to get a little
bit of lunch spiced with the spices of Royal Merchant
Trading Company, or just the perfect coffee to pass an afternoon,
(23:16):
or look forward in the areas of the Garden District
and just pass the time. Check out the still Perkin
Coffee House at the corner of Britannia and Washington Avenue
Still Perkin for all of your coffee, luncheon and panini needs.
Still Perkin a great place to go in the Rink
shopping center. Great to have your coffee. Check out the
Garden District Bookstore, Judy's at the Rink and all the others.
(23:38):
Remember free parking right there at the Garden District and
to wander around. It's worth a visit still Perkin Coffeehouse
in the Garden District and be sure to check on
their shelves for the Royal Merchant spices. Royal Merchant Local
spice company run by entrepreneur Barcley Rafferty import spices from
all over the world, but you have to go to
the rink. You could give her a call directly five
oh four nine five two five eight three one. That's
five oh four nine five two five eighth ever, or
(24:01):
check them out in the lab Royal Merchant dot co
dot com. Royal Merchant dot co. Check out the numerous
spices from all over the world, organic, cheap and imported
straight to you in an amount you'd to use in
the six month period. Check them out Royal Merchant dot col.
Speaker 6 (24:20):
Welcome back to the Founder Show and it's a chaplin
Heimchenry and with my partner Christopher Tidmore, we're always working
so very hard to bring you the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
So help us God.
Speaker 6 (24:29):
And today we have a wonderful author, Jane Delacour, who's
written a book as Woman of Bourbon Street, and she's
given us some great history about early New Orleans and
the French Quarter. And I'd like to open with this.
I read a book many many years ago. It's written
by a guy named Herbert Asberry. He wrote three books
of the same theme as the story of the poor
(24:50):
Irish and German immigrants arriving in New Orleans doing what
I call it Ellis Island period. And you may have
never heard of it, but probably one thing you've heard
of is the movie Gangs of New York and that
was the name of the book, and it was about
that story at the Five Points in New York City.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
An amazing movie, an amazing movie. He wrote two other books.
Speaker 6 (25:09):
One on was The Barbary Coast, about the same story
in San Francisco, and the third one was called The
French Quarter, and it tells us these amazing stories about
all the crazy characters we had in the French Quarter,
including one of my favorite. Her name was Annie Christmas.
She's a big, tall woman. She ran a house of prostitution,
and everybody behaved in her place of business because when
(25:30):
you met her, you noticed that around her neck was
a necklace of human ears. She was one tough gal. Everybody,
very tough gag. Anyway, let's take it away. And by
the way, I'm here with my partner Christopher Tidmore.
Speaker 5 (25:42):
And Jane, who was the Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (25:47):
The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street would actually be Evangeline
the oyster girl whose name was Kitty West, a amazing
woman originally from Alabama, moved to Mississippi where she was
a poor young woman picking cotton, always wanted more in life,
(26:08):
hopped a bus to New Orleans and never looked back.
Speaker 5 (26:13):
And she's kind of emblematic.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
Jaye Delacor of what you saw as the transformation of
Bourbon Street from this affluent creole neighborhood into this basically
adult Disneyland. Can you talk about how this change is
going on into from the twenties into the into the
into the fifties, all right.
Speaker 7 (26:32):
The change started with prohibition. It came out really quickly
that selling illegal booze made you a lot of money,
and so people were turning their coffee houses into illegal bars.
And when prohibition ended, obviously our local organized crime wanted
(26:54):
to keep the easy money coming, and they saw that
illegal gambling and live in entertainment would become not just
equally but much more lucrative.
Speaker 6 (27:06):
Well, and so you know, talking about that time, we
have a famous or infamous story here in New Orleans.
A famous FBI agent who is going around busting all
the speakeasies, and he'd go to all the different cities,
and his test was when he got to the city,
he'd ask the taxi cab driver where the closest speaks
he was, and it might take him ten, fifteen, thirty
(27:28):
whatever minutes to get to the place. And he was
looking for who would get him the first bottle of
booze he could find. Well, when and when he hit
New Orleans, the taxi and the tax he has the
tax cab driver that the response was, well here I
got a bottle right here, and he it was we
set the record. We provided booze in seconds versus all
(27:49):
the other cities.
Speaker 7 (27:50):
I believe he called it six seconds. He had a
drink in his hand.
Speaker 3 (27:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Jane Delacourt and that sort of Bourbon Street becomes because
as this becomes this poor Sicilian neighborhood. For the most part,
it's interesting my grandfather. There's still a few of the
old creoles there, my grandfather a villary who grows up
at the edge of the French quarter. But for the
most part they've moved either further up into the marine
or more jumped up and developed modern uptown. The other
(28:16):
side of the garden district is moving in. It's also
the same time in the nineteen twenties and Prohibition becoming
sort of a bohemia for the South. It's poor, it's easy,
but it's sort of European. So writers are coming here.
William Faulkner is sherwo Anderson others, and all of this
(28:36):
sort of creative tension is happening in the streets around
Bourbon Street. And how is this street evolving through into
what we came to know it in this because jazz
is running into performance and then of course New Orleans
is going to come in something first created in France
but made famous here called burlesque.
Speaker 7 (28:58):
Yes, it actually got to started in Italy. Well, yes, yes,
Italian theaters in the seventeenth century. That started out as
a comedic break between the interludes of you know, plays
and operas. Burless comes from the Italian word burla, which
means to joke or to mock, to make fun of.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
So an opera started in Italy, you know.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
Yeah, So it was like it was like saying, like
the pantomime, like you would have any English theaters, and
they just started, you know, making fun of you know, literature, theater, politics,
social norms and this. You know, because as I love
to say, everyone loves a dick joke.
Speaker 4 (29:45):
Jane Delacore when it when it comes in, it's actually
comedy in performance, that's gonna say Bourbon Street because frankly,
prohibition is gonna end and a lot of people are
going to be out of work, and so they're gonna
have to get creative.
Speaker 7 (29:59):
And because we had Vaudeville basically stopped coming around touring
and they started going the vaudeville performers, the you know,
the magicians, the emce's, the comedians, the dancers, they need
a place to perform. And they started heading to tourist destinations.
(30:22):
They were going to you know, New York, the Hamptons,
going out west, and a group came to New Orleans
and started performing in the you know bars that were
quasi legal. And by the time we get out of
prohibition and we're into you know world, you know, into
the depression, then we're getting into the war effort. You know,
(30:45):
New Orleans is a major part of the war effort,
and you know, we have the Higgins Boat and we
have all this going on. And when all of this
happens and then the war ends, that's when Bourbon Street
really starts to gel as becoming an adult entertainment mecca.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
And so let's talk about this the clubs that come
in and the most famous of all of them the
five hundred Club.
Speaker 7 (31:13):
Oh, the good old five hundred Club. Yeah, that was
the club.
Speaker 6 (31:17):
That was.
Speaker 7 (31:19):
The club. It was owned by organized individuals.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Carlos Marcella. Yes, yeah, that's what I thought.
Speaker 7 (31:30):
Even though the five hundred Club was not at five
hundred Bourbon, that's the Chris Owens building. It does actually
in the four thirty seven to four forty one Bourbon Streets.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Is she still going?
Speaker 7 (31:44):
Chris Owens, bless her is still going And if anyone
knows the way, I would love to interview her.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
I've met her before and she's quite She's wonderful.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
If you ever want to meet her, let me know.
She's she's an incredible to this day, incredible life.
Speaker 7 (31:57):
Loved to interview her and just to see because she
saw Bourbon Street transform to what it is today.
Speaker 6 (32:05):
Jane, I'd like to ask a quick quick question about
entertainment and theater. Uh, it was New Orleans that introduced
opera to the Western hemisphere.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
Because of that, bringing it up with.
Speaker 6 (32:16):
Some of the finest opera houses and theaters in America.
If we had continued, we'd be the Broadway along with
New York of America. Oh yes, for some reason, it started,
it started falling apart. In fact, the first one of
the first great opera houses called the Grand Opera House
on Canal Street and that's where they had the first
meeting of the Courts Rex and Comas.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
So why did all that fall apart?
Speaker 6 (32:38):
And kind of like another French opera house burned down,
but it just seemed to kind of like disappear. Is
do you under do you have an understanding of how
that happened?
Speaker 7 (32:46):
It was just unfortunately the French when the French opera
house burned down there, and even up before that, for
the reconstruction time was really hard on the entertainment district.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
Yeah. And the yellow fever epidemics. We had a lot of.
Speaker 7 (33:06):
Our constant yellow fever app I mean the yellow fever
epidemic was just nineteen oh five.
Speaker 6 (33:12):
Yeah, yeah, I'm saying the worst epidemics in a history
of America. It's making this Corona thing look like it's lightweight.
