Bourbon Street: A History
New Orleans is a city of many storied streets, but only one conjures up as much unbridled passion as it does fervent hatred, simultaneously polarizing the public while drawing millions of visitors a year. A fascinating investigation into the mile-long urban space that is Bourbon Street, Richard Campanella’s comprehensive cultural history spans from the street’s inception during the colonial period through three tumultuous centuries, arriving at the world-famous entertainment strip of today.

Clearly written and carefully researched, Campanella’s book interweaves world events—from the Louisiana Purchase to World War II to Hurricane Katrina—with local and national characters, ranging from presidents to showgirls, to explain how Bourbon Street became an intriguing and singular artifact, uniquely informative of both New Orleans’s history and American society.

While offering a captivating historical-geographical panorama of Bourbon Street, Campanella also presents a contemporary microview of the area, describing the population, architecture, and local economy, and shows how Bourbon Street operates on a typical night. The fate of these few blocks in the French Quarter is played out on a larger stage, however, as the internationally recognized brands that Bourbon Street merchants and the city of New Orleans strive to promote both clash with and complement each other.

An epic narrative detailing the influence of politics, money, race, sex, organized crime, and tourism, Bourbon Street: A History ultimately demonstrates that one of the most well-known addresses in North America is more than the epicenter of Mardi Gras; it serves as a battleground for a fundamental dispute over cultural authenticity and commodification.

1117658106
Bourbon Street: A History
New Orleans is a city of many storied streets, but only one conjures up as much unbridled passion as it does fervent hatred, simultaneously polarizing the public while drawing millions of visitors a year. A fascinating investigation into the mile-long urban space that is Bourbon Street, Richard Campanella’s comprehensive cultural history spans from the street’s inception during the colonial period through three tumultuous centuries, arriving at the world-famous entertainment strip of today.

Clearly written and carefully researched, Campanella’s book interweaves world events—from the Louisiana Purchase to World War II to Hurricane Katrina—with local and national characters, ranging from presidents to showgirls, to explain how Bourbon Street became an intriguing and singular artifact, uniquely informative of both New Orleans’s history and American society.

While offering a captivating historical-geographical panorama of Bourbon Street, Campanella also presents a contemporary microview of the area, describing the population, architecture, and local economy, and shows how Bourbon Street operates on a typical night. The fate of these few blocks in the French Quarter is played out on a larger stage, however, as the internationally recognized brands that Bourbon Street merchants and the city of New Orleans strive to promote both clash with and complement each other.

An epic narrative detailing the influence of politics, money, race, sex, organized crime, and tourism, Bourbon Street: A History ultimately demonstrates that one of the most well-known addresses in North America is more than the epicenter of Mardi Gras; it serves as a battleground for a fundamental dispute over cultural authenticity and commodification.

39.95 In Stock
Bourbon Street: A History

Bourbon Street: A History

by Richard Campanella
Bourbon Street: A History

Bourbon Street: A History

by Richard Campanella

Paperback

$39.95 
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Overview

New Orleans is a city of many storied streets, but only one conjures up as much unbridled passion as it does fervent hatred, simultaneously polarizing the public while drawing millions of visitors a year. A fascinating investigation into the mile-long urban space that is Bourbon Street, Richard Campanella’s comprehensive cultural history spans from the street’s inception during the colonial period through three tumultuous centuries, arriving at the world-famous entertainment strip of today.

Clearly written and carefully researched, Campanella’s book interweaves world events—from the Louisiana Purchase to World War II to Hurricane Katrina—with local and national characters, ranging from presidents to showgirls, to explain how Bourbon Street became an intriguing and singular artifact, uniquely informative of both New Orleans’s history and American society.

While offering a captivating historical-geographical panorama of Bourbon Street, Campanella also presents a contemporary microview of the area, describing the population, architecture, and local economy, and shows how Bourbon Street operates on a typical night. The fate of these few blocks in the French Quarter is played out on a larger stage, however, as the internationally recognized brands that Bourbon Street merchants and the city of New Orleans strive to promote both clash with and complement each other.

An epic narrative detailing the influence of politics, money, race, sex, organized crime, and tourism, Bourbon Street: A History ultimately demonstrates that one of the most well-known addresses in North America is more than the epicenter of Mardi Gras; it serves as a battleground for a fundamental dispute over cultural authenticity and commodification.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780807181690
Publisher: Louisiana State University Press
Publication date: 01/31/2024
Pages: 384
Product dimensions: 6.10(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Richard Campanella, a geographer with the Tulane School of Architecture, is the author of several books about New Orleans, including Cityscapes of New Orleans, Bienville’s Dilemma, and Geographies of New Orleans. A two-time winner of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities Book of the Year Award, Campanella has also received the Louisiana Library Association’s Literary Award, the Williams Prize for Louisiana History, and the Monroe Fellowship from Tulane’s New Orleans Center for the Gulf South.

Table of Contents

Preface xiii

Part I Origins

1 A Straight Line in a Sinuous Space: Creating Rue Bourbon, 1682-1722 3

2 A Streetscape Emerges: Rue Bourbon and Calle Borbon, 1722-1803 17

3 A Transect of Antebellum Society: Ethnicity, Race, Class, and Caste on Bourbon Street, 1803-1860 29

4 A Smell So Unsavory: Managing Bourbon Street in the Mid-1800s 45

5 A Place to "See the Elephant": Antecedents of Modem-Day Bourbon Street 54

Part II Fame and Infamy

6 How Bourbon Street Germinated: 1860s-1910s 73

7 How Bourbon Street Blossomed: 1910s-1920s 94

8 How Bourbon Street Flourished: Late 1920s-Mid-1940s 105

9 How Bourbon Street Exploded: Late 1940s-Early 1960s 141

10 How Bourbon Street Degenerated: Late 1960s-1970s 201

11 How Bourbon Street Stabilized: 1980s-Present 222

Part III Bourbon Street as a Social, Artifact

12 Locating Bourbon Street: Why Here? 253

13 Working Bourbon Street: How the Machine Runs 259

14 Challenging Bourbon Street: The Rise of the Anti-Bourbons 283

15 Hating Bourbon Street: On Iniquity and Inauthenticity 292

16 Replicating Bourbon Street: Spatial and Linguistic Diffusion 304

17 Redeeming Bourbon Street: The Cheerful Defiance of Adversity 309

Notes 313

Index 353

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