May/June 2012 Cover by Dr. Bob.

The first clues that Dr. Bob might have a northshore connection are warning signs featuring the Honey Island Swamp Monster (As Seen on TV) and the wild-eyed albino, Onion Head (Bonfouca Boogie Man), greeting visitors in the studio’s parking lot. So what exactly does an iconic “New Orleans” artist like Dr. Bob know about the mysterious waterways of Slidell? It turns out he knows quite a bit.

Born in Wichita, Kan., Dr. Bob is of Crow Indian, French and German descent. His dad was an engineer for aerospace manufacturing giant Boeing Co. The family was among the first wave of “come here” high-tech workers (“missile gypsies,” as Dr. Bob calls his family) who settled in the Slidell area after Boeing won the contract to build the first stage of NASA’s Saturn V moon rocket at the Michoud plant in New Orleans East.

Coming of age at the dawn of suburban development in St. Tammany meant endless adventure to Dr. Bob. “To a kid from Kansas, it was like being in Jurassic Park down here. Every where you turned, something moved, slithered, splashed, jumped or growled,” he remembers. “I started out discovering the secrets of the South, so to speak—all these opportunities to go fishing and hunting. Walking out your front door with a dip net and a flashlight or a frog gig made out of a nail and a broom handle—man, you could catch whatever you wanted to.”

Listen to Dr. Bob recounting his mischievous, if not misspent, youth spent in St. Tammany and it quickly becomes obvious that his time spent exploring the parish’s streams, woods and swamps has greatly shaped his art as much as his subsequent adventures later in life in New Orleans and throughout the South.

Dr. Bob poses with his wire sculpture of Tammanend.

Dr. Bob’s storytelling intersects modern pop culture and the places that “ain’t dere no more” when he explains why he thinks he knows what’s behind the recent sightings of the northshore panther. “We had a neighbor, Arthur Jones, who later on invented Nautilus fitness machines. He owned a snake farm by the old White Kitchen on the road to the Gulf Coast. [Reptile Jungle, where Highways 90 and 190 meet.] That’s where Jayne Mansfield was killed when her driver ran into the back of a truck. We were at Bosco’s Restaurant in Slidell when we heard that. They took her car to Eddie’s Esso in Slidell. I saw that,” he digresses, then gets back on track with the panther. “Mr. Jones kept wild animals and snakes in his home, too. He had a pair of breeding jaguarundis that he kept in a bathtub with a sliding glass door he kept jammed up with a broom handle so you couldn’t slide it.”

Intrigued about the northshore panther reports, Dr. Bob did some research. “The climate is just the same as in Central America, and they describe jaguarundis as cocoa-colored—and they are blackish-looking—and I’m getting tickled over all this.” He brought it up in a visit with his friend, musician Coco Robicheaux, who died last November. (Robicheaux became known nationwide in 2010 for performing a bit of voodoo on the HBO show Treme.) “He was raised in Slidell and his real name was Curtis Arceneaux. Curtis and I used to catch snakes and lizards to sell to Mr. Arthur to feed his snakes and reptiles and stuff. We’d get a dollar for a turtle. That’s big money in the ’60s. Before he died, Curtis and I got to talking about Arthur Jones, who moved from the middle of Slidell to Palm Lake subdivision. Did those cats get away from the old White Kitchen? Or in the move? Or when Camille passed Slidell? Somehow, people are seeing these things and I truly believe it could be those jaguarundis.”

Dr. Bob's northshore icons.

What about Onion Head, the Boogie Man of the Bonfouca? Turns out tales of the mythological monster were made up to scare the youth of Slidell, tales equally believed as tales of the Loup Garou are by the children of Acadiana.

To paraphrase Dr. Bob and make the tale fit for print in a family magazine, he says it all became too real one evening as he and a young lady were “necking” out by Bayou Pacquet. “We were in my daddy’s ’67 Impala and a pine cone fell and hit the roof. BAM! That was the end of that.” The girl (who will remain nameless) screamed, ‘Onion Head! Get the hell out!’ And when she screamed, you see three more cars’ lights pop on and everybody’s hauling ass out of Bayou Pacquet ’cause Onion Head’s coming.”

Dr. Bob’s Art

Dr. Bob is self-taught. The first piece of art that he made and sold was as much a product of the boredom he faced in an early stint as a forest ranger in northern Louisiana as any big creative urge. “There was nothing else to do with no cable and only two TV stations. The Album Hour out of Natchez was the first time anybody heard Lynyrd Skynyrd, so we’re out there turning the antenna up on the hill trying to tape it on a cassette player. We wanted some rock ‘n’ roll, living up in the boonies.”

Mr. Okra.

Going back to his days in the swamps, he carved an alligator. But it wasn’t just a wooden gator. It was a musical instrument. A “ga-tar.” “I can’t play, I can’t sing and I was told I couldn’t carry a tune in a No. 3 washtub, so I made a washtub base. I wanted the neckpiece to be like snakes.” With an alligator’s head carved into the end, he says, “I put the eyes and the teeth in it. It’s the ga-tar, boys! Play one string at a time.” When he unveiled it, he says, “Everyone laughed. It turned into my first piece of art and sold to a New York collector. Last time it changed hands was 15 years ago for $5,000, and it’s in a private collection in New Jersey now. ”

Dr. Bob has since carved two more of these alligators in a labor- and time-intensive process. It takes hours and hours of sanding, he says, and adds that, “Once I get through with the sanding, I do the steel wool and get that down to 0000, which is really fine. After getting the wax on, it’s like butter.” The carved gators serve as demonstration pieces at art shows, where Dr. Bob shows off their finish. “I like to take a rag and just throw it and it slides down the gator, it’s so slick. I take a lot of pride in making it. It’s dangerous. A piece can go wrong after you spent months on it, bust it all to hell.”

He uses real alligator teeth in the alligator and dog pieces. “I get the eyes from anywhere that deals with glass or marbles; the guys at Studio Inferno around the corner are good at keeping me supplied. I buy my alligator teeth by the pound. People ask how I get ’em. I say, ‘Very carefully.’”

Found objects are the basis for much of his art. In an ironic twist, the storm that nearly killed him has ensured a steady supply of discarded signs, lumber, doors and window frames to forage in the decimated areas around his studio. “After the hurricane, I scoured the neighborhoods for what little bit of old New Orleans was left.”

Many of the bottle caps that he uses to bejewel his creations come from the Abita Brewery. He also has a stash of Barq’s root beer bottle caps and wood from the old Barq’s crates with the slogan “Drink Barq’s—it’s good!” stenciled on the sides. Dr. Bob recalls the old Conti St. warehouse. “It smelled intoxicating; that raw sassafras and birch just permeated that building. To this day, you walk in there and it knocks you over.

“The things that mean the most to me are things that come to me by magic,” Dr. Bob says. He has two rescued Union Beer signs from one of New Orleans’ first commercial breweries that are waiting to become part of some artwork, and, he says, “One of the only Dr. Nut signs in existence. It was on the gable-end of a building.” Dr. Nut, a local soft drink that ceased existence in the 1970s, is etched in literary history as the favorite beverage of Ignatius Riley in Confederacy of Dunces. Dr. Bob has cut an alligator-shaped portion out of the sign and, after adding eyes and teeth, will incorporate it into a piece assembled in tribute to the character. “I was thinking, I’ve got Ignatius done, and I want to make up some Dr. Nut bottle caps if I can’t find them online. I have to get the right eyeball to put on him to keep an eye on Ignatius.”

Be Nice or Leave

Even Dr. Bob’s catch phrase, “Be Nice or Leave,” has a back-swamp back-story. It started when Dr. Bob and some of his fellow St. Paul’s students took to the river to do some fishing on a holiday.

“We’d get a six-pack of Dixie, a pack of Marlboros and go out and act like we’re 14-year-old men. I drew the short straw, so I had to go get the beer,” says Dr. Bob. A Pearl River dive bar behind the St. Joe brick works was where the underage artist-to-be entered to buy the day’s “refreshments.”

“It was called Working Man’s Paradise, owned by a man named Edgar Ducre; it was painted red with black and white dice on the building and spelled ‘paradise’ for ‘pair of dice.’ It just intrigued me.” The scene inside the bar made an even bigger impact on Dr. Bob. “The interior was painted this turquoise blue that makes you feel like you’re in Haiti or something. On one wall was this big painting of Edgar Ducre’s son who went to LSU. He’s in his uniform riding Mike the Tiger and throwing a football. It’s awesome; it’s painted really good.”