Speaker 7 (33:20):
We've done some ugly times with pandemics, definitely.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
Yeah, And that was part of the reason we have
to eat, drink and be merry for because it literally,
in New Orleans tomorrow you may well be dead. If fire, flood,
and hurricane didn't get your disease would have. So we
had to value and appreciate and Bourbon Street becomes the
center of that. Jane Delacour talks about that in her
new book, The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street. And Jane,
as we were coming in the last few minutes, I
(33:45):
want to say, how can somebody get a copy of
this book because it's so wonderful.
Speaker 7 (33:49):
The book is on Amazon Utah on ebook and paperback,
and just go to Amazon, type in the ax one
of Bourbon Street and take you straight to it.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
Jane, Jane. It covers what period in history, there's a
couple hundred.
Speaker 7 (34:06):
Covers and when to win right. It covers a one time,
one night event and the fallout of that event in
one night in October of nineteen forty nine.
Speaker 5 (34:17):
Okay, and let's let's talk about that one night.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
Because you start off just so we get with the
history of the street to the decades, you talk about
some of the changes, and you set yourself up to
nineteen forty nine, what was going on?
Speaker 7 (34:29):
Right? Everything does lead up to nineteen forty nine, we
have a incredible character who runs Stormy's casino Royale. His Stormy.
She was a dancer performer. She had a episode at
LSU where she got tossed into a lake because she
(34:53):
was performing burlesque at LSU and they were too Christian
to allow that to happen.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Well, I'm glad they didn't burn her at the stake there.
Speaker 7 (35:05):
Her club was on Crosses the street there at Bourbon Street,
across from the five hundred Club, and Stormy was the
manager of the place. And just so happened, a Life
magazine photographer was in the area. Gone with the Wind
(35:26):
was only about ten years old, and there was still
this push to see the grand homes of the plantations
and what was left of the Annebellum South, and they
were said, go to New Orleans, take a whole lot
of pictures of New Orleans, and then we can use
these pictures in Life magazine, you know, like be stock.
(35:50):
So as this photographer is on Bourbon Street, Stormy comes
up and says, hey, I have new act debuting tonight.
I will save you a table by the stage. You
don't want to miss this, and no reporter is going
(36:10):
to miss out on that and that is when the
events start to happen.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Wow, what happens? Now? This was in Stormy's place.
Speaker 7 (36:20):
This Stormy casino royale.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
And we'll see that the paramour of along, that's.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
That's coming. Keep going if you would.
Speaker 7 (36:31):
What happens lace after a bit, so we have Kitty
West who has worked really hard to create a very
elaborate and erotic act. It is a eight minute erotic
ballet where she has taken the Longfellow poem Evangeline and
(36:53):
brings it to life. And she also uses Boncelli's venus
rising out of the oyster shell, well the clamshell, and
using oysters as Louisiana's favorite wallusk, she creates Evangeline the
Oyster Girl. And for those who are not familiar with
(37:15):
Longfellow's poem, it is about the separation of two French
Canadian lovers, Evangeline and Gabrielle. Evangeline comes to Louisiana and
then she spends her whole life looking for her lost
love Gabrielle.
Speaker 5 (37:30):
Yeah, and so we get this.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
This scene, which would have been shocking for most Americans
in nineteen forty nine, of course, is fantastic fodder for
a Life magazine photographer who takes pictures of this, they
publish it, and then suddenly everything begins to change.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
And this was from the famous Longfellow point.
Speaker 7 (37:50):
The Evangeline to Oyster Girl. Yes, she takes her act
Evangeline from Longfellow's poem, uses Bonocelli's art as the inspiration
for the oyster shell and having pearls and having this
sea motif as she performed her dance.
Speaker 4 (38:12):
Well, and suddenly everybody wants to see the pearl of
wisdom that is on Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (38:18):
Correct, and they're without giving too much away. A rival
rolls into town who also has a water theme.
Speaker 4 (38:29):
Act, and this starts the competition that becomes and creates
modern Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (38:35):
And for those yeah, yes, we have two dancers vying
for the spotlight of one stage. One has an ax
to grind and.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
I and I gotta tell you, folks, you got me
on the edge of mouth, seat me.
Speaker 5 (38:48):
You gotta buy the book, You gotta buy thet buy
the book.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
Yeah sounds exciting.
Speaker 5 (38:52):
The ax woman of Bourbon Street. It's worth doing.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
And of course we we've only got a few minutes,
a couple more minutes left. I wanted to get this,
Jane Delacour, author, historian. You part of this book came
about by you telling these stories as a tour guide.
You own one of the more prominent tour guide companies
here in New Orleans. Tell us about Strange True Tours.
Speaker 7 (39:14):
Yes, Strange True Tours is the love of my husband,
Jeffrey Holmes and I. We brought about Strange True Tours
because we wanted.
Speaker 8 (39:24):
To talk about the real, crazy history of New Orleans
and get away from the you know, the ghost tours
and the.
Speaker 7 (39:35):
Typical French Quarter tour. We wanted to get into the
more salacious side of New Orleans history, but keep to the.
Speaker 4 (39:43):
Facts, and Strange Shoe Tours has done that very effectively.
In fact, one of the things that bothers me about
locals as somebody who's also a licensed tour guide and
may have done a few tours for you in the past,
Jane Delacour, is the fact that a lot of our
locals don't know what a rich history we have.
Speaker 7 (40:00):
We have over three hundred years of just incredible history
from and pick a subject, and New Orleans has it
in abundance. Women's history, minority history, gay history, military history, vice,
crime and culture, you know, we have everything you could
(40:22):
possibly ask for.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
And Jane Delacuer, I want to finish up talking about
your book in the last couple of minutes that the
ex Women of Bourbon Street. But the it kind of
what we'll see out of this competition that we teased earlier,
that you have to read the book to find out
what happens is that suddenly these music and performance clubs
come up and down Bourbon Street. We become a center
of performance. In this Bourbon Street is going to go
(40:47):
through many different incarnations. Today perhaps it's not what it
once was, but at the same time, the city is
going to evolve and a lot of these women are
going to become matriarch of a cultural change. And I
wanted you to talk about what becomes of them because
the most famous, of course, of all of them, ultimately
it's not the ax Woman, it's Blaze Star, who becomes
(41:09):
the power more of Governor Earl Long, but all of them,
they put their imprint there there. We think of them
sort of in a bur lest way, but they're extraordinary women,
business people who end up changing the culture of a city.
Speaker 7 (41:24):
They very much. Did you know these women they not
just owned their image they ended up, you know, owning
their own night clubs, like Chris Owens, who is still
performing on Bourbon today. They went on to movies film.
You know, Lily Christine was a pin up girl that
was you know, famous throughout all of America. And the costumings,
(41:50):
the makeup, the choreography, you know, this was high theater.
I mean it may have been erotic theater, but it
was still a high theater. You know, these women use
their brains and their bodies, especially when you think about
that era of the you know, the fifties and sixties
where you know, women, you know, were considered to stay
(42:13):
at home, you know, be wives and moms. And here
we have these women who are shaking their money makers
on stage while celebrities and movie stars are in the
audience watching them and dating them.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
That's incredible. I mean it shows that New Orleans. Of course,
it was setting the shed for culture at this point.
This is also the time nineteen fifties when all of
this is happening, another thing is happening down the street.
The first rock and roll song is going to be
taped to j M Studios. At we mentioned Matassa's Cosmo
Matassa's J and M Records. So in a lot of
these clubs where it's Burlesquez, you're literally having the first
(42:51):
rock and roll performances. You're having Ernie Cato and you're
having one Fats Domino begin to play. And so rock
and roll really was born Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (43:01):
It really was. They were listening to the music that
was coming out of, you know, the clubs, and they
took that and took it to a whole new direction.
And it's just amazing to see that nothing happens in
a vacuum.
Speaker 4 (43:17):
All of this culture things, making us the birthplace of
an only jazz and rock and roll, but culture and
so much of what is America. You outline it that
and so much more in your book, The ax Woman
of Bourbon Street Jane Delacort's available at Amazon dot com,
both an e form and in print form and as
and it's available through Strange to Tours.
Speaker 7 (43:38):
Through www dot Strange True tours dot com.
Speaker 4 (43:44):
And if somebody wants to take one of your tours,
just a quick plug for Strange Shoe Tours. You don't
just offer a Bourbon Street a French Court tour. You're
offer a whole variety of them. And this is great for.
Speaker 7 (43:51):
Locals, especially for locals. We my Jeffrey does a tour
that talks about the organized crime here. He has he's
a local expert on Lee Harvey Oswald and the whole
conspiracy in New Orleans. Ties to that. I do tours
(44:12):
at the French Quarter, the Garden District and our adult
history tour that we do, the Strange True Tour.
Speaker 4 (44:19):
And if somebody wants is not so technically and wants
to use the old fashioned telephone number, do you have
an office number they can call a strangehow yes, you can.
Speaker 7 (44:26):
You can give me a call at five oh four
four four four one, five three nine, and we'll take
good care of you.
Speaker 5 (44:33):
Give that out one more time. Jane Delacour, if.
