New Orleans in Louisiana

Friday, 15 December 2017 - 11:00 am (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination:
Category/Kategorie: General
Reading Time:  18 minutes

Royal Street © Jan Kronsell/cc-by-sa-3.0

Royal Street © Jan Kronsell/cc-by-sa-3.0

New Orleans (French: La Nouvelle-Orléans) is the major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The population of the city is at 392,000. The New Orleans metropolitan area (New Orleans–Metairie–Kenner Metropolitan Statistical Area) has a population of 1.4 million. The city is known for its distinct French and Spanish Creole architecture, as well as its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage. New Orleans is famous for its cuisine, music (particularly as the birthplace of jazz) and its annual celebrations and festivals, most notably Mardi Gras. The city is often referred to as the “most unique” in the United States. New Orleans is located in southeastern Louisiana, and occupies both sides of the Mississippi River. The heart of the city and its French Quarter is on the river’s north side. The city and Orleans Parish (French: paroisse d’Orléans) are coterminous. The city and parish are bounded by the parishes of St. Tammany to the north, St. Bernard to the east, Plaquemines to the south, and Jefferson to the south and west. Lake Pontchartrain, part of lies within the city limits, lies to the north and Lake Borgne lies to the east.

La Nouvelle-Orléans (New Orleans) was founded May 7, 1718, by the French Mississippi Company, under the direction of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, on land inhabited by the Chitimacha. It was named for Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, who was Regent of the Kingdom of France at the time. His title came from the French city of Orléans. The French colony was ceded to the Spanish Empire in the Treaty of Paris (1763). During the American Revolutionary War, New Orleans was an important port for smuggling aid to the rebels, transporting military equipment and supplies up the Mississippi River. Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez successfully launched a southern campaign against the British from the city in 1779. New Orleans (Spanish: Nueva Orleans) remained under Spanish control until 1803, when it reverted briefly to French rule. Nearly all of the surviving 18th-century architecture of the Vieux Carré (French Quarter) dates from the Spanish period, notably excepting the Old Ursuline Convent. Napoleon sold Louisiana (New France) to the United States in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Thereafter, the city grew rapidly with influxes of Americans, French, Creoles and Africans. Later immigrants were Irish, Germans and Italians. Major commodity crops of sugar and cotton were cultivated with slave labor on nearby large plantations. Thousands of refugees from the 1804 Haitian Revolution, both whites and free people of color (affranchis or gens de couleur libres), arrived in New Orleans, often accompanied by slaves of African descent. While Governor Claiborne and other officials wanted to keep out additional free black people, the French Creoles wanted to increase the French-speaking population. As more refugees were allowed into the Territory of Orleans, Haitian émigrés who had first gone to Cuba also arrived. Many of the white Francophones had been deported by officials in Cuba in retaliation for Bonapartist schemes. Nearly 90 percent of these immigrants settled in New Orleans. The 1809 migration brought 2,731 whites; 3,102 free persons of African descent; and 3,226 slaves of African descent, doubling the city’s population. The city became 63 percent black, a greater proportion than Charleston‘s 53 percent.

French Quarter - Bourbon Street © ChrisLitherland/cc-by-sa-3.0 French Quarter - Jackson Square © Daniel Schwen/cc-by-sa-4.0 French Quarter - Old Absinthe Bar © Dand8282/cc-by-2.5 French Quarter - Jackson Square © Justin Watt French Quarter - Bourbon Street towards Canal Street © Adrian Pingstone French Quarter - Arnaud's Remoulade - Restaurant & Oyster Bar © Jan Kronsell/cc-by-sa-3.0 © flickr.com - djnaquin67/cc-by-sa-2.0 © flickr.com - Lara Farhadi/cc-by-2.0
<
>
French Quarter - Arnaud's Remoulade - Restaurant & Oyster Bar © Jan Kronsell/cc-by-sa-3.0
The Central Business District is located immediately north and west of the Mississippi and was historically called the “American Quarter” or “American Sector.” It was developed after the heart of French and Spanish settlement. It includes Lafayette Square. Most streets in this area fan out from a central point. Major streets include Canal Street, Poydras Street, Tulane Avenue and Loyola Avenue. Canal Street divides the traditional “downtown” area from the “uptown” area. Every street crossing Canal Street between the Mississippi River and Rampart Street, which is the northern edge of the French Quarter, has a different name for the “uptown” and “downtown” portions. For example, St. Charles Avenue, known for its street car line, is called Royal Street below Canal Street, though where it traverses the Central Business District between Canal and Lee Circle, it is properly called St. Charles Street. Elsewhere in the city, Canal Street serves as the dividing point between the “South” and “North” portions of various streets. In the local parlance downtown means “downriver from Canal Street”, while uptown means “upriver from Canal Street”. Downtown neighborhoods include the French Quarter, Tremé, the 7th Ward, Faubourg Marigny, Bywater (the Upper Ninth Ward), and the Lower Ninth Ward. Uptown neighborhoods include the Warehouse District, the Lower Garden District, the Garden District, the Irish Channel, the University District, Carrollton, Gert Town, Fontainebleau and Broadmoor. However, the Warehouse and the Central Business District are frequently called “Downtown” as a specific region, as in the Downtown Development District. Other major districts within the city include Bayou St. John, Mid-City, Gentilly, Lakeview, Lakefront, New Orleans East and Algiers. New Orleans is world-famous for its abundance of architectural styles that reflect the city’s multicultural heritage. Though New Orleans possesses numerous structures of national architectural significance, it is equally, if not more, revered for its enormous, largely intact (even post-Katrina) historic built environment. Twenty National Register Historic Districts have been established, and fourteen local historic districts aid in preservation. Thirteen of the districts are administered by the New Orleans Historic District Landmarks Commission (HDLC), while one—the French Quarter—is administered by the Vieux Carre Commission (VCC). Additionally, both the National Park Service, via the National Register of Historic Places, and the HDLC have landmarked individual buildings, many of which lie outside the boundaries of existing historic districts. Housing styles include the shotgun house and the bungalow style. Creole cottages and townhouses, notable for their large courtyards and intricate iron balconies, line the streets of the French Quarter. American townhouses, double-gallery houses, and Raised Center-Hall Cottages are notable. St. Charles Avenue is famed for its large antebellum homes. Its mansions are in various styles, such as Greek Revival, American Colonial and the Victorian styles of Queen Anne and Italianate architecture. New Orleans is also noted for its large, European-style Catholic cemeteries.