Then he says, “That’s where I saw ‘Be Nice or Leave.’ It was written with a Marks-A-Lot on a piece of a cardboard beer box. When I got my order and turned to leave, the back of the sign said, ‘There’s Nothing in the World Worth Getting Killed Over.’ It hit me that I didn’t belong there, that I could get killed.”

His Be Nice or Leave signs can be found hanging all over the city, and he’s constantly commissioned to make signs with a personalized spin on the phrase. He has his own versions on sale as well. Be Nasty and Stay, Shut Up and Fish and Shut up and Eat are variations, and he paints Be Nice or Be Bitten signs that he donates to local animal shelters for them to give to donors and people adopting pets.

Dr. Freakin’ Bob

How did Dr. Bob, a man of no obvious medical training, get the name Dr. Bob? He’ll be happy to tell you. It was at the birth of the S.O.B.—the son of Bob, his boy Isaac. “My nickname came when I was helping deliver him at Lakeside Women’s Hospital. Lamaze failed, and we had to do an emergency C-section. I was in the sterile field, so I assisted with it. The nurse, Margie Vanderbeck, who I went to school with, said ‘Well, doctor freakin’ Bob,’ and that was it.”

Dr. Bob participates in many charitable endeavors in the New Orleans area and Bay St. Louis, where the first gallery to carry his work is located, and in Memphis and Washington, D.C. When Mr. Okra, a beloved New Orleans’ roaming vegetable vendor, needed a new truck, neighbors and businessmen rallied to help, as Mr. Okra had become a necessity in Katrina-ravaged neighborhoods after so many local grocery stores had closed. Dr. Bob helped organize the benefit and provided the decorative painting for the new truck. “My piece-de-resistance,” he says.

His work is now found in many private collections and museums throughout the South. Dr. Bob is a regular participant in the Kentuck Festival of the Arts in Tuscaloosa, Ala. A piece was featured in the Smithsonian Magazine in 1999; the Smithsonian’s affiliate, the Memphis Rock ‘n’ Soul Museum, also includes one of his pieces in its collection.

“I did it! I used to tell my friends, ‘Screw you, I’m going to be in the Smithsonian, and then I’m going into the Louvre!’” he says, with only one more internationally-known institution to go.

Dr. Bob’s work can be found at drbobart.net.

Louisiana Roots

The house was once home to the New Orleans branch of French artist Degas’ family, the Mussons, one of the most well regarded of New Orleans’ Creole families. (While “Creole” has taken on many meanings, here it refers to descendants of French or Spanish colonial subjects born in the Americas.)

Degas’ mother, Célestine Musson, and her brother Michel were born in New Orleans but were sent to France to be educated when young. Célestine married Auguste De Gas and remained in France, while Michel returned to New Orleans after completing his studies. (Auguste changed their name from Degas to De Gas, but Edgar re-adopted “Degas” later in life).

Detail of Degas' "Woman Seated on a Balcony," portrait of Mathilde Bell.

Michel became a very wealthy cotton and silver merchant in the 1820s. As a businessman, he had dealt favorably with both the old Creole guard and the American businessmen who had begun arriving in the city after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. He had even built a grand home in the Garden District, or, as it was known, “the American Sector,” one of the first Creoles to do so.

During the Yankee occupation of New Orleans in the Civil War, Michel sent his wife, Odile, and daughters Désirée and Estelle to France, where they got to know their cousin Edgar and his brothers René and Achille.

While Edgar completed some portraits of his aunt and cousins during their time in France, his brother René was falling in love with Estelle. René writes at one point, “She inspires so much sympathy, she has so much sweetness in her sadness that she made us all become attached to her in an instant.” He and Achille leave France to find their fortunes in Louisiana once the war is over, and, in a move that would be shocking today but wasn’t uncommon then, René and Estelle become husband and wife.

René and Achille formed their own import/export firm in New Orleans and joined Michel’s cotton factoring operation. Factors were commissioned agents working in the city who handled the business end of buying, selling and exporting cotton for the rural growers and plantation owners who were spread throughout the region.

Michel’s fortunes went into steady decline after the war. He had gone “all in” for the South and invested heavily in Confederate war bonds, which, of course, were worthless after the war. He sold his Garden District home and moved the family into the rented mansion on Esplanade in 1869.

Rendered by architectural artist Adrian Persac shortly after it was built in 1858, the home on Esplanade Avenue appears as a large, stately, well-landscaped mansion occupying the river-side end of the block, taking up, as the formal description states, “two fine lots of ground.” A wing is attached to its side; there are a couple of detached buildings alongside the property and a pigeonnier in the garden to the rear of the house.

The state of the Musson family fortune made life in the home more like a bunkhouse than a mansion. Upwards of 16 people lived there, at least six of them energetic kids, with the parlors partitioned off and serving as bedrooms for the unmarried adults; the married couples and children were in the bedrooms upstairs.

“Louisiana must be respected by all her children … and I am almost one of them.”
—Edgar Degas

René Degas traveled to France in 1872 to buy costumes for the next year’s Comus Mardi Gras proceedings. (The secretive organization’s 1873 ball and procession became perhaps the most famous of all time, with the theme “Darwin’s Origin of Species” providing cover for the satiric skewering of the Union conquerors, carpetbaggers and reconstructionists who ruled Louisiana at the time.) His mission on behalf of the Mistick Krewe completed, René convinced Edgar to come back with him to New Orleans for a visit.

While his works now fetch millions of dollars on the open market, Degas was struggling for recognition in the formal salons of Paris, and, like the Mussons, he was at a difficult point in his life when he came to visit in the fall of 1872.

The Degas House on Esplanade Avenue.

David Villarrubia, who has owned the Degas House since 1993 and has endeavored to restore it to its Creole roots, has spent years researching Degas’ life. He explains, “Degas is 38, just out of the Franco-Prussian War and just got kicked to the curb by his girlfriend. He’s hurting, he’s down, he lost his best friend in battle and he realizes he’s going blind—that’s a hell of a thing for a painter who is not really famous. He’s a little bit popular in Paris, but he’s not the Degas we’ve come to know.”

Degas’ eyes gave him fits in New Orleans. While fascinated with the scenery and diversity of possible subjects on the riverfront and in and around the market’s stalls, the glare hurt his eyes too much for him to spend enough time to make any drawings.

“One does nothing here, it lies in the climate, nothing but cotton, one lives for cotton and from cotton. The light is so strong that I have not yet been able to do anything on the river. My eyes are so greatly in need of care that I scarcely take any risk with them at all. A few family portraits will be the sum total of all my efforts,” Degas writes.

Despite his complaints, Villarrubia notes, “New Orleans was a very pivotal point in time for his art. He does re-group here. He’s with family. His letters explain a tremendous amount of what he was going through when he arrives here. He hadn’t been painting, so he starts painting again.”

Degas does get to paint some family portraits and manages to incorporate life’s great topic, cotton, into a couple of paintings that will make him famous. “What he accomplishes while he’s here is pretty amazing,” says Villarrubia. Regarded as one of Degas’ most cherished masterworks is an unlikely family portrait that appears to be an observational picture of some men at work in an office. “Portraits in an Office at the New Orleans Cotton Exchange—which was done on Factor’s Row, not the Cotton Exchange—is 14 people, and they’re recognizable. You could hold a photograph up and we know who they were,” says Villarrubia. “His brothers René and Achille, cousin-in-law William Bell, Oscar Chopin and his uncle’s business partners, all included in this fantastic painting of his uncle’s cotton office, which is going defunct.”

Degas’ painting Children on a Doorstep depicts several of Degas’ young cousins and nieces and nephews, along with one of the household’s nurses, framed in a doorway leading out to the back garden, the family dog in the garden and a neighbor’s home in the background.

There are 18 paintings in all attributed to Degas’ time in New Orleans. His cousins Estelle and Mathilde are certainly subjects. He didn’t always identify his subjects or state whether their depictions were to be portraiture or used as models to which he applied his own spin on a figurative work. It’s been the job of experts to speculate who may or may not be the person depicted in some of his New Orleans portraits. While some are definitely of Estelle, and at least one definitely Mathilde, there is no consensus whether unmarried cousin Désirée is in any of the paintings.

Tragedies

“Ah! my friend, how I have also wept—even though at my age, and given how much I have already wept, the stream is nearly dried up.”
—letter from Michel Musson to Edgar Degas, 1883.