Speaker 7 (44:35):
You would five oh four four four four one, five
three nine.
Speaker 5 (44:40):
The book is the ex Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 4 (44:43):
The historian is Jane Delacour, also known as Historian Jane,
and it is something worthy of getting it. Check it
out at Amazon dot com and we're seeing other local
bookstores will have it or get it through Strange True Tours. Jane,
thank you so much for giving us this view, this
glimpse into such an essential part of New Orleans.
Speaker 5 (44:59):
And American history, and thank you for having me appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (45:03):
Yes, Sane, thank you so very much.
Speaker 6 (45:05):
What a great show on what a tremendous and lovely
historian you truly are. And I've just got one more
thing to say before I depart, before our final.
Speaker 3 (45:14):
Break, and that is this ha.
Speaker 6 (45:18):
The axe Woman cometh in all of her raging parline
Bourbon glory, the pearl of Bourbon Street. Folks get it,
the ax Woman of Bourbon Street. Don't miss it. It's
a thriller. Hey, you my share You confused about healthcare ware?
(45:41):
Mary can help? Is your health insurance too expensive these days?
Now there are new plans with a great coverage at
a huge, huge thirty to fifty percent saving. Are you
looking for more benefits and better rate?
Speaker 3 (45:55):
So?
Speaker 6 (45:55):
Are you really happy about your current plan? Mary, a
Lesson's insurance agent, Ken talk with you about your options,
provide flexible choices and custom tailor your coverage to fit
your every need and your budget. For more information, please
call Mary bruce Ard at Tree Tree seven nine six
(46:16):
seven one eight zero four for a free consultation of
the very best health insurance that you can get.
Speaker 3 (46:24):
Again.
Speaker 6 (46:25):
The number is Tree Tree seven nine six seven, one
eight zero four. Thank you so very very much and
a big ol'cagun mercy boku and remember Boudro say you do. Folks,
is chappenheimch Henry, and I'm here to tell you about
our ministry, LAMB Ministries. We're an inner city ministry with
(46:47):
an inner city formula and focus for inner city folks.
Please check us out. Go to our website Lambanola dot
com and find out all about us. We're in ministry
that deals with some of the greatest needs in the
city's great challenges with the urban poor, inner city kids.
If you'd like to get involved, we need all the
(47:08):
help we can get. We need volunteers, we need financial support,
and we need prayer warriors, so please contact us. Go
to our website l A M B N O l
A dot com Lambonola dot com and find out all
about us. We have seen remarkable results, close to five
thousand kids coming to Christ and a few adults, and
(47:30):
then we've seen hundreds of these kids go on to
living really productive lives when the only hope they had
was was tragedy. So check us out again. Go to
our website. L A M B N O L a
dot com or contact me on my cell phone. Chapelheimick
Henry at aera code five zero four seven two three
(47:51):
nine three six nine, And thank you so very very big.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Os.
Speaker 3 (48:01):
This is Chapelheih mcgnry.
Speaker 6 (48:03):
And we're down to the last part of our show
where we cover the biblical foundations of our country, our
Gudeo Christian jurisprudence, and then our gospel moment. And so
today we want to talk about the Ursuline Nuns. Our
show today had to do with women in the French Quarter. Well,
the Ersuline Nuns were some of the very first women
in the French Quarter, and they did miracles and amazing things,
(48:24):
and they're still here in New Orleans. They had one
of the finest prep schools in the country. It's truly
a remarkable story. Well, when they were in the early
days and America had become the government, if you know,
an American government had basically bought Louisiana Louisiana purchase, and we
were now part of America. One of the first things
(48:45):
that the nuns did was they sent Thomas Jefferson a letter.
They were very concerned, just like the Baptist Convention of Dansbury, Connecticut,
who sent him a similar letter saying is it safe?
Are we going to be put in jail? Or is
it going to be a government persecution of the church.
They basically said the same thing, but they based their
thing on what had gone on in the French Revolution.
(49:05):
They want to know in that brutal communism reign of terror,
were they going to be shut down, were they going
to be thrown in jail, executed?
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Whatever?
Speaker 6 (49:13):
What was the future of the Earthline nuns? And he
wrote him back a letter. We have that letter here
in New Orleans and it goes like this. It says
that you nuns are so great, You've done such a
remarkable job in educating the poor taking care of the poor,
that it should be incumbent upon government to help fund you.
(49:34):
He was calling for tax money to support a religious organization.
I don't think Thomas Jeffson's trying to keep God out
of government. And just like he did with the Baptist Convention,
he wrote him a letter that said that there is
an inseparable wall between the church and government. However, it's
a one way world wall designed to keep the government
out of the church. But could never and should never
(49:54):
keep the church out of government. And he was quoting
a famous Baptiste elogian, Roger Williams, when he did that. Well,
you know, not too long thereafter we had the Battle
of New Orleans eighteen fifteen in January, in early January,
and during that time the nuns, if you won on
the battlefield, fighting for your life, fighting for the salvation
(50:16):
of the city, which was certain to fall against these
overwhelming British force, one of the greatest armies ever assembled,
and greatest armadas to actually ever cross the Atlantic. Up
until that time, there was no hope for New Orleans
to hold, no hope, and so the nuns, realizing the
dire state, called for prayer meetings, and they had prayer
(50:36):
meetings during the entire time of the battle. If you
won on the battlefield, no matter what your background was,
you were and their church praying. And after the battle
and we won such an overwhelming victory, Churchill said, it's
the lowest point in the entire history of the British military.
Jackson met with them and commended them, and they went
(50:58):
over how their prayer had gone and what had gone
on on into the battlefield. At the time of Verre's
points of the prayer, and he was stunned because he
realized that when they were praying for this or that,
that's what was happening at that moment on the battlefield.
He committed them greatly and he thanked them greatly for
the great job they did. Again, another great American president
who I know, wanted to keep God in government.
Speaker 3 (51:18):
So, folks, but what about you. Do you have God
in you? Well?
Speaker 6 (51:21):
You need to know that because one day you're going
to meet your maker. Will you be ready, well, right
now and a brief time, I'm going to tell you
how you can. You know, the Bible says God loves
you with an everlasting love. He loved you so much, folks,
that he created you in his image. And then he
came to this earth, God, the Son, perfect God and
perfect Man, the Lord Jesus Christ, to take care of
(51:41):
you two greatest problems, your sin problem and your death problem.
When he died for all your sins, and the Bible
says it's blood washed him all the way. He took
care of your first love problem, sin and all your
sins and the day you died to the I'm sorry,
from the day you were born to the day you
die from your first to your last sins were washed
it way with his precious blood. The next thing he
(52:02):
did was he took care of your death problem, your
second great love problem, when he rose from the dead
to win for you his precious free gift of resurrection,
everlasting life. Folks, don't you thank you all to get
that resurrection life, thank you all to get that free
payment for your sins. This is a free gift. God
is giving us this on the basis of a free gift.
(52:24):
You cannot earn it, you cannot work for it. That's
why Jesus kept saying, repent and believe. When you repent,
you believe you can't earn it. You believe you're hopeless
and helpless without God, and there's nothing you can do
to help God out, or do part of the job,
or do anything for your eternal life. You have to
fall before Him and fully trust Him and only Him
with all of your heart, believing that Jesus died for
(52:46):
all of your sins, was buried and rose from the dead.
If you've never done that before, do it now. Repent
and believe you can't save yourself, so that you're free
to put faith alone in Christ, alone with childlike faith.
You're free to believe that only he can, that he did,
and then He will save you from a burning hell
and guarantee you ever lasting life to be with Him
and her heaven forever. Folks, if you've never done it,
(53:08):
do it now. The Bible says today. Now it's a
day of salvation. Like the old country preacher said, don't
wait until it's too late. Well, folks, it's time for
us to close. Now with a mind Saint Martin singing
a creole goodbye, and God bless Allah.
Speaker 1 (53:25):
You call you cel goodbye. Please think we just wasted time.
Put me all three savy. There's time for a creol goodbye.
Battles the politicians.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Listener addressed the digitators and magicians. Who's to see the money?
Speaker 3 (00:13):
Then you don't.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
There's nothing to fill the holes while they are feeling
their pockets bi holes, the politicians bouncing down the road.
Everybody's wition for no moment, corruption and dysfunction. It's gone
to take divide it Avention.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
Ladies and gentlemen, a little break from politics this week
as we look at New Orleans's most famous street and
its most famous character that helped it come to be,
the Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Here on the Founders Show.
Speaker 6 (00:46):
And God bless all out there you are now listening
to the Founders Show, the voice of the Founding Fathers.
