A couple of years ago, when I stayed in the Bywater with a friend, I ran across a curious sign. At the corner of Press and Royal streets, in an unkempt, empty lot, sat a sign which declared the site to be the "future home of the New Orleans civil rights memorial" or some such proclamation. After a few weeks however, the sign had been removed and post-Katrina, no one remembered it's existence.
Flash forward to a couple of days ago when the indie movie, "Treme: the Untold Story of Black New Orleans" played at the New Orleans Film Festival. The movie rocked - it told a fascinating story of an integrated neighborhood of whites, slaves and free blacks near the French Quarter in pre-Civil War New Orleans through the eyes of the Times-Picayune columnist Lolis Eric Elie.
And yet the most intriguing part was a little nugget in the movie explaining everything about that sign at the corner of Press and Royal. It seems that during Reconstruction following the Civil War, segregation took a hold of previously desegregated New Orleans. Fighting back, the Organizing Citizens' Committee looked for a guy who they could build a legal case around. They found that guy in Homer Plessy, a 7/8 white - 1/8 black guy who looked white, but considered himself black.
He bought a ticket to ride on the 'white' car, but was arrested when he refused to leave after the conductor ascertained he was in fact, at least partially black. Now, many of you non-lawyers may vaguely recollect the name Plessy from high school civics class. And if you remembered that he might have been in involved in a landmark Supreme Court case, you'd be right. Homer Plessy was the "Plessy" in Plessy v. Ferguson - which argued that, sure, separate but equal was quite alright.
Which brings us back to the sign in the Bywater. It ends up that, well, Homer Plessy was actually from the Treme and bought his ticket to board the 'white' car in the Bywater - at the corner of Press and Royal St. And history was made - right here in New Orleans, in two neighborhoods I've stayed in.
This city fascinates and enlightens me every day...every day.
(To see a larger version of the sign shown below and an update on why the sign came down, read this Gambit link.)
Comments