Michel Musson, Degas’ uncle and paterfamilias of the New Orleans branch of the family, continued to suffer misfortune after misfortune in the years after Edgar returned to Paris in 1873.

Musson corresponded with Edgar for years, with no success, in an attempt to have him send to New Orleans the portrait of his daughter Mathilde, probably the painting now known as Woman Seated Near a Balcony. (The piece is now in the collection of the Ordrupgaard Museum in Copenhagen, Denmark, as is Children on a Doorstep.)

In 1878, Edgar’s brother, René, had an affair and then ran off with America Olivier. She was the children’s music teacher and had been hired to read to Estelle, who was by then blind. The Oliviers were close friends of the family. In a legacy made permanent through Edgar’s art, America Olivier had also been the lady of the house that is seen in the background of his painting Children on a Doorstep.

“America was married, they took her children with them and got ‘quickie’ divorces and ‘quickie’ married, and they were off to France. He had left Estelle blind, with six children, so nobody was very happy with him,” says Joan Prados, a tour guide at the Degas House and a descendant of Estelle Musson and René Degas. One of their children was Prados’ grandfather, Gaston Degas, who was the godson of the Oliviers. In the coming years, four of Estelle’s children with René died. Michel adopted the two surviving children, Gaston and Odile, replacing the now-despised Degas name with his own.

By the time Michel Musson died in 1885, he had also seen the death of his daughter Mathilde, Josephine Balfour (Estelle’s daughter from her first marriage) and his brother, Henri.

Adrien Persac's painting of the Degas House from the 1850s.

The Degas family was not without difficulties. In France, Degas’ father dies, leaving him to deal with the family’s bank that had failed, in no small part, due to investments in the Confederacy made at the behest of Michel. It didn’t help that René had lost thousands of dollars of the bank’s money in a series of unsuccessful business dealings prior to his abandoning Estelle for America Olivier.

“It took Degas about 10 years to pay off the bank’s debt, and he did it by painting ballet pictures, for the most part,” Prados says. “That’s one reason he became known as a painter of artists and dancers over anything else. They say about half of his work was dancers, so he did a lot of other things people don’t know him for.”

Restoration

Villarrubia grew up in the neighborhood and was familiar with the home on Esplanade and its historic marker, which had been placed in the ’70s, but didn’t know a whole lot more. As an airline pilot, he had spent time in Europe enjoying art museums, including the Monet House in Giverny, France. In 1993, he took a break from flying due to illness in his family. Villarrubia recalls that one day, “I passed the house and it had a ‘For Sale by Owner’ sign. I called a friend of mine who was in real estate to come see the house with me.

“I was curious about where Degas had painted. Having traveled a lot in Europe, I knew that if this were in Europe, it would be a museum house. So we came through the house, and the owner didn’t know anything about Degas, except to say the name on the marker was ‘Dee-gas,’ who’s actually in the encyclopedia.

Degas' "Children on a Doorstep" depicts the rear of the Degas House.

“The house was in terrible shape. It had been remodeled with drop ceilings added, and there was termite damage throughout. “The architectural detailing was there; it was just hidden. The ceilings had been lowered; they were acoustical tile and really had not been done well,” Villarrubia remembers. Concerned that the home was to be featured in the next day’s real estate section of the paper, he asked his friend to make an offer on the house right away.

“We got a contract late that night and started this adventure.” Villarrubia says he wasn’t sure what he was going to do with it; he just knew that he didn’t want the property to keep going in the direction it had been going. It was a favorable price because the owners were looking to dump it, not knowing exactly what they had. He didn’t necessarily intend to keep and restore the house himself, just to preserve it until the right person came along. “I didn’t think it would be my adventure. I thought the museum would be interested, or the City of New Orleans, but nobody really understood.”

His adventure, it turns out, involved even more research about the painter and his family, a quest to solve an architectural mystery and a lot of hard work.

What researchers believed was that the house with the historical marker in front of it (the second house from the corner of N. Tonti and Esplanade) had an additional wing during Degas’ time that had since been demolished. Villarrubia had a revelation of sorts when he went to talk to his neighbor across the street. She told him, “Well, they write their books and their newspaper articles about the house, but they never ask for my perspective.”

“I was patronizing her,” Villarrubia says, “thinking she was probably lonely, so I asked, ‘What is your perspective?’ She said to get up on the stoop and she would show me. I got up there, she turned me around and faced me towards house on the corner and the one with the marker, and she said, ‘Look at the roof lines. That wing wasn’t destroyed, it was just moved.’”

He remembers, “It hit me like a train, because I could see it. The guillotine windows were still in the front behind glass jalousies and yellow brick that had been used to modernize the building.”

Villarrubia dug deep into the property’s history and found that after the Mussons moved out in 1880, the home became the Markey-Picard Institute for Girls, a young ladies’ finishing school, until 1917, when Madame Picard died. Her succession wasn’t complete, he says, until 1920, when her heirs sold it to a developer, who split the property into six different lots of ground.

“The dividing line for lots one and two went through the parlor. So they simply moved it and re-did it as a more modern house. They got rid of the high doorways and enclosed the parlor into several apartments. It became a six-plex.” The house was cut in two at the left side of the doorway in the center of the house and both sides moved to the centers of their newly defined lots. The wing that had been on the side was moved and attached to the rear of the main section.

Degas' "Portrait of Estelle." Courtesy the New Orleans Museum of Art.

Villarrubia has restored the house that was traditionally believed to be the Degas House into an elegant and formal space in a manner as close as possible to its appearance during Degas’ visit. The bedrooms upstairs have been converted into charming rooms and suites that form part of the home’s latest incarnation—it is now a bed and breakfast.

He acquired the corner property as well, which had undergone several additions and modernized touches over the years, rendering it, as he explained earlier, almost unrecognizable as part of the same home. “It’s the second project we’ve taken on, never to be as formal as the other. We don’t want to Disney-fy this one and make them matching twins. We use this more for the offices of our non-profit and for the tours. People who come for tours see this more as the museum and classroom side, and over there it’s more elegant and finished.”

Joan Prados points out that the door itself where the children were standing in Children on a Doorstep is now part of the wing that had been added to the main house when the property was divided. It still looks out to the back courtyard, which, at the time it was painted, was a garden that extended completely across the block to the next street. The home in the background was where the Mussons’ close friends, the Oliviers, lived. It still stands on N. Tonti; today, however, there are several other houses between it and the Degas House.

Ghosts of Residents Past

Villarrubia says the property is not an art museum and he doesn’t ever intend it to be one. It is home, however, to quality reproductions of the paintings attributed to Degas during his time spent there. He says, “Our focus is history. The reproductions are there as a backdrop to the history and the stories that we tell. You get a sense of how beautiful these paintings are without traveling the rest of the world; they’re in the context of where they were actually painted.”

Traces remain, like the doorway where the children once stood and Degas painted them. In the background of Mathilde’s portrait on the balcony is the sketchy shadow—an impression—of the iron railing that still rings the balcony today. A print of a painting of a pregnant Estelle, sitting on a daybed, her blind eyes fixed on nothing, stands on an easel under the main stairway. A print of The Song Rehearsal, a painting that depicts a man resembling his brother René at a piano with two ladies singing, hangs in the front parlor. “The picture,” Prados says, “was done in this room. It doesn’t have all the features of the room, but Degas says, ‘painting is not copying.’ You have René playing piano. Degas put the pocket doors on a different side, and then he changes it into a single door.”

A reproduction of the portrait of Estelle, the largest of his New Orleans works, hangs over the fireplace in the center room. Depicting a pregnant Estelle arranging a vase of flowers, it is, for the city of New Orleans and, it turns out, the Degas House itself, the most important of all. Portrait of Mme René De Gas, née Estelle Musson now resides in the New Orleans Museum of Art. How it became a cornerstone of the collection is a great story that in no small measure inspired Villarrubia to become the steward of the home where it was painted, just a few blocks away from the museum.

“In 1965, the then Delgado Museum [New Orleans Museum of Art] was empty. They had to lure people from the Quarter to an empty museum. The director at the time, James Byrnes, took on the challenge of putting something in the museum done by the most famous painter that ever lived in New Orleans, Edgar Degas. He found a painting on the market, the portrait of Estelle, went on a public campaign to raise enough funds to buy it and was able to do that through a campaign called ‘Bring Estelle Home.’ As a campaign, it involved every layer of society. The city put up some money, corporations put up some money, Junior League, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, bake sales at schools, everybody participated. On the final day, he was $5,000 short. He went back on radio and TV making a further appeal. Late into the night, he got a call from an anonymous donor who put up the money so they would not have to re-crate the painting and send it back to London.”