You're Founding Fathers coming to you deep within the bowels
of those mystic and cryptic alligator swamps of the that
old Crescent City, New Orleans, Louisiana, and high up on
top of that old Liberty Cypress tree way out on
(01:08):
the Eagles Branch, this is none other than your spingary
Baba of the Republic, Chaplain Hi mcenry, who, with.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
Christopher Tidmore, you roving reporter, resident radical moderate, and associate
editor of the Louisiana Weekly newspaper available at Louisiana Weekly
dot net. And ladies and gentlemen, we have a fantastic
show for you today. We're going through the depths of
Bourbon Street, taking a little break from politics at the
beginning of the show and talking about the most storied,
literally in historic street of our era, of our time,
(01:38):
and of our city. And that is the street named
not after the alcohol but after the royal family that
has so dominated the history of New Orleans. And we're
speaking about that street with a living expert on that street.
Joining us here in the Founder's Show is Jane Delacour.
She's the author of the new book The ax Woman
of Bourbon Street. It is a fantastic sort of place
(02:00):
history of New Orleans's most famous boulevard, with its personalities,
it's various figures female and male, and the progression of
this incredible street that is so defined the history of
New Orleans. And Jane Delacour, welcome to the Founder Show.
Speaker 7 (02:17):
Thank you so much, a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
Yes, Jane, it's great to have you this Chaplinhi mcnram
I love New Orleans history.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I've read a good bit about it.
Speaker 6 (02:26):
Christopher's an expert, and so we're very excited about having
you on the show and can't wait to hear your story.
Speaker 7 (02:31):
And thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (02:33):
And Jane, let's kick off with it. You're writing what
is a defandant of what I walking person's history of
Bourbon Street, so you can feel as you go down
the street. But you start off in a chapter over
the various decades of how Bourbon Street presents, and one
of the points that you make very clear is frankly,
(02:54):
most of the people who lived on Bourbon Street throughout
his history would have been rather surprised, maybe even shocked
that it is today in adult Disneyland. And we're talking
as late as the twentieth century, that for most of
its history, Bourbon Street was just kind of a residential,
kind of upscale residential boulevard at the best, the back
of town.
Speaker 5 (03:12):
Can you talk about that.
Speaker 7 (03:14):
Yes, definitely, even up until the early nineteen twenties, I
believe many people who worked and resided on Bourbon Street
would be shocked and maybe a little appalled at how
Bourbon Street has progressed.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
So really, yeah, I mean it's in fact you talk
about it. Let's start off with as I as I
sort of tease the beginning the most common misconception that
many tourists have, and I'd be astonished how many New
Orleanians have it as well. Bourbon Street's not named after
a drink, No, sir, it is not.
Speaker 7 (03:50):
It is named after the ruling royal family of Bourbons,
or as they say in France, Boubon's. And they ould
France for over two hundred and fifty years, and they
made quite an impression on French, American and world history.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
And who was who was the first Bourbon King?
Speaker 7 (04:12):
Oh, my personal favorite, Henry Legrand, the first Bourbon king.
He was actually the King of Navarre.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Okay, he was a fellow, wasn't he.
Speaker 7 (04:23):
Oh he was a grand fellow. Uh.
Speaker 4 (04:27):
He definitely thought Paris was worth a mass, so you know,
yes he did.
Speaker 7 (04:32):
He started out Protestant, switched teams to Catholicism, and was
finally crowned King of France after quite a bit of
war and sieging of Paris to finally relent and take
the throne.
Speaker 6 (04:50):
Yeah, he was. He was a Huguenot and he gave
that up to be the king. And then tragically they
had the what was it the Saint Bartholomew is massacre.
Speaker 7 (05:01):
Oh, the Saint Bartholomew massacre. It was more than a day.
It kind of turned into a season.
Speaker 5 (05:07):
Oh my god.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Yes, it Prince here at the time. He was only
survived because he was royalty and him and his close
friends were barricaded in a tower waiting for them to die,
and the crowd went past them and they were able
(05:29):
to make their escape.
Speaker 6 (05:30):
No wonder, the Hugonots fled France and they made they
for the country. But that's Asconauts were Baptists.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Uh well, they were Baptists, well, French Calvinists, you know,
which I guess I'm Baptist.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Would well, they.
Speaker 6 (05:44):
Actually call themselves Baptists, but anyway, they were Calvinists, that's right.
Speaker 7 (05:47):
But the most famous Bourbon king would be Louis the fourteenth,
who Louisiana is named for.
Speaker 4 (05:54):
And and that's important because going to our story, of course,
that he revokes Edigre of nonce, which is the reason
that Huguenots end up leaving and many people end up
leaving France. But he's part of the story that comes
into this before it's Louis the fourteenth who begins with
Samuel Champagne and says, find me this new empire in
(06:15):
the west. And over the course of this and the
next generation, through his five year old great grandson Louis
the fifteenth, Louisiana would be found Louisiana. But this comes
into the founding of New Orleans. Bourbon Street is called
after this, after the royal dynasty. But that's kind of
a consistent theme. You have Royal Street, you have Dauphine
Dauphin as in the sort of the Prince of Wales
(06:36):
of France, Burgundi, the royal French houses offso the Dukes
of Burgundi.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
You go through the whole thing.
Speaker 7 (06:42):
But h don't get me started on the Burgundians.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
I love that family, and so Jane Delacour we get
in this. All of these streets were named laterally as
a way for the founder of the city, Bienville, to
get in good with the monarchy, getting good with the
royal family. The Saint and others were illegitimates who had
saint and illegitimate son of the king, So Saint Bastard,
Saint Bastard and the other streets. But we've got this
(07:07):
street called Bourbon that when Bienville finds the city. It's
kind of a backwarter, isn't it, literally and figuratively.
Speaker 7 (07:15):
But literally and figuraively, it was a dirt path, it
was considered back of town, and there was almost no
residencies or buildings on that street up until almost the
eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 4 (07:31):
In fact, that something a lot of people don't realize
about the French Quarter Chain Delacorte is the fact that, well,
they were really only surviving thanks to the fires. About
seven properties that predate the American period. You can argue
parts of walls of others are, but for the most part,
the French Quarter is something that comes to formation in
its currents at the very end of the seventeen nineties,
(07:52):
in the beginning of it, and the current incarnation of
Bourbon Streets certainly is a product of the early nineteenth century.
Speaker 7 (07:59):
Definitely, the fires sent the tone for the city to
rebuild and how they were going to rebuild, And just
by serendipity, so many factors came together in a very
short period of time that completely changed how New Orleans
(08:19):
lived and functioned. We went from being a French Spanish
colony to being an American colony, and once the Americans
started coming into town. They brought their money with them
and that really spurred development. We now have steam engines,
(08:40):
and that is what really changed the path of New
Orleans forever, was the ability to take goods not just
down the river, but back up the river.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
And Subourbon Street's going to become the street of people
who are making fortunes on this intercontinental trade and in
the sugar industry. These grand mansions are going to be
built on Bourbon Street, and sooner cotton and cotton because
the largest cotton exchange is going to be Saint Louis Hotel,
and that's going to spawn a lot of things being
built on Bourbon Street, including an opera house.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Yes, when the Americans started coming into town and started
building their big, beautiful mansions uptown, the French felt like
they needed to have something that was French, and that
is when the French opera House was built and the
Saint Louis Hotel, which would later become our Bourbon Orleans.
Speaker 5 (09:38):
Now are the Royal Islands.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
And of course that you know, was the largest exchange,
the Saint Louis Exchange Hotel, the largest commodities exchange, the
largest slave exchange in the in the world. All of
this is happening on this street. Bourbon's creating its identity
at the end of Exchange Place in the beginning of
the and the beginning of the century as the French
(10:02):
removing sort of downriver. But Bourbon Street itself is going
to develop its character Jane Delacour in the decades really
as we know it, not only after the Civil War,
but really after the late nineteenth century. So walk us through,
if you would, how Bourbon Street became what we think
(10:23):
about it, and tell us a little bit about another Presbyterian,
a man by the name of Albert Sidney's story.
Speaker 7 (10:31):
Oh good old story. Yes, the dawn of the twentieth
century brought new winds of change. The old ways, the
old South was definitely on its last legs. And we're
now having a newness coming into the city. And we're
(10:52):
having all this trade happening with the Port of Orleans.
We've got the military Navy base year well before the
Naviies came in, and we have all of this happening,
and prostitution is thriving to the point it's a nuisance.
And New Orleans has had a problem with prostitution since
(11:15):
the eighteen hundreds, we had Loretta X where we had
to have licenses for what they would call lewd and
abandoned women. And finally, what they considered the street harassment
of the prostitutes was so bad that the city got
(11:36):
together and sent a wonderful man by the name of
a story to go to Europe to study how European
cities dealt with their prostitution. And that's when he comes back,
hopefully with receipts saying that these cities in Europe have
(11:56):
districts where the women can work fleet out of And.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
Certainly he was a man of the church, if you.
Speaker 7 (12:04):
Will, and uh he was an alderman, yes.
Speaker 6 (12:07):
Yes, and and and wanted his life, his career to
be a great testimony of Christianity in the church.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
And tragically his name.
Speaker 6 (12:14):
Was it was the advertised prostitution, the one guy we.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Know for a fact, never we know for a fact,
never patrinized happy.