New Orleans has many visitor attractions, from the world-renowned French Quarter; to St. Charles Avenue, (home of Tulane and Loyola Universities, the historic Pontchartrain Hotel, and many 19th-century mansions); to Magazine Street, with its boutique stores and antique shops. The French Quarter (known locally as “the Quarter” or “Vieux Carré”), which was the colonial-era city and is bounded by the Mississippi River, Rampart Street, Canal Street, and Esplanade Avenue, contains popular hotels, bars and nightclubs. Notable tourist attractions in the Quarter include Bourbon Street, Jackson Square, St. Louis Cathedral, the French Market (including Café du Monde, famous for café au lait and beignets), and Preservation Hall. Also in the French Quarter is the old New Orleans Mint, a former branch of the United States Mint which now operates as a museum, and The Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum and research center housing art and artifacts relating to the history and the Gulf South. Close to the Quarter is the Tremé community, which contains the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park and the New Orleans African American Museum — a site which is listed on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail. The National WWII Museum offers a multi-building odyssey through the history of the Pacific and European theaters. Nearby, Confederate Memorial Hall, the oldest continually-operating museum in Louisiana, contains the second-largest collection of Confederate memorabilia. Art museums include the Contemporary Arts Center, the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) in City Park, and the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. New Orleans is home to the Audubon Nature Institute (which consists of Audubon Park, the Audubon Zoo, the Aquarium of the Americas and the Audubon Butterfly Garden and Insectarium), and home to gardens which include Longue Vue House and Gardens and the New Orleans Botanical Garden. City Park, one of the country’s most expansive and visited urban parks, has one of the largest stands of oak trees in the world.

Read more on Remoulade, New Orleans, New Orleans Tourism, New Orleans Tourism, New Orleans Online, Wikivoyage New Orleans and Wikipedia New Orleans (Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State - Weather report by weather.com - Johns Hopkins University & Medicine - Coronavirus Resource Center - Global Passport Power Rank - Democracy Index - GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank - Global Competitiveness Report - Corruption Perceptions Index - Press Freedom Index - World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index - UN Human Development Index - Global Peace Index - Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index). Photos by Wikimedia Commons. If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at comment@wingsch.net. Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.






Recommended posts:

Share this post: (Please note data protection regulations before using buttons)

Joint Security Area between North and South Korea

Joint Security Area between North and South Korea

[caption id="attachment_192256" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Military Demarcation Line © Kallgan[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The Joint Security Area (JSA) is the only portion of the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) where North and South Korean forces stand face-to-face. It is often called the Truce Village of Panmunjom in the media and various military accounts. The JSA is used by the two Koreas for diplomatic engagements and, until March 1991, was also the site of military negotiations between North Korea and the United Natio...

[ read more ]

Theme Week La Rioja - Logroño

Theme Week La Rioja - Logroño

[caption id="attachment_153262" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Market square © flickr.com - comakut/cc-by-sa-2.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Logroño is the capital of the autonomous community of La Rioja, formerly known as La Rioja Province. The population is at 152,000 while the metropolitan area included nearly 197,000 inhabitants. The city is a centre of the trade in Rioja wine, for which the area is noted, and also produces wood, metal, and textile products. The Camino de Santiago passes through the city. Logroño is the s...