With the restoration of the Degas House and the success of the campaign to “Bring Estelle Home,” the historic connection between New Orleans and Edgar Degas—one of Louisiana’s “almost” children—is perpetuated for generations to come.

The Southern Hotel soon after it was completed. Photo courtesy Rusty Burns.

The hotel was built in 1907 during the glory days of the “Ozone Belt,” when the area enjoyed immense popularity as a resort. The cool air flowing out of the piney woods was welcome in the days before air conditioning, and area waters, whether from springs or deep wells, were reputed to be medicinal. The Southern Hotel and others on the northshore thus attracted guests from all over the country.

Lisa Condrey Ward purchased the Southern Hotel along with her husband, Joseph, her brother Ricky Condrey and his wife, Gayle, in 2011. She is familiar with its history, noting, “It catered to northerners during the winter and New Orleanians during the summer.” They purchased the building last November, but it had been on her mind since she first saw it. “We moved here from New Orleans in 1999. I started talking about it, probably the day after we moved here, ‘Gosh, why hasn’t somebody turned that back into a hotel?’”

The Southern Hotel. Photo courtesy Rusty Burns.

Their plans are to renovate the mission-style, 34,000-square-foot building and open it as a boutique hotel. Ward has hired architect Peter Trapolin of New Orleans, a veteran of several successful historic hotel renovations.

While it’s still on the drawing board, Ward says, “It’s going to have 41 rooms and a restaurant on the New Hampshire corner. We’re looking for an exciting restaurateur to work with on the build-out.” She hopes her plans for the property spark as much interest in what the area has to offer today’s visitors as the elements did at the turn of the century. “I want people to come here and enjoy things like the bike path—we’re going to have bikes available and kayaks for the river.”

Renovations include facilities that Covington residents will be able to take advantage of as well as the hotel’s guests. “We’re going to have a ballroom and space for business meetings.” Ward notes the building is in the shape of a “u” that opens onto the alley that runs from New Hampshire to Vermont. “We’re going to close that in and have the ballroom and all those spaces spill out into a really beautiful courtyard. It will be a very nice party space. The hotel bar will be open to everyone, and that’s going to have access to the courtyard, too.”

Echoing Mayor Cooper’s optimism in the project’s role in the revitalization of downtown Covington, Ward says, “I think there’s going to be a renaissance. Covington is already a great little town. My personal vision is to expand the types and diversity of businesses into something similar to what Magazine Street has in New Orleans. If we put that together, get the movie theater open—and hopefully the hotel will be an ideal catalyst for that—it will become a really wonderful, pedestrian-friendly city that has a lot to offer.”

During his career as an earth scientist for Chevron, Chok travelled the  passion: cooking and sharing the food of their native Thailand, a move equivalent to a Louisiana native settling down and opening a gumbo and jambalaya joint in Bangkok.

Chok and Summalee of Sala Thai in Covington.

“We travelled around the world and did research on Thai and western foods,” Chok says. The couple’s passion for cooking native Thai specialties came naturally, as Chok’s grandmother cooked for the Thai royal family, and Sumalee’s mother was a chef for one of Bangkok’s five-star hotels. “So we have the recipes—the authentic recipes—passed along to us.”

Sumalee’s Bangkok culinary resources aren’t limited to her mother’s experience as a chef; she completed a Thai cooking training program there. Her experience and resources combine with Chok’s to make unique cuisine that stands out in a fairly competitive northshore Thai food market.

“What we like to do is not a business—we want to do it like art. The real homemade Thai food,” Chok notes.

“Our Pad Thai is totally different than the others,” says Sumalee of the Thai noodle-based dish. “I got this recipe from my mother. Of all the dishes we have on the menu, I think it’s the best we can cook.” Thai food has a reputation as a fiery cuisine, but what stands out for Sala Thai are the fresh spices and herbs used in their dishes—lemongrass, galangal, ginger and key lime leaves round out the heat in the curry dishes they serve.

Thai food novices take note: Sala Thai now offers a lunch buffet, which started as a better way to serve the busy and often time-pressed downtown Covington business people and the courthouse crowd. It’s also been a great way, Sumalee says, for people to become familiar with Thai dishes.

“They don’t want to try other dishes because they don’t know what they’re going to get. The buffet is a better way. You can come and taste a little bit of each thing, and every day we change the menu.”

Sala Thai is located at 315 N. Vermont St. in Covington; (985) 249-6990.

After a pause, he adds, “I’m Timmy.”

Like many people, Tim had not talked much about his personal experience with suicide because of society’s “hush, hush” attitude toward the subject. But in 2010, Kevin Davis, then parish president, made an effort to change that mindset by initiating the St. Tammany Parish Suicide Prevention Support Program with the slogan “It’s OK to talk about it.”

That’s when Tim decided it was time to share his story with others. He hopes that by speaking out, others in the community will become aware of the warning signs of suicide as well as the high suicide rate in our parish. “There’s been a hole in my heart as a result [of Tommy’s death], so I know the effects of suicide,” he adds. “It’s the elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about, but no one is immune to this. Every single day in St. Tammany parish, someone tries to kill himself.”

With 34 suicides in 2011 and 11 as of March 2012, St. Tammany Parish has one of the highest suicide rates in Louisiana. (In contrast, there were only six homicides in the parish in 2011, and one to date in 2012.) As St. Tammany’s suicide rate rose 30 percent from 2005 to 2010, Davis decided to take action.

John Tobin, Rebecca Thees and Tim Lentz.

In October 2010, members of the parish government met with other concerned leaders to determine a course of action. From this meeting, the St. Tammany Parish Suicide Prevention Support Program was born, with the goal of lowering the suicide rate by providing adequate resources to parish residents.

“Just as one single factor did not create today’s situation, one entity cannot solve it,” says Pat Brister, St. Tammany’s current parish president. “It will take many partners to return the necessary mental health services to our area.”

Currently, the St. Tammany Parish Suicide Prevention Support Program brings together representatives from many organizations, businesses and agencies who meet quarterly to discuss the most efficient and effective ways to reduce St. Tammany Parish’s high suicide rate and to provide resources for residents in need.

United Way/2-1-1

John Tobin, director of St. Tammany’s Department of Health and Human Services, was part of the suicide prevention task force from its inception. “At the first meeting, they decided they needed a single point of entry—one call,” he says. It was decided to use 2-1-1, which was already available. It is now the primary contact for all parish residents in need of counseling and resources for any crisis, including suicide.

The 2-1-1 information and referral line, currently funded by United Way, offers trained crisis-intervention and suicide-prevention specialists as well as multi-lingual counselors. These professionals are on call 24/7 to provide counseling and information about community resources. They can transfer callers directly to the appropriate 9-1-1 operators if necessary, and 9-1-1 operators throughout the parish can transfer callers to 2-1-1 when needed.

From October 2011 through March 2012, the 2-1-1 line in St. Tammany Parish fielded 1,648 calls, 29 percent of which were identified as “crisis/suicide calls.” Out of the 10 parishes served by 2-1-1, St. Tammany has the highest percentage of crisis calls, with Tangipahoa and Washington following close behind.

Besides giving free help to residents in need, the 2-1-1 line provides a valuable service to the law enforcement officers in the parish by fielding calls that would have otherwise gone to 9-1-1. In 2011, the sheriff’s department alone—which does not include the municipalities of Covington, Mandeville, Slidell, Madisonville, Pearl River, Folsom or Sun—responded to 543 suicide-attempt calls.

“Anytime someone dials 9-1-1, even if it was a mistake, my deputies are going, but some people really just need someone to talk to,” Tim Lentz says. “Many of the calls to 2-1-1 are calls that we don’t have to go to, but it still hasn’t slowed down. As of [late March], we have responded 127 times to attempted suicide calls in 2012.” (The numbers for the entire parish are even higher because the sheriff’s office only receives calls from unincorporated St. Tammany.)

“My men spend more time dealing with mental health calls than with traffic enforcement. It consumes us. We recognize the mental health crisis and we try to give our guys the best mental health training. But at the end of the day, we went to cop school. We’re not mental health professionals, but we are being forced into that role.”

