The 1984 World’s Fair. New Orleans, LA I had just moved to Houston. I had found a couple of good municipal bond accounts in New Orleans. My Uncle Dave and his family lived there, so I found a reason to go to New Orleans quite often. New Orleans was about six hours driving from Houston. You could also fly there in a little more than an hour on Southwest and a competitor called Muse Airlines founded by Lamar Muse, an early investor in Southwest.
New Orleans does things differently. I called on a number of bankers there. The most memorable was the venerable Whitney Bank. There I called on Julian Neill who sat on the banking floor in gilded splendor and handled the bond account of the bank as well as the accounts of the Widow Jones and other small customers. At first I thought it was hopelessly parochial that he wasn’t surrounded by screens and in a room by himself. Later I saw the quaint wisdom of the approach in that he did several things in the bank, not just investments.
Then there was Mr. Villere, St. Denis J. Villere to be exact. He was the president of Villere & Company. He took me to lunch at the Boston Club. You can’t find it if you tried to go back there. It has almost a secret entrance. Very nice gentleman and excellent investor.
It was decided that New Orleans should have a World’s Fair in 1984. There had been one two years earlier in Knoxville, pretty much financed by the Butchers. The New Orleans Fair was built up on both sides of the Mississippi River. There was a thing like a ski lift way up in the sky that provided rides across the river. At about 10 at night they would shoot fireworks from a barge in the river that would go right next to that ski lift car crossing the river. It was fun to get on the car right when they were shooting the fireworks.
Stroh’s Brewery had a “Bier Halle” in the midst of the fairgrounds. It had a bit of a Munich feel to it. I would go hang out there frequently when I was there. One night I went down there and the place was jam packed. There was a zydeco band up front playing. The German navy was in town, and lots of drunken sailors were jumping around and dancing. It was full of college kids from everywhere, not just LSU and Tulane. People were literally standing on tables and hollering and yelling. I had never been to such a wild and crazy display of pure fun. There was no way to get even close to the bar. I was mesmerized.
After the Fair was over, the local banks who had loaned it money found themselves not getting paid. Except the Whitney. They had passed on the deal.
When I stayed at my Uncle Dave’s house, my cousin Ford and I would drink beer at Cooter Brown’s. Sometimes we would go with Uncle Dave to the Old College Inn for dinner. Then of course if we stayed out late we could get something to eat at the Camellia Grill.
If I had driven, then on the way back there was Pat’s restaurant in Henderson. Or you could go up to Opelousas, home of Paul Prudhomme and eat at any restaurant in town, because they were all good.
Louisiana means a lot of things to many people, but to me it’s about food.
(Editor’s note: Ever notice how many bridges in rural Louisiana are called the Huey P. Long bridge? They sure built a lot of bridges when Huey was governor. )