Speaker 7 (12:26):
Yeah, the women were not happy at being corralled and
forced to work in this district, and so as a
lure they took his name on for the district. Now
what was your wife could not show her face in public?
Speaker 4 (12:39):
What was now? What was Storyville? Storyville was not Bourbon Street.
This is a common misconception.
Speaker 7 (12:44):
Correct. Storyville was outside of the French quarter on by
you know Basin Street, conveniently located next to the train.
Speaker 5 (12:54):
Station, which have you ever seen Basin Street station?
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Basically that was one of the ends of story All
the others it would go towards Black.
Speaker 5 (13:02):
Storyville would be about where the Little Gem Saloon was.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
So it was a seventy block area that was huge,
but it was it was the best zontain that.
Speaker 6 (13:09):
Was probably near Tremay, which was a very exclusive black neighborhood,
the first one we had in New Orleans, I mean
in America.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
And it was, you know, the first neighborhood free people
of color. But of course this is the late this
is at this point. Tree has been around for close
to one hundred.
Speaker 6 (13:23):
Years, right oh yeah, yeah, So I'm saying, yeah, you're
saying the portion for the African America.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
Was Actually it was right, it was on the other side.
It was actually closer to what would it was close
to the worst part of town, a place called Poydras Street,
which it was.
Speaker 5 (13:41):
It was, that was it.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
But the point is that this is an area where
prostitution is neither legal nor illegal where there is a
code where it's it's they've kind of corraled it. And then,
and as it usually does, the federal government screws everything up.
Speaker 5 (13:53):
Jane can talk about that.
Speaker 7 (13:55):
Oh, yes, we're at the point of World War One
and the Navy has decided that New Orleans needs a
Navy base. The Navy has a very unusual law on
the books there cannot be a legal house of ill
(14:15):
repute within five miles of a Navy base.
Speaker 5 (14:20):
And guess what's within five miles of a Navy base.
Speaker 7 (14:22):
Oh, our beautiful Navy base.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
City.
Speaker 7 (14:26):
The city begged the Navy secretary to build five miles
in either direction, and the Navy refused, and they closed
down Storyville. But as we know, sex doesn't stop selling,
It just changes the address.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
Now, this is what's important. What's important here is not
only by this point has Storyville been a center of prostitution.
When things became legal, you needed a way to draw
people into these houses. And frankly, we're one of the
few places in America because slaves have Sunday afternoons off,
they were able to maintain a little bit of the
(15:02):
African culture, very small amount, but part of it was
their musical traditions. We also are the place where they
had the highest free people of color because of our
manumission policies who were training classical music. And yet after
the Civil War, our sort of caste system where we
had multiple shades of this gets into white and black.
We go from one of the more open places in
the South to one of the most repressive. But a
(15:24):
lot of these musicians are able to get jobs in
these bordellos as ways of drawing it, and they're coming
up with a new form of music jazz.
Speaker 5 (15:34):
Actually, that would be.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Wrong high it was that that would be the wrong
name because it was we can't say what the real
name was, but let's just say it's something very close
to jazz that you would not want to put on
the front of the Times picking you you.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Know jazz mains. You know a jazz mains.
Speaker 5 (15:50):
It means it's it's a delta euphemism for sex.
Speaker 6 (15:53):
And it's it's it was a streight term and it
meant the male seed.
Speaker 5 (15:58):
Yeah, and that's and that it's literally what the original
name for this music was. It was sex music.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
But now definitely and now Jane Delacour, the author of
the ex Woman of Bourbon Street. This new book on
the history of Bourbon Street. This, this is how we're
getting into our story here. So Bourbon Street is this
affluent street. It's got the Saint Louis Exchange Hotel, it's
got the Grand Opera House.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
It's this exfluent street.
Speaker 4 (16:22):
Suddenly Storyville, this area behind the View Core is shut down,
and these musicians and frankly, these horse have to go.
Speaker 7 (16:30):
Somewhere exactly, And they just basically crossed the street and
the first couple of blocks were known as the Tango Belt,
and then Bourbon Street just became known as Harlot's Row.
Speaker 6 (16:44):
Wow, and you know, you know it's starting this all off.
As you mentioned that there were prostitutes were spread out
all over the city, and some of them had their
own homes, of course, and how's the prostitution And they
was actually one in the Garden district and it was
a very exclusive one. It was known as a sporting club.
(17:07):
And you know, do you know where that was? That
was Commander's Palace.
Speaker 7 (17:12):
I thought, so if you go upstairs.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
You'll see the naked statues at Women's Statue.
Speaker 7 (17:19):
Pallas had a colorful history, including girlfriends, dining, upstairs, wives
and family dining downstairs.
Speaker 6 (17:31):
I can just imagine seeing our so our silk stocking
ancestors saying, well, dear, I think this evening, I'll go
meet my friends over at the Sporting Club. Watch how
you play Blackjack tonight, James.
Speaker 4 (17:50):
This is the Garden Room had a totally different meeting
in those days, and that that gets us into what
we're talking about. Part of the reason Storyville was created
was the fact that there was no zoning, and that
means somebody could literally move into the neighborhood next to you.
I mean the Garden District being at this time as
is today, the most affluent neighborhood in New Orleans, and
yet you could somebody could move in and basically start
(18:10):
up a bordello.
Speaker 5 (18:11):
They could start.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Anything, and that becomes the battle of what becomes Bourbon Street.
And joining us here on the Founder Show with Hi
mckenry and Christopher tied Moore is Jane Delacorcey's the author
of the new book The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
It's a comprehensive history of the street and we'll get
to who the Axe Woman was in a second. But Jane,
of course, the idea of Bourbon Street becoming the Harlot's
(18:35):
Row didn't happen overnight. There was a bit of a
fight for this to happen.
Speaker 7 (18:39):
It was Bourbon Street was a mix of high end
residential coffee houses and restaurants that were all catering to
the upscale crowd that was going to the Opera House.
And then it all comes crashing down. On a cold
December night nineteen nineteen. What happened a restaurant fire across
(19:05):
the street from the French Opera House, and the embers
from the restaurant crossed the street and caught the French
Opera House. Now, while the outside of the Opera House
was brick, the inside was wood, and it went up
in just a matter of almost minutes.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
Now, it's not it's hard to underestimate how critical the
French Opera House was to the culture and history of
New Orleans. It's hard for us to contemplate it. But basically,
modern marti gros developed and grew out of the French
Opera House. The first balls were held there, the first
debutante presentations what would become the first carnival organizations from
comas Momas Proteus were there. This was the center of
(19:49):
New Orleans culture. So when it was lost in this fire,
it was more than a gaping hole in a block.
It was a gaping hole in what would become Bourbon Street.
It sort of threw everything a skew.
Speaker 7 (20:00):
It really did, because the Saint Louis Hotel was now
a crumbling, open air junkyard. It had collapsed during a storm,
and then the French Opera House went down, and now
there is what we consider the French Quarter had lost
(20:21):
its French identity at that moment. Anything that was properly
French is now really gone. And what year was that,
Jane nineteen nineteen, and in.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Fact the French Court at that point we just heard
in the newspapers. Of course that a classic French Quarter location,
Matassa's Matassa's grocery store, is closing down. But it's kind
of one of the last windows to what the French
Quarter was in those days, which was an Italian neighborhood.
Speaker 5 (20:50):
It was a safe it.
Speaker 7 (20:51):
Was as it was known as the Latin Quarter.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Right.
Speaker 6 (20:54):
The way I remembered was that as the city grew,
the wealthy mainly again to move out of the French Quarter,
go out Esplanade, I mean at least esplanade down to
the I mean up to the Garden district lower Garden
district and whatnot. And so it was being vacated and
probably because of all the other things going, it was
(21:15):
becoming a blighted area. At that time, the poor Italian
immigrants were coming in and it.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
Was cheap property for him.
Speaker 6 (21:22):
So now the French quarter is pretty much half the
French car is probably only by Italians to.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
This day, is that troop?
Speaker 7 (21:27):
It is basically true, correct, Yeah, And at the jackpot
and well and joining us of course, Jane Delacour, the
author of the new book The ax Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
We are getting to that, folks. She's joining us for
most of the hour here. But before we get into
that and all this, we're gonna have to take a
quick commercial break. We'll do that, Jane, and be back
after these important messages.
Speaker 5 (21:46):
Stay tuned.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
We'll also give you information when we come back on
how to get the ax Woman of Bourbon Street. Remember
you can always hear the Founder Show Ladies and Gentlemen
every Sunday from eight to nine am on Wrno. Nine
nine five FM. Every Monday one seen Friday Friday, Monday
and Wednesday on WSLA ninety three point nine FM fifteen
sixty AM twenty four to seven three sixty five on
(22:07):
the iHeartMedia app. We highly recommend it's better than Pandora
for the music choices, but you can also download it,
type in the Founder's Show and follow us and get
the updates of our show on it, or you can
always go to the Foundershow dot com or listen to
a streamed at Rattlesteak Radio, the Foundershow dot Com being
the easiest way to always get the program. Jane Delacour,
author of The Actual and Bourbon Street, Hima Kenny, Christopher
tim Or back up to these important messages.