Volunteers of America/Crisis Response Team

In response to the realization that most police officers are not properly equipped to handle suicide-attempt calls, the task force created a crisis action team through a partnership with the Volunteers of America. Using public health millage dollars, the parish government funded the Volunteers of America’s Crisis Response Team, which came online in August 2011.

“Our mission is two-fold,” says Rebecca Thees, Crisis Response project director. “When an officer calls, we respond immediately and go to the scene of an attempted suicide, and then we provide follow-up.” The team has five full-time and eight part-time licensed counselors who are on call 24/7 to respond to crises reported by the sheriff’s department.

Each deputy contacts the Crisis Response Team while on the way to the scene of an attempted suicide; at least one counselor meets the deputy and consults with everyone involved, including the individual in crisis and the family. The counselor evaluates the person’s condition and offers support and guidance. “Every situation is extremely different,” Rebecca says. “We are one of the first people they see, so we try to be a calming presence.”

After making an assessment and helping the deputy make a decision about the next step for the person, the counselor begins case management services, which are tailored to the individual’s needs. This last step is important because research shows that immediate support and a thorough follow-up will prevent subsequent attempts.

“We will stick with a family as long as we need to, helping them get resources and making sure they go to doctor’s appointments and counseling,” Rebecca says. “We try to get them long-term solutions to become stable and maintain that stability.” This dedication has paid off—none of the people who participated in the follow-up program with the Volunteers of America have made a second suicide attempt.

In the first three months of 2012, the response team was called out 144 times. Rebecca notes that this number only reflects the suicide attempts reported to the sheriff’s office, which does not include other police departments in the parish. “It’s obvious that the need far exceeds our ability to respond. It would be great if we could expand our services to provide assistance to all who have a mental health crisis.”

Nevertheless, the work that the Crisis Response Team has been able to do thus far has been invaluable. “They have been a godsend,” Tim says.

Mental Health Services

The severe lack of funds, facilities and professionals that are equipped to provide mental health services in St. Tammany posed a third problem to the original suicide prevention task force.

“The sad part about it is there’s just not enough help for these people, especially as there are more cutbacks for mental health in the state,” Tim says, adding that emergency rooms—where they have to bring many mentally ill residents—are not equipped to handle most cases.

While 2-1-1 and the Crisis Response Team were being set up, the parish took a more immediate course of action in January 2011 by funding two one-time grants totaling $75,000—one to St. Tammany Outreach for the Prevention of Suicide and one to the Mental Health Association of St. Tammany. These organizations used the funds to offer counseling to residents who could not afford it.

This was only a temporary solution, however. The parish government began working with the St. Tammany Community Health Center, a federally qualified health center in Slidell. The center, a 501(c)3 that handles about 5,000 cases each month, provides physical and mental services based on a sliding scale and also accepts Medicaid, making its services available to virtually anyone in the parish.

In September 2011, the parish solidified its partnership with the health center by supplying a grant to add a full-time social worker and a part-time psychiatrist to the staff. The grant was used to fund the new employees’ salaries, allowing the center to expand its much-needed counseling services. At the beginning of 2012, again with help from the parish, a second full-time social worker was hired, and there are plans to hire a third by the end of the summer. In the first three months of 2012, the center provided behavioral health services to 648 patients.

In keeping with the goal of providing for the mental needs of the community, Judge Peter Garcia of the 22nd Judicial Court initiated a behavioral health court in October 2011. This court operates with the knowledge that rather than serving time in jail, some offenders need intensive supervision to make sure they see their doctors and take their medications. “It has worked really, really well,” Tim says.

Suicide Prevention Resources

Research shows that suicide survivors—those who are left behind when a loved one has committed suicide—are twice as likely to commit suicide. One local organization that plays a key role addressing this issue is the St. Tammany Outreach for the Prevention of Suicide.

STOPS’s Local Outreach to the Survivors of Suicide team is one of the first of its kind in the nation, says Lynnette Savoie, administrative coordinator. The LOSS team is comprised of survivors of suicide who are on call 24/7 to meet with others who have recently lost a loved one to suicide. “They suffered losses in their own life, so they speak with their hearts,” says Tim, a founding member of STOPS. The organization also hosts a Survivors of Suicide support group twice a month for follow-up and support from other suicide survivors as well as a licensed clinical social worker.

Education about the warning signs of suicide and the appropriate courses of action is of paramount importance to the goal of preventing suicide in St. Tammany. STOPS offers two types of training: SafeTALK, a three-hour suicide alertness program; and Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training, an intensive two-day course about prevention and intervention.

“We are teaching people how to pick up on the signs and how to react to the signs,” Lynette says. Upcoming ASISTs are planned for June 14-15 as well as September 6-7 and 27-28. STOPS volunteers are also available to speak about suicide prevention to churches, schools, businesses and other groups.

St. Tammany’s chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness is also a partner in the parish’s suicide prevention, and some of the programs are supported by the healthcare millage. John Tobin recommends NAMI St. Tammany for those who need information on how to care for mentally ill family members and friends.

For more information about the St. Tammany Parish Suicide Prevention Support Program, visit itsoktotalkaboutit.org. Donations to the overall effort can be made to United Way at unitedwaysela.org. Donations for the crisis response team can be made to the Volunteers of America at voagno.org. For more information about STOPS, visit stops-la.org. For more information about NAMI St. Tammany, visit namisttammany.org.

March/April 2012 Cover by Marcia Holmes

What has changed is that her career as an artist (she’s a recovering CPA) has grown. Steadily and surely, it has built since her first excursion into art in 1999 and her February 2004 IN cover painting of Venice’s St. Mark’s Square.

“It’s been a long time,” Marcia says. “I had just gone to Venice to paint plein air.” Her travels have also taken her to Paris, where, on one trip, plein air (when an artist paints on site, out in the open) took on a new meaning. “We [September 2008 IN cover artist Susan Morgan and artist Terri Ford] were set up and painting in a garden at the Louvre and they turned the sprinklers on!”

Over the years, along with her interesting travels, Marcia has developed a steady following among both art buyers and fellow artists. She’s also expanded her talents into a new medium. “I guess the biggest change is that I’m painting in oil,” Marcia says. “This past year, I really started to enjoy working in oil. I had stuck with the pastels because they were fast, and I was learning. Oil has been very freeing.”

One of the neatest things about Marcia’s kitchen is that her favorite place to paint is not far from the places that give her a lot of inspiration. A small grove of live oaks on the property is footsteps away from a pond, which in turn is just a skip and a jump from the Tchefuncte River. “People really love my oak trees. Every time I do a large oak, it sells right away,” she says.

While a veteran of numerous pastel workshops over the years, she doesn’t attend many now. The trees, however, got her out on a freezing cold day last November for a class with artist Richard McKinley that was sponsored by the Degas Pastel Society, of which she is treasurer. “Richard’s at the top of his game; I wanted to support the society, and I love the trees!”

The pond and river near her home inspired some creative muscle stretching with her newfound fondness for oils. “For the waterscape and water lily paintings, I just walk down to the river. It’s so pretty.” Marcia takes photos of these scenes and then sets off to painting. No matter what has changed in the world since Monet’s lily paintings, peace and beauty can still be found by gazing into a reflective pool, and Marcia’s work captures the same beauty that inspired the master so many years ago.

When she noted that one of her lily scene oils was sold recently to a family in Connecticut, Marcia was reminded of another positive change since IN last visited with her: “Now, I’m selling nationally from the gallery and my web site.” The two galleries she’s featured in, one in uptown New Orleans and one in Breaux Bridge, La., have also helped expose Marcia’s work to new audiences. “New Orleans gets so many people coming in, and that’s cool. People are buying who don’t know me.” Don’t make any mistakes, though—she still has a great following on the northshore. “My bread-and-butter is here, and that’s what I’m most appreciative of. It gives you validation.”

Validation has been coming in by the bushel from her peers. Every two years, the International Association of Pastel Societies has a convention. In 2011, she was presented with a gold medallion signifying her admission into the association’s Master Circle, an honor earned through points she received by winning awards at exhibits during her years as a member.

A Master Circle exhibit was held at the convention. Out of 50 paintings, only eight awards were presented. Marcia and her fellow Degas Pastel Society board members Alan Flattmann from Covington (an IN cover artist) and Sandra Burshell from New Orleans took home prizes. Marcia and Burshell, who won the exhibit’s top honor, were participating in their first years in the IAPS Master Circle.

