3 of my 4 grandparents came from the Bayou Teche region of southwest La which runs down just west of the huge, primeval swamp that is the Atchafalaya Basin.
My mother’s mother was from Breaux Bridge, the very heart of French Cajun country, and both my father’s parents came from Charenton, only 35 miles to the south if you were born with wings, but nearly twice that if you are wheel-bound to the old two-lane highway that twists and turns with the bayou toward the Gulf of Mexico.
[Lake Charles is included here, but won’t be for long. Lake Charles formed in a unique manner, geographically, politically, and demographically, having less in common with French Cajun country than east Texas, just a few miles away, the Northern lumber states, and the North Sea region in Germany and Holland who followed the lumber industry and became the founding fathers of the town they created from the forest wilderness.]
Breaux Bridge –
- Breaux Bridge, pg.1 of 5 – A 19th Century Cajun Sugarcane Farm
- Breaux Bridge, pg.2 of 5 – My Grandmother’s Cajun Ancestors
- Breaux Bridge, pg.3 of 5 – Remnants of a 19th Century Cajun Homestead on Bayou Teche
- Breaux Bridge, pg.4 of 5 – Changes Come to 20th Century Cajun Ways
- Breaux Bridge, pg.5 of 5 – Chênes Brûlée, a found-art piece
Thibodeaux –
- Thibodeaux/Azor Succession #2859, 1890s
- Thélèsphore Thibodeaux, a Black Creole family hero on post-Civil War Bayou Teche
- The Thélèsphore Thibodeaux house, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana
- The Thibodeaux Sculpture So Far (2014-2015)
- The Thibodeaux Assemblage Sculpture; Progress Through 3 Years of Upheaval (2016-2019)
- Two Verandahs and an Ice Box: a Thibodeaux Assemblage Sculpture
- Moss in the Mattress, History on the Wall: a Thibodeaux Assemblage Sculpture
- Coffee, a Kitten, and Poison Ivy Everywhere: a Thibodeaux Assemblage Sculpture
Lake Charles –