Speaker 5 (22:29):
Stay tuned.
Speaker 4 (22:33):
Give the gift of flowers from Villari's Florist for any occasion.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's never a bad idea Villaries Florist
with locations on the South Shore in the North Shore.
Tell them you heard it on The Founder's Show for
their expert great rate twelve dozen roses, cash and carry.
But if you want Villaries for any other occasion, their
gift baskets are unbelievable. For any holiday occasion, their floral
(22:55):
arrangements are unspeakably beautiful. Ladies and gentlemen. Don't trust what
I'm saying. Check Mount online at the Villariesflorist dot com
or call them at one eight hundred VI L L
E R or Villariesflorist dot com for all of your
floral needs. And if you want to get a little
bit of lunch spiced with the spices of Royal Merchant
Trading Company, or just the perfect coffee to pass an afternoon,
(23:16):
or look forward in the areas of the Garden District
and just pass the time. Check out the still Perkin
Coffee House at the corner of Britannia and Washington Avenue
Still Perkin for all of your coffee, luncheon and panini needs.
Still Perkin a great place to go in the Rink
shopping center. Great to have your coffee. Check out the
Garden District Bookstore, Judy's at the Rink and all the others.
(23:38):
Remember free parking right there at the Garden District and
to wander around. It's worth a visit still Perkin Coffeehouse
in the Garden District and be sure to check on
their shelves for the Royal Merchant spices. Royal Merchant Local
spice company run by entrepreneur Barcley Rafferty import spices from
all over the world, but you have to go to
the rink. You could give her a call directly five
oh four nine five two five eight three one. That's
five oh four nine five two five eighth ever, or
(24:01):
check them out in the lab Royal Merchant dot co
dot com. Royal Merchant dot co. Check out the numerous
spices from all over the world, organic, cheap and imported
straight to you in an amount you'd to use in
the six month period. Check them out Royal Merchant dot col.
Speaker 6 (24:20):
Welcome back to the Founder Show and it's a chaplin
Heimchenry and with my partner Christopher Tidmore, we're always working
so very hard to bring you the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
So help us God.
Speaker 6 (24:29):
And today we have a wonderful author, Jane Delacour, who's
written a book as Woman of Bourbon Street, and she's
given us some great history about early New Orleans and
the French Quarter. And I'd like to open with this.
I read a book many many years ago. It's written
by a guy named Herbert Asberry. He wrote three books
of the same theme as the story of the poor
(24:50):
Irish and German immigrants arriving in New Orleans doing what
I call it Ellis Island period. And you may have
never heard of it, but probably one thing you've heard
of is the movie Gangs of New York and that
was the name of the book, and it was about
that story at the Five Points in New York City.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
An amazing movie, an amazing movie. He wrote two other books.
Speaker 6 (25:09):
One on was The Barbary Coast, about the same story
in San Francisco, and the third one was called The
French Quarter, and it tells us these amazing stories about
all the crazy characters we had in the French Quarter,
including one of my favorite. Her name was Annie Christmas.
She's a big, tall woman. She ran a house of prostitution,
and everybody behaved in her place of business because when
(25:30):
you met her, you noticed that around her neck was
a necklace of human ears. She was one tough gal. Everybody,
very tough gag. Anyway, let's take it away. And by
the way, I'm here with my partner Christopher Tidmore.
Speaker 5 (25:42):
And Jane, who was the Axe Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (25:47):
The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street would actually be Evangeline
the oyster girl whose name was Kitty West, a amazing
woman originally from Alabama, moved to Mississippi where she was
a poor young woman picking cotton, always wanted more in life,
(26:08):
hopped a bus to New Orleans and never looked back.
Speaker 5 (26:13):
And she's kind of emblematic.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
Jaye Delacor of what you saw as the transformation of
Bourbon Street from this affluent creole neighborhood into this basically
adult Disneyland. Can you talk about how this change is
going on into from the twenties into the into the
into the fifties, all right.
Speaker 7 (26:32):
The change started with prohibition. It came out really quickly
that selling illegal booze made you a lot of money,
and so people were turning their coffee houses into illegal bars.
And when prohibition ended, obviously our local organized crime wanted
(26:54):
to keep the easy money coming, and they saw that
illegal gambling and live in entertainment would become not just
equally but much more lucrative.
Speaker 6 (27:06):
Well, and so you know, talking about that time, we
have a famous or infamous story here in New Orleans.
A famous FBI agent who is going around busting all
the speakeasies, and he'd go to all the different cities,
and his test was when he got to the city,
he'd ask the taxi cab driver where the closest speaks
he was, and it might take him ten, fifteen, thirty
(27:28):
whatever minutes to get to the place. And he was
looking for who would get him the first bottle of
booze he could find. Well, when and when he hit
New Orleans, the taxi and the tax he has the
tax cab driver that the response was, well here I
got a bottle right here, and he it was we
set the record. We provided booze in seconds versus all
(27:49):
the other cities.
Speaker 7 (27:50):
I believe he called it six seconds. He had a
drink in his hand.
Speaker 3 (27:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Jane Delacourt and that sort of Bourbon Street becomes because
as this becomes this poor Sicilian neighborhood. For the most part,
it's interesting my grandfather. There's still a few of the
old creoles there, my grandfather a villary who grows up
at the edge of the French quarter. But for the
most part they've moved either further up into the marine
or more jumped up and developed modern uptown. The other
(28:16):
side of the garden district is moving in. It's also
the same time in the nineteen twenties and Prohibition becoming
sort of a bohemia for the South. It's poor, it's easy,
but it's sort of European. So writers are coming here.
William Faulkner is sherwo Anderson others, and all of this
(28:36):
sort of creative tension is happening in the streets around
Bourbon Street. And how is this street evolving through into
what we came to know it in this because jazz
is running into performance and then of course New Orleans
is going to come in something first created in France
but made famous here called burlesque.
Speaker 7 (28:58):
Yes, it actually got to started in Italy. Well, yes, yes,
Italian theaters in the seventeenth century. That started out as
a comedic break between the interludes of you know, plays
and operas. Burless comes from the Italian word burla, which
means to joke or to mock, to make fun of.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
So an opera started in Italy, you know.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
Yeah, So it was like it was like saying, like
the pantomime, like you would have any English theaters, and
they just started, you know, making fun of you know, literature, theater, politics,
social norms and this. You know, because as I love
to say, everyone loves a dick joke.
Speaker 4 (29:45):
Jane Delacore when it when it comes in, it's actually
comedy in performance, that's gonna say Bourbon Street because frankly,
prohibition is gonna end and a lot of people are
going to be out of work, and so they're gonna
have to get creative.
Speaker 7 (29:59):
And because we had Vaudeville basically stopped coming around touring
and they started going the vaudeville performers, the you know,
the magicians, the emce's, the comedians, the dancers, they need
a place to perform. And they started heading to tourist destinations.
(30:22):
They were going to you know, New York, the Hamptons,
going out west, and a group came to New Orleans
and started performing in the you know bars that were
quasi legal. And by the time we get out of
prohibition and we're into you know world, you know, into
the depression, then we're getting into the war effort. You know,
(30:45):
New Orleans is a major part of the war effort,
and you know, we have the Higgins Boat and we
have all this going on. And when all of this
happens and then the war ends, that's when Bourbon Street
really starts to gel as becoming an adult entertainment mecca.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
And so let's talk about this the clubs that come
in and the most famous of all of them the
five hundred Club.
Speaker 7 (31:13):
Oh, the good old five hundred Club. Yeah, that was
the club.
Speaker 6 (31:17):
That was.
Speaker 7 (31:19):
The club. It was owned by organized individuals.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Carlos Marcella. Yes, yeah, that's what I thought.
Speaker 7 (31:30):
Even though the five hundred Club was not at five
hundred Bourbon, that's the Chris Owens building. It does actually
in the four thirty seven to four forty one Bourbon Streets.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Is she still going?
Speaker 7 (31:44):
Chris Owens, bless her is still going And if anyone
knows the way, I would love to interview her.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
I've met her before and she's quite She's wonderful.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
If you ever want to meet her, let me know.
She's she's an incredible to this day, incredible life.
Speaker 7 (31:57):
Loved to interview her and just to see because she
saw Bourbon Street transform to what it is today.
Speaker 6 (32:05):
Jane, I'd like to ask a quick quick question about
entertainment and theater. Uh, it was New Orleans that introduced
opera to the Western hemisphere.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
Because of that, bringing it up with.
Speaker 6 (32:16):
Some of the finest opera houses and theaters in America.
If we had continued, we'd be the Broadway along with
New York of America. Oh yes, for some reason, it started,
it started falling apart. In fact, the first one of
the first great opera houses called the Grand Opera House
on Canal Street and that's where they had the first
meeting of the Courts Rex and Comas.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
So why did all that fall apart?