In 2011, American Art Collector magazine asked three times to include her work. “I did a botanical feature, a horse feature and then an American expressionist. I’m getting calls from New York!”

So how did a corporate accountant find a new career as an artist? Upon reflection, Marcia says it really came to her, while maybe late in life, quite naturally. Her first paintings in 1999 didn’t come completely out of the blue; creativity runs in this Southern lady’s blood. (Marcia’s from Laurel, Miss., and an Ole Miss grad, to boot.)

“My mother, Arlene Perry, was an artist—she’s deceased; my dad built custom homes and now makes custom furniture; and my grandfather was a jewelry designer. So it all came through the genes!”
Her mother remains an inspiration. “My mother said you could paint anything—no rules! She did a lot of collages,” Marcia says. She suddenly recalls, “Oh, my God! She did acid on steel. She did burnt X-ray film! It probably could have killed her. I think somebody told her not to do that anymore.”

While the March/April cover piece, a pastel-on-paper work called Spring Reflection, might appear to be one of the waterscapes from her home, it’s actually the product of a trip to the Southwest with friends Connie and Jim Seitz. (He’s yet another IN cover artist—Marcia keeps great company!) “We went to a gallery in Santa Fe called Nedra Matteucci. They have a gorgeous sculpture garden with a pond and falling-water features. The sky out there is so blue. I took these water-sky reflection pictures, the blue-green water and some leaves.” Earlier, they had gone to see a well-established Santa Fe landscape artist, Forrest Moses. “His is a kind of style I admire. I had a photograph.” Inspired by Moses, she says, “I just zeroed in on the water.”

Marcia’s work can be seen at the Garden District Gallery in New Orleans, the Rue du Pont Galerie in Breaux Bridge, La., and online at MarciaHolmes.com.

It was an actual cannon ball, and it was fired from all the way across the Mississippi River, from the front gallery of one of New Orleans’ most notable landmarks—the Presbytere. A prankster, whose identity remains unknown, had loaded a Civil War-era cannon on display in front of the old building on Jackson Square with powder and a four-pound ball. The blast, which sent the ball sailing over Gen. Jackson’s head and over the river, was reported to have knocked out 60 windows and knocked down a night watchman nearby.

This might be the quirkiest story coming out of a building with thousands of stories to tell. It stands on ground set aside in the city’s earliest plans to house the clergy of the cathedral standing next to it and is the fourth building on the site that was called the Presbytere, or priests’ house. Construction on the present building started under Spanish colonial rule, after the fire of 1794, but was halted after the first floor was built in 1798 when Don Andres Almonester y Roxas, the philanthropist whose fortune financed its construction (along with the Cabildo and St. Louis Cathedral), died. It remained a one-story building until 1813, when the second story and roof were completed. The third floor and signature mansard roof and dormer windows were added in 1847.

The present building, while called “the Presbytere,” was never used to house the clergy, but was leased out by the church first as storage and retail space. Around 1822, it was leased to the city and became the home of the city’s civil courts, where they stayed until 1910. At that time, the Presbytere was turned over to the Louisiana State Museum. Following extensive renovations, it began telling the stories of Louisiana and has continued to do so ever since.

The first floor, once the home of two courtrooms, the Orleans Parish sheriff’s office and the Supreme Court’s law library, now houses the exhibit Katrina and Beyond.
But, as Al Johnson famously sings, “it’s Carnival Time, and everybody’s having fun”—and it’s time to take a look at Mardi Gras: It’s Carnival Time in Louisiana, the comprehensive exhibit on all things Mardi Gras housed on the Presbytere’s second floor.

The old courtrooms are now “krewe” rooms. Rooms where lawyers argued and judges judged and fortunes and liberties were won and lost as clerks furiously wrote down every word of it (for a time, one in French and one in English) now display costumes, masks, floats, doubloons, ball favors, invitations and beads—the trinkets, treasures and ephemera that represent the history of Mardi Gras, one of the many things earning New Orleans a place among the most interesting cities in the world.

The Presbytere. Photo by Jay Rosenblatt, courtesy La. State Museum.

Why do we have all these seemingly frivolous items, these souvenirs of passing parades and remnants of secretive and exclusive societies, housed in such a grand building that was built for a sacred purpose?

“The New Orleans Carnival is descended from ancient religious rites of the Greek and Latin World. Ovid described the Greek shepherds of Arcadia who, five thousand years ago, celebrated a spring festival in hopes of better pastures and the remission of sins.”
—Henri Schindler, Mardi Gras in New Orleans, 1997.

As Schindler points out, Mardi Gras is a very deeply rooted tradition. What’s celebrated in South Louisiana on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday has its roots in ancient culture and is celebrated in some form or another in almost all parts of the world that are predominately Christian, particularly where Roman Catholicism prevails.

Carnival, from the Latin carne vale (farewell to flesh), is the season just before Lent, the religious period of penance and fasting during which the church in its earliest days forbade the eating of meat for the 40 days before Easter Sunday. The last day of the season became Mardi Gras, French for Fat Tuesday, because on that day the Boeuf Gras, or fattened beef steer, was led through medieval towns and slaughtered for a final “farewell to meat” feast.

What are the things that set Louisiana’s Mardi Gras traditions apart from those in the rest of the world? The items that hold the answer to that question are on display in the Presbytere.

Prior to 1852, Carnival here was celebrated haphazardly, with a combination of public and private balls held throughout the city, and a tradition had arisen of street thugs throwing flour, or worse things, at passers-by on Mardi Gras day. Starting in 1852, the Mistick Krewe of Comus, the first organized krewe in New Orleans, held a public parade on Mardi Gras evening and a very private ball after the parade. It served as a model for future organizations.

The Twelfth Night Revelers and Rex were organized after the Civil War. Although at the time Rex was merely 10 years old, a British journalist visiting the city observed:

“The first essential in the successful conduct of the Southern carnival is an entire and unswerving belief in the personality and supremacy of Rex…[R]egal edicts…are not only implicitly believed in, but as implicitly obeyed.”
—George A. Sala, America Revisited, Vol. II, 1882.

Sala wrote several volumes about his travels around the world. He observed Mardi Gras in New Orleans at a time when organized revelry was but 30 years old. Rex’s proclamations, declaring Mardi Gras a holiday and inviting all of his subjects to participate, were printed up and distributed throughout the country in hopes of stirring up interest for travelers to visit the city. Sala had seen one at the train depot in Atlanta.

Preparations underway for a ball in the old French Opera house. Courtesy La. State Museum.

Rex’s early proclamations, along with hundreds of other items of printed Carnival-related items—ball invitations, admit and dance cards, sheet music and parade bulletins—are in the museum’s vast collection, only a fraction of which can be displayed. Krewes seemingly tried to outdo each other in the golden age.

Examples of the elegance and splendor of those bygone days grace the Presbytere’s display cases, which are filled with the jewels, costumes and gowns worn by the kings and queens of various courts, as well as smaller items such as ducal badges and ball favors.

Wayne Phillips, the curator of Mardi Gras: It’s Carnival Time in Louisiana, says the Louisiana State Museum was founded in 1904 and began its Mardi Gras collection right away. “It’s significant that in the 1900s people realized its importance and began collecting items related to Mardi Gras,” Phillips says. “Mardi Gras wasn’t that old then; several krewes were brand-new and the oldest were only 50 years old.” He says the first items collected were ball invitations because they fit well with the museum’s system of archiving documents. Ball invitations are highly collectible for another reason—many are individual works of art, which Schindler refers to as “These beautiful messages from the gods…”

In 1873, the Mistick Krewe of Comus, known for satirical social commentary through its allegorical parade and tableaux ball themes, reached an infamous peak with its representation of carpetbaggers and occupying troops through the theme “The Missing Links to Darwin’s The Origin of Species.” The despised Gen. Butler, who led the Union occupation of New Orleans during the war, was depicted as half man, half hyena and President Ulysses S. Grant as a tobacco grub. A booklet printed by the krewe with drawings of the 100 animals and their satirized counterparts is on display.

Comus Ball 1873. Courtesy La. State Museum.

Parade bulletins, poster-sized depictions of the floats that were to appear in the parades, were handed out or published in newspapers. The earliest Phillips knows of was printed in 1874. “Their importance was not imagined at the time; they offer the only record of what the parades looked like,” he says. The museum has about 350 bulletins, and Phillips says, “What’s unique about the 1874 bulletin is that it’s not printed locally but by an illustrated weekly on the East Coast.” In the 1880s, local printers, notably Walle & Co., printed color lithograph bulletins, which often had advertisements for local business on the back.

