Columns

Louisiana’s French speakers were in serious demand during World War II, especially when interpreters were needed as GIs fought their way across France after D-Day. But south Louisiana’s French speakers were also wanted for their fighting ability and even their typing skills.
Men from south Louisiana caught the eye of the Marine Corps early in the war. At the beginning of 1942, the brass sent Capt. Bob Mouton, a former congressman and a member of the Marine Reserves, into the byways to “get the best men from the bayou country.”

As we struggle through the changes brought on by the coronavirus outbreak, I am reminded of the 1980s, when a disastrous downturn in the oil industry turned south Louisiana topsy-turvy.
We’d boasted back then that our oil and gas made Louisiana recession-proof, that we had something everyone else needed, and nothing could change that. When others complained about oil prices, we put stickers on our bumpers: “Let the [blankety-blanks] freeze in the dark.”

When Prohibition became the law of the land, it was not very popular in south Louisiana. I’m told that some of the best illegal whiskey made anywhere during those supposedly dry days came from communities along Bayou Teche, and that smuggling in factory-made stuff was a substantial enterprise along parts of the Louisiana coast and in the Atchafalaya Basin.