Speaker 6 (32:38):
And kind of like another French opera house burned down,
but it just seemed to kind of like disappear. Is
do you under do you have an understanding of how
that happened?
Speaker 7 (32:46):
It was just unfortunately the French when the French opera
house burned down there, and even up before that, for
the reconstruction time was really hard on the entertainment district.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
Yeah. And the yellow fever epidemics. We had a lot of.
Speaker 7 (33:06):
Our constant yellow fever app I mean the yellow fever
epidemic was just nineteen oh five.
Speaker 6 (33:12):
Yeah, yeah, I'm saying the worst epidemics in a history
of America. It's making this Corona thing look like it's lightweight.
Speaker 7 (33:20):
We've done some ugly times with pandemics, definitely.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
Yeah, And that was part of the reason we have
to eat, drink and be merry for because it literally,
in New Orleans tomorrow you may well be dead. If fire, flood,
and hurricane didn't get your disease would have. So we
had to value and appreciate and Bourbon Street becomes the
center of that. Jane Delacour talks about that in her
new book, The Axe Woman of Bourbon Street. And Jane,
as we were coming in the last few minutes, I
(33:45):
want to say, how can somebody get a copy of
this book because it's so wonderful.
Speaker 7 (33:49):
The book is on Amazon Utah on ebook and paperback,
and just go to Amazon, type in the ax one
of Bourbon Street and take you straight to it.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
Jane, Jane. It covers what period in history, there's a
couple hundred.
Speaker 7 (34:06):
Covers and when to win right. It covers a one time,
one night event and the fallout of that event in
one night in October of nineteen forty nine.
Speaker 5 (34:17):
Okay, and let's let's talk about that one night.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
Because you start off just so we get with the
history of the street to the decades, you talk about
some of the changes, and you set yourself up to
nineteen forty nine, what was going on?
Speaker 7 (34:29):
Right? Everything does lead up to nineteen forty nine, we
have a incredible character who runs Stormy's casino Royale. His Stormy.
She was a dancer performer. She had a episode at
LSU where she got tossed into a lake because she
(34:53):
was performing burlesque at LSU and they were too Christian
to allow that to happen.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Well, I'm glad they didn't burn her at the stake there.
Speaker 7 (35:05):
Her club was on Crosses the street there at Bourbon Street,
across from the five hundred Club, and Stormy was the
manager of the place. And just so happened, a Life
magazine photographer was in the area. Gone with the Wind
(35:26):
was only about ten years old, and there was still
this push to see the grand homes of the plantations
and what was left of the Annebellum South, and they
were said, go to New Orleans, take a whole lot
of pictures of New Orleans, and then we can use
these pictures in Life magazine, you know, like be stock.
(35:50):
So as this photographer is on Bourbon Street, Stormy comes
up and says, hey, I have new act debuting tonight.
I will save you a table by the stage. You
don't want to miss this, and no reporter is going
(36:10):
to miss out on that and that is when the
events start to happen.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Wow, what happens? Now? This was in Stormy's place.
Speaker 7 (36:20):
This Stormy casino royale.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
And we'll see that the paramour of along, that's.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
That's coming. Keep going if you would.
Speaker 7 (36:31):
What happens lace after a bit, so we have Kitty
West who has worked really hard to create a very
elaborate and erotic act. It is a eight minute erotic
ballet where she has taken the Longfellow poem Evangeline and
(36:53):
brings it to life. And she also uses Boncelli's venus
rising out of the oyster shell, well the clamshell, and
using oysters as Louisiana's favorite wallusk, she creates Evangeline the
Oyster Girl. And for those who are not familiar with
(37:15):
Longfellow's poem, it is about the separation of two French
Canadian lovers, Evangeline and Gabrielle. Evangeline comes to Louisiana and
then she spends her whole life looking for her lost
love Gabrielle.
Speaker 5 (37:30):
Yeah, and so we get this.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
This scene, which would have been shocking for most Americans
in nineteen forty nine, of course, is fantastic fodder for
a Life magazine photographer who takes pictures of this, they
publish it, and then suddenly everything begins to change.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
And this was from the famous Longfellow point.
Speaker 7 (37:50):
The Evangeline to Oyster Girl. Yes, she takes her act
Evangeline from Longfellow's poem, uses Bonocelli's art as the inspiration
for the oyster shell and having pearls and having this
sea motif as she performed her dance.
Speaker 4 (38:12):
Well, and suddenly everybody wants to see the pearl of
wisdom that is on Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (38:18):
Correct, and they're without giving too much away. A rival
rolls into town who also has a water theme.
Speaker 4 (38:29):
Act, and this starts the competition that becomes and creates
modern Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (38:35):
And for those yeah, yes, we have two dancers vying
for the spotlight of one stage. One has an ax
to grind and.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
I and I gotta tell you, folks, you got me
on the edge of mouth, seat me.
Speaker 5 (38:48):
You gotta buy the book, You gotta buy thet buy
the book.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
Yeah sounds exciting.
Speaker 5 (38:52):
The ax woman of Bourbon Street. It's worth doing.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
And of course we we've only got a few minutes,
a couple more minutes left. I wanted to get this,
Jane Delacour, author, historian. You part of this book came
about by you telling these stories as a tour guide.
You own one of the more prominent tour guide companies
here in New Orleans. Tell us about Strange True Tours.
Speaker 7 (39:14):
Yes, Strange True Tours is the love of my husband,
Jeffrey Holmes and I. We brought about Strange True Tours
because we wanted.
Speaker 8 (39:24):
To talk about the real, crazy history of New Orleans
and get away from the you know, the ghost tours
and the.
Speaker 7 (39:35):
Typical French Quarter tour. We wanted to get into the
more salacious side of New Orleans history, but keep to the.
Speaker 4 (39:43):
Facts, and Strange Shoe Tours has done that very effectively.
In fact, one of the things that bothers me about
locals as somebody who's also a licensed tour guide and
may have done a few tours for you in the past,
Jane Delacour, is the fact that a lot of our
locals don't know what a rich history we have.
Speaker 7 (40:00):
We have over three hundred years of just incredible history
from and pick a subject, and New Orleans has it
in abundance. Women's history, minority history, gay history, military history, vice,
crime and culture, you know, we have everything you could
(40:22):
possibly ask for.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
And Jane Delacuer, I want to finish up talking about
your book in the last couple of minutes that the
ex Women of Bourbon Street. But the it kind of
what we'll see out of this competition that we teased earlier,
that you have to read the book to find out
what happens is that suddenly these music and performance clubs
come up and down Bourbon Street. We become a center
of performance. In this Bourbon Street is going to go
(40:47):
through many different incarnations. Today perhaps it's not what it
once was, but at the same time, the city is
going to evolve and a lot of these women are
going to become matriarch of a cultural change. And I
wanted you to talk about what becomes of them because
the most famous, of course, of all of them, ultimately
it's not the ax Woman, it's Blaze Star, who becomes
(41:09):
the power more of Governor Earl Long, but all of them,
they put their imprint there there. We think of them
sort of in a bur lest way, but they're extraordinary women,
business people who end up changing the culture of a city.
Speaker 7 (41:24):
They very much. Did you know these women they not
just owned their image they ended up, you know, owning
their own night clubs, like Chris Owens, who is still
performing on Bourbon today. They went on to movies film.
You know, Lily Christine was a pin up girl that
was you know, famous throughout all of America. And the costumings,
(41:50):
the makeup, the choreography, you know, this was high theater.
I mean it may have been erotic theater, but it
was still a high theater. You know, these women use
their brains and their bodies, especially when you think about
that era of the you know, the fifties and sixties
where you know, women, you know, were considered to stay
(42:13):
at home, you know, be wives and moms. And here
we have these women who are shaking their money makers
on stage while celebrities and movie stars are in the
audience watching them and dating them.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
That's incredible. I mean it shows that New Orleans. Of course,
it was setting the shed for culture at this point.
This is also the time nineteen fifties when all of
this is happening, another thing is happening down the street.
The first rock and roll song is going to be
taped to j M Studios. At we mentioned Matassa's Cosmo
Matassa's J and M Records. So in a lot of
these clubs where it's Burlesquez, you're literally having the first
(42:51):
rock and roll performances. You're having Ernie Cato and you're
having one Fats Domino begin to play. And so rock
and roll really was born Bourbon Street.
Speaker 7 (43:01):
It really was. They were listening to the music that
was coming out of, you know, the clubs, and they
took that and took it to a whole new direction.
And it's just amazing to see that nothing happens in
a vacuum.
Speaker 4 (43:17):
All of this culture things, making us the birthplace of
an only jazz and rock and roll, but culture and
so much of what is America. You outline it that
and so much more in your book, The ax Woman
of Bourbon Street Jane Delacort's available at Amazon dot com,
both an e form and in print form and as
and it's available through Strange to Tours.
Speaker 7 (43:38):
Through www dot Strange True tours dot com.
