The French Market is a notable location right at the edge of the French Quarter. The market was built in 1791 and has continued to be a historic and important location for the people of New Orleans. Throughout its years the market has changed with…

In 1983, archaeologists of Coastal Environments, Inc. conducted extensive testing and excavations for the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development in the areas of the proposed east-bound Greater New Orleans Bridge Number 2. The first…

Standing at the intersection of Basin and Conti Streets and facing just west of St. Louis Cemetery #1, is the former location of the Storyville district in the Tremé neighborhood. From 1897 to 1917 New Orleans established a centralized prostitution…

There were times when enslaved people in New Orleans could no longer bear the intense burden that came with the constant suffering of bondage. Escape became the last hope for some of these slaves despite the dangers that they would surely face if…

Michael Mizell-Nelson was a historian of the streetcar, exploring the labor history and publicizing the connection of streetcar strikes to the creation of the Po Boy Sandwich, examining streetcar segregation and integration, documenting the women…

The projectionist strike of 1914 is one of the earliest examples of film workers organizing in New Orleans. Few details are known about its origins or outcomes, but accounts of its unfolding offer insight into the shifting cultural landscape of the…

Following increasingly heated contract negotiations, New Orleans streetcar motormen and conductors struck beginning July 1, 1929. The survival of the carmen's union and 1,100 jobs was in question. Transit strikes throughout the nation provoked…

During the Second World War, a labor shortage developed as men began to serve in the armed forces. Women were increasingly encouraged to take over responsibilities on the home front. Women took jobs of all types: skilled and unskilled, manual and…

Shortly before the arrest of Homer Plessy in June 1892, a successful streetcar strike initiated a wave of union organizing that culminated in what has been called the first biracial general strike in US history. Between 20,000 and 25,000 union…

As with many culinary innovations, the poor boy or po-boy sandwich has attracted many legends regarding its origins. However, documentary evidence confirms that stories about one particular restaurant were right.Bennie and Clovis Martin left their…

Facing Jackson Square, one should see a line of mules and their drivers ready to take visitors on a trip around the French Quarter. Now a tourist attraction, these animals played a vital role for New Orleans before the advent of motorized vehicles.…