The crown jewels of the old-line krewes like Comus and Rex are in display in a room reached through the last vestige of the Presbytere’s role as courthouse—a massive steel vault door that entered what was a fireproof room where court records were stored.

“Crowns and scepters represent a real important collection for us. The crown represents what it means to be a monarch more than anything else,” says Phillips. “A lot of the time, the crown and scepter would survive, but the rest of the costume would not. They’re really hard to collect because, until the 1960s, the krewes gave the jewels to the king and queen, who would donate to us. Now they keep the jewels to re-use every year.”

His favorite story involves Elizabeth Nicholson, who was Rex’s queen in 1948. “The early crowns and scepters that were going to be worn by the king and queen of Carnival would be displayed in a jewelry store window on Canal Street before Mardi Gras,” he says. The public did not know who the royals would be, but Nicholson knew months in advance that she would be queen. “She would go stand in the crowd of people ogling her jewels, because she knew she was the one who would get to wear them. No one else knew that secret yet. And we now have that crown and scepter in our collection for everybody to see.”

It’s funny how things don’t change. Nicholson’s story echoes the observation Sala made more than 65 years before:

“Crowds have been gathering, evening after evening, before the window of a jewelry store in Canal Street, in which Rex’s ‘Crown jewels’—his diadem, his scepter, his orb, and his ring—have been displayed. A leading hardware man gravely advertises that he has been appointed to construct a fireproof safe for the custody of the Royal jewels.”
—George A. Sala, America Revisited, Vol. II, 1882.

Phillips strives to acquire and maintain artifacts from all over Louisiana. He recently acquired a small collection of ball gowns from Morgan City krewes that had been displayed at a museum there.

Of great interest are the costumes and masks collected from the Acadian Mardi Gras tradition, the Courir de Mardi Gras. Towns in Acadiana, such as Mamou, Eunice and Church Point, host celebrations far removed from processions on city thoroughfares and masquerade balls.

“Rural communities don’t have a float-based parade tradition,” Phillips says. “It’s based on visiting households on horseback, trucks and wagons pulled by tractors. Participants perform music, working for ingredients for the gumbo.” Masked revelers travel on horseback or truck from house to house in the Acadiana countryside, dressed as clowns, thieves or demons.

“One thing that is really important is the extent of the disguise, because they are performing acts of mischief. Cajun Mardi Gras mask-makers have devised a variety of ways to make sure the wearer can see out of them but no one can see through to identify the wearer. As a result, you have a group of well-known mask-makers that people regularly go to for Acadian-style masks.” Fifty or so masks are on display from the museum’s collection of over 100.

Acadian Courir de Mardi Gras masks.

Many more items observing Carnival from different cultural perspectives are found at the Presbytere. The Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club’s traditions are celebrated, as are the Twelfth Night Revelers, modern “super krewes,” marching bands and costumes from gay carnival clubs. Modern costumes made post-Katrina out of the then-ubiquitous blue-roof tarp material are displayed in the Presbytere’s Katrina exhibit.

Another item in the collection that’s become common at the parades is a ladder that’s been converted to have seating for children at the top (there’s no indication of whether its owners prefer the sidewalk side or the neutral ground side, though). We might think this is a new invention. But Robert Tallant observed in his 1947 book Mardi Gras that as he wandered from the French Quarter to view a parade on Canal Street, “Fathers held small children on their shoulders, or they held them high above adult heads in particular contrivances that appear in New Orleans only at Mardi Gras time—boxlike seats at the tops of long poles.”

So it is true that, at least with Carnival time in Louisiana, the more things change, the more they stay the same—but I’m guessing today’s ladders are safer.

Beverly is the owner of Planet Kids Academy, a preschool for children ages 1 to 5. As we talked, her passion for children was evident, as was her philosophical approach to beauty, life and parenting.

MD:        As an educator, I know you always want to convey professionalism and set an example. How is your style influenced by what you do?

BMc:        I would describe my style as classic but comfortable. The classic look of a starched white shirt with something as simple as a pair of jeans is always appropriate to me. Of course, I always walk around with a fish hook in my mouth.

MD:        A fish hook?

BMc:        That sounds so funny doesn’t it? I was a local model for some time. You are taught to hold your head up as if a fish hook were pulling you. It just sort of stuck with me, and I do that every day as a practice. It keeps my head up and my shoulders back!

MD:        If you say that, then you must have had a slouchy phase.

BMc:        I did at one point. I think we all do. When I  was in high school, I dressed sort of punk, with short hair, piercings and really baggy clothes. What can I say? It was the ’80s. I didn’t really pay attention to what I wore until after my kids were born because I went through another slouchy phase having babies back to back. I think I was trying not to accent my body, but hide it.

Riller and Font dress, $332; crystal bead necklace, $138; long gold beads, $302; gold chain bracelet, $655; all from Izabella’s Villa. Blue oval topaz ring, $435, Champagne Jewelers. Chinese Laundry shoes, $89, Fleurt. Copyright 2012, Abby Sands Miller, abbyphoto.net.

MD:        At what point did you just “get it” about dressing better?

BMc:        I have to say my mother-in-law deserves a lot of the credit. She showed me how to put things together, and she is an inspiration. Also, I saw friends and the way they dressed. I just started paying more attention.

MD:        Has being 6-feet tall ever hindered your style or made it hard to find clothes? I would imagine you have never had to hem a pair of pants!

BMc:        You’re right. And if something does fall a little short, then it looks like a cropped pant, which is fine with me. Actually, I had a harder time finding a man tall enough for me! Luckily, he is 6-foot-4, so I can still wear high heels.

IN Fashion with Beverly McQuaid. Blouse, $194, and shorts, $198, from Izabella’s Villa. Crystal bead necklace, $138; long gold beads, $302; all from Izabella’s Villa. Pearls, $1,150, with Swarovski enhancer, $175, Champagne Jewelers. Jeweled handbag, $129, Three Divas and a Sugar Daddy. BCBG shoes, $89, Shoefflé. Copyright 2012, Abby Sands Miller, abbyphoto.net.

MD:        Beverly, no one can say you don’t look amazing now. I know you work out very hard.

BMc:        I do, and I credit my gym for helping to reshape my body. I do circuit training three times a week, and I try to run 3 to 4 miles at least twice a week. I do love to exercise—it is sort of my time to myself.

MD:        Earlier, we talked about taking time for yourself and how that influences your life.

BMc:        I am firm believer in finding balance. I am always trying to balance my family, my business and myself. I truly believe that comes out of taking care of yourself first. It is almost counterintuitive to think that, but it is so true. I feel I cannot be better at all the things I do if I have not fueled myself and taken care of me.

Prior to her recent inauguration, Pat’s transition team orchestrated a smooth changeover from Kevin Davis’ leadership. The team was directed by Howard Daigle, managing partner of the Daigle Fisse & Kessenich law firm. He says, “I think we’ve been blessed with very good leadership for the past 12 years with President Davis and the members of the council that have served with him.”

Howard believes that with this solid foundation, residents won’t see many dramatic changes under Pat’s guidance, but there will be a new focus on economic development. He explains, “We will see a far more robust economic development effort supported by a realignment of the administrative organizational structure to support that mission more clearly and better align the administration’s efforts to provide the services that residents are expecting and need from their government today.”

Shortly after her election, Pat spoke at a St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce luncheon. Following that event, we asked her to tell us more about what we could expect to see under her leadership as parish president.

IN:        What do you see as the most important issues for St. Tammany Parish in 2012?

PB:        Just as in other parts of the country, the economic downturn has hit St. Tammany. While we have not been as negatively impacted as most of the country, it has caused our revenue to shrink. One of the most important things we will face in 2012 is finding a way to provide the services our citizens want and need with less money. We will look very closely at how our tax dollars are spent while we develop a more pro-active economic development plan that will bring more jobs to our area. In addition, we will always have infrastructure and drainage issues with which to contend and will have to find efficiencies in those areas also.

Pat Brister. Photo by Thomas Growden.

IN:        Are there specific barriers to economic development that you will focus on in the short term? Can you elaborate on the pro-active economic development plan, including partnerships with the chambers, Northshore Business Council and Economic Development Foundation?