[ read more ]

Mount of Beatitudes on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee

Mount of Beatitudes on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee

[caption id="attachment_218840" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Church of the Beatitudes © Berthold Werner[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The Mount of Beatitudes is a hill in the Northern District of Israel, in the Korazim Plateau. It is where Jesus is believed to have delivered the Sermon on the Mount which started with the Beatitudes. Pope John Paul II celebrated a Mass at this site in March 2000. The Jesus Trail pilgrimage route connects the Mount to other sites from the life of Jesus. A Byzantine church was erected lowe...

[ read more ]

Theme Week Brittany - Be Breizh!

Theme Week Brittany - Be Breizh!

[caption id="attachment_153436" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Crozon © S. Möller[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Brittany (Breton: Breizh, French: Bretagne) is one of the 27 regions of France. It occupies a large peninsula in the northwest of the country, lying between the English Channel to the north and the Bay of Biscay to the south. Its capital is Rennes. The region of Brittany is made up of 80% of the former Duchy and Province of Brittany. The remaining 20% of the province is the Loire-Atlantique department which now lies in...

[ read more ]

Astana, Berlin in Eurasian style

Astana, Berlin in Eurasian style

[caption id="attachment_152781" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Ak Orda Presidential Palace © Amanante[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Astana (translated: Capital), is the capital and second largest city (after Almaty) of Kazakhstan, with an officially estimated population of 708,794. It is located in the north-central portion of Kazakhstan, within Akmola Province, though administrated separately from the province as a federal city area. Politics and government are the main economic activities in the capital, which also forms a Spec...

[ read more ]

Garden Ring in Moscow

Garden Ring in Moscow

[caption id="attachment_230632" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Sadovaya-Triumfalnaya Street © Mos.ru/cc-by-4.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The Garden Ring, also known as the "B" Ring, is a circular ring road avenue around central Moscow, its course corresponding to what used to be the city ramparts surrounding Zemlyanoy Gorod in the 17th century. The Ring consists of seventeen individually named streets and fifteen squares. It has a circumference of 16 kilometers (9.9 mi). At its narrowest point, Krymsky Bridge, the Ri...

[ read more ]

Theme Week Latvia - Tukums

Theme Week Latvia - Tukums

[caption id="attachment_227660" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Durbe Manor © panoramio.com - Igors Jefimovs/cc-by-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Tukums is a town in the Courland region of Latvia. Three regions of Latvia meet in the vicinity of Tukums – Vidzeme, Zemgale and Courland. The historical center of Tukums developed between trade routes leading from the mouth of the Daugava River to Prussia. The oldest part is today's Talsi Street that originated at the river named Zvirgzdupite where there used to be a castle mound w...

[ read more ]

Chinatown in New York

Chinatown in New York

[caption id="attachment_171407" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © chensiyuan/cc-by-sa-4.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Manhattan's Chinatown is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City, bordering the Lower East Side to its east, Little Italy to its north, Civic Center to its south, and Tribeca to its west. Chinatown is home to the highest concentration of Chinese people in the West. With an estimated population of 90,000 to 100,000 people, Manhattan's Chinatown is also one of the oldest Chinese ethnic enclaves. The Manhat...

[ read more ]

Theme Week Nepal - Bhaktapur

Theme Week Nepal - Bhaktapur

[caption id="attachment_201693" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Early morning view of Durbar Square © Bikrampratapsingh/cc-by-sa-4.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Bhaktapur, literally translates to Place of devotees. Also known as Khwopa, it is an ancient Newa city in the east corner of the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal, about 8 miles (13 km) from the capital city, Kathmandu. It is located in and serves as the headquarters of Bhaktapur District in Province No. 3 of Nepal. It is administratively divided into 10 wards. Khwopa was ...

[ read more ]

Coburg, values and change

Coburg, values and change

[caption id="attachment_150172" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Veste Coburg © Kerem Ozcan[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Coburg is a town located on the Itz River in Bavaria, Germany. Its 2005 population was 42,015. Long one of the Thuringian states of the Wettin line, it joined with Bavaria by popular vote in 1920. Before 1918, it was the smaller of the two capital cities in the united duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Coburg's Coat of Arms honoring the city's patron Saint Maurice was granted in 1493. [caption id="attachmen...

[ read more ]

Return to TopReturn to Top
© Bluedog423
Rosenborg Castle in Copenhagen

Rosenborg Castle (Danish: Rosenborg Slot) is a renaissance castle located in Copenhagen. The castle was originally built as a country...

© Wandernder Weltreisender/cc-by-sa-3.0
Dyck Castle in Aldenhoven

The castle Dyck is one of the most important moated castles of the Rhineland. The complex consists of a stronghold...

© Žiga
Miramare Castle in Trieste

Miramare Castle is a 19th-century castle on the Gulf of Trieste near Trieste, northeastern Italy. It was built from 1856...

Schließen