Speaker 4 (43:44):
And if somebody wants to take one of your tours,
just a quick plug for Strange Shoe Tours. You don't
just offer a Bourbon Street a French Court tour. You're
offer a whole variety of them. And this is great for.
Speaker 7 (43:51):
Locals, especially for locals. We my Jeffrey does a tour
that talks about the organized crime here. He has he's
a local expert on Lee Harvey Oswald and the whole
conspiracy in New Orleans. Ties to that. I do tours
(44:12):
at the French Quarter, the Garden District and our adult
history tour that we do, the Strange True Tour.
Speaker 4 (44:19):
And if somebody wants is not so technically and wants
to use the old fashioned telephone number, do you have
an office number they can call a strangehow yes, you can.
Speaker 7 (44:26):
You can give me a call at five oh four
four four four one, five three nine, and we'll take
good care of you.
Speaker 5 (44:33):
Give that out one more time. Jane Delacour, if.
Speaker 7 (44:35):
You would five oh four four four four one, five
three nine.
Speaker 5 (44:40):
The book is the ex Woman of Bourbon Street.
Speaker 4 (44:43):
The historian is Jane Delacour, also known as Historian Jane,
and it is something worthy of getting it. Check it
out at Amazon dot com and we're seeing other local
bookstores will have it or get it through Strange True Tours. Jane,
thank you so much for giving us this view, this
glimpse into such an essential part of New Orleans.
Speaker 5 (44:59):
And American history, and thank you for having me appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (45:03):
Yes, Sane, thank you so very much.
Speaker 6 (45:05):
What a great show on what a tremendous and lovely
historian you truly are. And I've just got one more
thing to say before I depart, before our final.
Speaker 3 (45:14):
Break, and that is this ha.
Speaker 6 (45:18):
The axe Woman cometh in all of her raging parline
Bourbon glory, the pearl of Bourbon Street. Folks get it,
the ax Woman of Bourbon Street. Don't miss it. It's
a thriller. Hey, you my share You confused about healthcare ware?
(45:41):
Mary can help? Is your health insurance too expensive these days?
Now there are new plans with a great coverage at
a huge, huge thirty to fifty percent saving. Are you
looking for more benefits and better rate?
Speaker 3 (45:55):
So?
Speaker 6 (45:55):
Are you really happy about your current plan? Mary, a
Lesson's insurance agent, Ken talk with you about your options,
provide flexible choices and custom tailor your coverage to fit
your every need and your budget. For more information, please
call Mary bruce Ard at Tree Tree seven nine six
(46:16):
seven one eight zero four for a free consultation of
the very best health insurance that you can get.
Speaker 3 (46:24):
Again.
Speaker 6 (46:25):
The number is Tree Tree seven nine six seven, one
eight zero four. Thank you so very very much and
a big ol'cagun mercy boku and remember Boudro say you do. Folks,
is chappenheimch Henry, and I'm here to tell you about
our ministry, LAMB Ministries. We're an inner city ministry with
(46:47):
an inner city formula and focus for inner city folks.
Please check us out. Go to our website Lambanola dot
com and find out all about us. We're in ministry
that deals with some of the greatest needs in the
city's great challenges with the urban poor, inner city kids.
If you'd like to get involved, we need all the
(47:08):
help we can get. We need volunteers, we need financial support,
and we need prayer warriors, so please contact us. Go
to our website l A M B N O l
A dot com Lambonola dot com and find out all
about us. We have seen remarkable results, close to five
thousand kids coming to Christ and a few adults, and
(47:30):
then we've seen hundreds of these kids go on to
living really productive lives when the only hope they had
was was tragedy. So check us out again. Go to
our website. L A M B N O L a
dot com or contact me on my cell phone. Chapelheimick
Henry at aera code five zero four seven two three
(47:51):
nine three six nine, And thank you so very very big.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
Os.
Speaker 3 (48:01):
This is Chapelheih mcgnry.
Speaker 6 (48:03):
And we're down to the last part of our show
where we cover the biblical foundations of our country, our
Gudeo Christian jurisprudence, and then our gospel moment. And so
today we want to talk about the Ursuline Nuns. Our
show today had to do with women in the French Quarter. Well,
the Ersuline Nuns were some of the very first women
in the French Quarter, and they did miracles and amazing things,
(48:24):
and they're still here in New Orleans. They had one
of the finest prep schools in the country. It's truly
a remarkable story. Well, when they were in the early
days and America had become the government, if you know,
an American government had basically bought Louisiana Louisiana purchase, and we
were now part of America. One of the first things
(48:45):
that the nuns did was they sent Thomas Jefferson a letter.
They were very concerned, just like the Baptist Convention of Dansbury, Connecticut,
who sent him a similar letter saying is it safe?
Are we going to be put in jail? Or is
it going to be a government persecution of the church.
They basically said the same thing, but they based their
thing on what had gone on in the French Revolution.
(49:05):
They want to know in that brutal communism reign of terror,
were they going to be shut down, were they going
to be thrown in jail, executed?
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Whatever?
Speaker 6 (49:13):
What was the future of the Earthline nuns? And he
wrote him back a letter. We have that letter here
in New Orleans and it goes like this. It says
that you nuns are so great, You've done such a
remarkable job in educating the poor taking care of the poor,
that it should be incumbent upon government to help fund you.
(49:34):
He was calling for tax money to support a religious organization.
I don't think Thomas Jeffson's trying to keep God out
of government. And just like he did with the Baptist Convention,
he wrote him a letter that said that there is
an inseparable wall between the church and government. However, it's
a one way world wall designed to keep the government
out of the church. But could never and should never
(49:54):
keep the church out of government. And he was quoting
a famous Baptiste elogian, Roger Williams, when he did that. Well,
you know, not too long thereafter we had the Battle
of New Orleans eighteen fifteen in January, in early January,
and during that time the nuns, if you won on
the battlefield, fighting for your life, fighting for the salvation
(50:16):
of the city, which was certain to fall against these
overwhelming British force, one of the greatest armies ever assembled,
and greatest armadas to actually ever cross the Atlantic. Up
until that time, there was no hope for New Orleans
to hold, no hope, and so the nuns, realizing the
dire state, called for prayer meetings, and they had prayer
(50:36):
meetings during the entire time of the battle. If you
won on the battlefield, no matter what your background was,
you were and their church praying. And after the battle
and we won such an overwhelming victory, Churchill said, it's
the lowest point in the entire history of the British military.
Jackson met with them and commended them, and they went
(50:58):
over how their prayer had gone and what had gone
on on into the battlefield. At the time of Verre's
points of the prayer, and he was stunned because he
realized that when they were praying for this or that,
that's what was happening at that moment on the battlefield.
He committed them greatly and he thanked them greatly for
the great job they did. Again, another great American president
who I know, wanted to keep God in government.
Speaker 3 (51:18):
So, folks, but what about you. Do you have God
in you? Well?
Speaker 6 (51:21):
You need to know that because one day you're going
to meet your maker. Will you be ready, well, right
now and a brief time, I'm going to tell you
how you can. You know, the Bible says God loves
you with an everlasting love. He loved you so much, folks,
that he created you in his image. And then he
came to this earth, God, the Son, perfect God and
perfect Man, the Lord Jesus Christ, to take care of
(51:41):
you two greatest problems, your sin problem and your death problem.
When he died for all your sins, and the Bible
says it's blood washed him all the way. He took
care of your first love problem, sin and all your
sins and the day you died to the I'm sorry,
from the day you were born to the day you
die from your first to your last sins were washed
it way with his precious blood. The next thing he
(52:02):
did was he took care of your death problem, your
second great love problem, when he rose from the dead
to win for you his precious free gift of resurrection,
everlasting life. Folks, don't you thank you all to get
that resurrection life, thank you all to get that free
payment for your sins. This is a free gift. God
is giving us this on the basis of a free gift.
(52:24):
You cannot earn it, you cannot work for it. That's
why Jesus kept saying, repent and believe. When you repent,
you believe you can't earn it. You believe you're hopeless
and helpless without God, and there's nothing you can do
to help God out, or do part of the job,
or do anything for your eternal life. You have to
fall before Him and fully trust Him and only Him
with all of your heart, believing that Jesus died for
(52:46):
all of your sins, was buried and rose from the dead.
If you've never done that before, do it now. Repent
and believe you can't save yourself, so that you're free
to put faith alone in Christ, alone with childlike faith.
You're free to believe that only he can, that he did,
and then He will save you from a burning hell
and guarantee you ever lasting life to be with Him
and her heaven forever. Folks, if you've never done it,
(53:08):
do it now. The Bible says today. Now it's a
day of salvation. Like the old country preacher said, don't
wait until it's too late. Well, folks, it's time for
us to close. Now with a mind Saint Martin singing
a creole goodbye, and God bless Allah.
Speaker 1 (53:25):
You call you cel goodbye. Please think we just wasted time.
Put me all three savy. There's time for a creol goodbye.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!