PB:        It will be necessary to look at all issues affecting our economic development, including planning and zoning, taxing and impact fees. We will pull together the different organizations in St. Tammany to come to the table with their wealth of knowledge, ideas and resources. One of my strengths is the pulling together of ideas from many areas and coming up with an overall program of work to best use those ideas. In my conversations with leaders of the organizations mentioned, I have learned that they are willing and excited to work with my administration to accomplish our economic development goals.

IN:        You’ve mentioned the importance of film production jobs for St. Tammany’s economy. How will you help the growth of the technology sector?

PB:        There has been a lot of work done in this area already, and we will expand on what has been started. In this regard, regionalization will be even more important than ever. I have a great working relationship with the leadership of our neighboring parishes. I will work with GNO, Inc. and the Louisiana Economic Development department to make sure we are at the table when decisions are made to go after the companies in the technology and film industries. The move by Globalstar to St. Tammany has given us a very good entrée into the Silicon Valley companies that are looking to move to a more economical area of the country. We must also make sure we have the educated and trained personnel that these companies will need.

IN:        How do you plan to communicate and work with local government leaders, leaders of the business sector and other community leaders in St. Tammany?

PB:        I have already started an outreach to other government leaders in St. Tammany. Those with whom I have spoken have agreed to meet regularly to discuss issues that are important to all of us. The municipalities are eager for us to join forces in attracting new jobs and businesses. Before being elected, I served as executive director of the Northshore Business Council for four years. This organization is made up of CEOs from 50 of the top companies in our area. I have already built a relationship with them and will continue to foster that relationship while reaching out to other companies to be a part of our vision of job growth in St. Tammany. I have been involved with numerous organizations over the years and built relationships with community leaders through that involvement. But, as with everything else, continued effort will be put forth to make sure these relationships grow.

IN:        How will your experience with the U.S. delegation on the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women play into your role as parish president?

PB:        The experience I gained during the four years on the U.N. Commission will certainly be put to use when working with different groups to come to a compromise on issues that separate us. I understand how to negotiate for the most important parts of an agreement while realizing every stakeholder has a strong opinion on what is important to them. I know how difficult it is to get everything you want in negotiations and I have learned you often have to take a step at a time to reach your goal. While there will never be issues as divisive as the ones I faced at the U.N., the techniques are the same when trying to reach a conclusion that benefits the residents of St. Tammany Parish.

IN:        How will your experience as chairman and vice-chairman of the St. Tammany Parish Council help you in this position?

PB:        I was very fortunate to have been elected by my fellow council members to serve as chairman of the council for two years and vice chairman for two years. The experience I bring from those years helps me understand the working relationship between the council (the legislative) and the parish president (the administrative) sides of parish government. The charter spells out responsibilities of each of these arms of government and gives a good roadmap as to how St. Tammany should be run. That will be the basis of my administration—the Parish Charter and what responsibilities are given to each.

IN:        Please elaborate on your plans for working with the legislative delegation in Baton Rouge.

PB:        Over the past several years, I have sought to develop a good working relationship with our delegation. We have a dedicated group of legislators who have come together to form a very powerful bloc. I have already begun conversations with many of them to continue that relationship. I also will work to have a location where members of our delegation and parish leaders can meet whenever necessary to discuss specific legislation in a timely fashion. It is vitally important that the parish administration and our delegation work together to ensure that we are on the same page when it comes to helping St. Tammany achieve our legislative goals. That can be done more effectively if I spend as much time as possible in Baton Rouge during the legislative sessions. Other parishes have been very successful by using this method of communication.

IN:        With the many demands of official duties, how do you juggle family responsibilities as well?

PB:        I have been so fortunate to have the full support of my family—particularly my husband. We are at a time in our lives that affords me the freedom to pursue this job fully. Our children are grown and married with their own families, and my husband is totally retired. He was wonderful during the campaign period, making sure everything on the home front ran smoothly. He has worked most of his life to give our family the freedom to make the most of our opportunities, and he continues to do that for me today. I will never be able to thank him enough for his love and support. I will always strive to make him proud of my actions as parish president.

“As long as I’ve been painting, I’ve been a portrait artist. It’s been people, people, people,” says Ryan.

This month’s cover is an example of Ryan’s meticulous style. While it’s a departure from the straight portrait perspective—he didn’t have anyone sit or pose for him—it’s still an exercise in capturing on canvas the person behind the image. He says it came about partly out of simple economics.

Artist Ryan Perea.

“The problem is that people don’t really want to buy paintings of faces that they don’t know,” says Ryan. “I was trying to think of a way where I could still do a face or a figure but make it so people—anybody—would want to have it.” Recognizing that many local artists, no matter what their normal focus might be, paint Mardi Gras scenes, he says, “I thought a marching band would be a good idea, really—just Mardi Gras in general.”

Ryan says he always had a knack for drawing and was in the talented art program in high school. He went to Southeastern Louisiana University but did not major in art. After graduating in 2003, he moved to New York. There, he encountered a serendipitous situation.

“It’s funny. I was living in a loft in New York around 2007. It was a slummy place, full of graffiti; it had character, though—it was neat,” he says, recalling the bohemian environment. “One time, I was taking trash to the trash room and there were three or four big canvases sitting in the trash with a bag of paints. I hadn’t painted in six years or done any drawing. When I saw that, I said, ‘I can’t pass this up.’ So that’s how I started. I had no idea what I was doing, but I loved it. It stuck.”

Not happy with the results he was getting, Ryan decided he needed some training. He found Rob Zeller, an artist who is originally from New Orleans, living in the Bushwick area of Brooklyn, near Ryan’s loft. “Rob studied with Jacob Collins in New York. Collins is a world-renowned figurative and portrait artist, a classical realist. Rob took everything I knew and said, ‘All right. We’re starting from scratch. I’m going to show you how to do this correctly.’ It’s all based on classical 17th- and 18th-century European drawing and painting techniques.”

After three years of study, Ryan left New York. He says, “I decided to move home just to focus on painting. New York’s pretty expensive. I taught talented art for a year when I got back because I needed a job. But painting full time was where my heart was sitting, and I said if I really want to do this, I can’t be doing two things at once.”

Upon coming home to Louisiana, Ryan realized that with the change in geography came a change in the artistic environment. New York City has seen a revival in classical realism, the genre that best represents his artistic focus. “Coming down here, I didn’t see as much of that; it was more whimsical, colorful things—which is great, but I didn’t see anybody in a more classic style until I saw one of Gretchen Armbruster’s nudes at Mo’s Art Supply. I said, ‘That’s the person I need to be talking to.’”

January/February 2012 Cover.

He ended up getting in touch with Gretchen (whose work has been featured on the cover of Inside Northside) and took some of her classes. Gretchen introduced him to Bobbie Chassaignac at the Louisiana Artists Gallery in Mandeville, which now features his work. He has one still life of apples there, but mostly there are portraits or figurative work that he’s painted from photos of his good friends. “I try to do other things, too, but nothing grabs me like doing people,” he says. He’d rather paint from life, but notes laughingly that his friends won’t sit still for eight or 10 hours.

The conundrum facing Ryan is, given that buyers seldom purchase portraits of people they’re not connected to, how do you make a living painting people before having a steady stream of portrait commissions? He’s finding the answer in creating images like his cover piece.

“Coming back to New Orleans, I noticed a lot of Mardi Gras scenes. I don’t want to fall into the same-old, same-old New Orleans scene. But if I do one, it has to be a scene that really grabs me, I’ll have to really feel it and I’ll have to ‘bring it’ whenever I paint it. I don’t want to run on the coattails of other people.”

With the cover painting, which is his interpretation of a photo of the Warren Easton High School marching band, Ryan certainly did “bring it.” “When I saw the photo, I was ‘Whoa, that’s a great image!’ Those guys made me feel like I was there, and that’s what I wanted to portray,” Ryan says.

The meticulously detailed painting took several weeks to complete, with, he says, at least two weeks spent getting the reflections in the marcher’s helmets just right. “Any time I’m doing something, I hear Rob Zeller’s voice saying, ‘You’ve got to keep going; you’ve got to keep going.’ That’s what makes me excited about painting—to try to get the person to be there, to be real. And to get their personality. It doesn’t do it for me if I can’t capture that,” says Ryan.

“There’s something about being able to portray a person on canvas that excites me to death.”

And that, for any young portrait artist, says it all.

Ryan Perea’s work is featured at the Louisiana Artists Gallery, 813 Florida St., Ste. A, in Mandeville. 624-7903. ryanperea.com.