Profile for Tourists of the Past

I was able to purchase on eBay a copy of the Louisiana edition of A Guide to the States published by the Louisiana Writer’s Project of the Works Progress Administration in 1941. It is a very interesting book, one I wish I could find a contemporary version of today. It gives brief profiles of the largest communities in Louisiana and includes more than two dozen driving tours of the state, listing points of interest on each tour, providing distances and describing the road conditions and accommodations along each route. The Appendices include a glossary of Louisiana terms from armoire to zombie, a chronology of Louisiana History, an extensive bibliography of sources for Louisiana information, a list of places including populations from the 1940 census and five regional maps of the state with points of interest marked. I really wish I had been able to find such a concise, but informative tour book a few weeks back when I went through Plantation Country along the River Road.


Since it seems a little too short to be the basis of a newspaper column, I decided to post the text about Minden to my blog word for word. I hope some of you will find interesting. There are some errors, by 1940, Minden had three movie theaters, not one as listed, and with the coming of the Louisiana Ordnance Plant in the Summer of 1941 we would soon add a drive-in between McIntyre and the Plant. The timing of the emerging oil and gas boom is off by more than a decade and there are other mistakes such as the description of the events of 1933 is hopelessly jumbled. However it is fun to read how our town was described to travelers 70 years ago.

Minden:

Railroad Station: Foot of S. Broadway for Louisiana & Arkansas Railroad

Bus Station: 120 Pearl Street for Tri-State Bus Line

Taxies: Fare $0.25

Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 25 mph. Turn on green light only. Parallel parking; no limit.

Accommodations: Two hotels; boarding houses; tourist camps

Information Service: Courthouse, S. Broadway and Pearl Sts.

Motion Picture Houses: One

Golf: Minden Country Club, 1.6 miles N. on U.S. 79, 9 holes (3,100 yds.), $0.50 a day

Swimming: Municipal Natatorium, Victory Park, northern part of town, adults $0.15, children $0.10

Tennis: Six courts in three city parks

Annual Events: Flower Show, usually in April; Garden Party, May; Fish Fry, first Tuesday in September

MINDEN (181 alt; 5,623 population), is the trading and shipping center of a productive cotton-growing and general farming district in the Northwestern corner of the State. During the late 1930s the town experienced a modest boom brought about by discovery of oil and gas in the vicinity. The presence of a plant which manufactures presses for cotton gins adds to the town’s industrial aspect.

Minden has a wide main street, tree-shade residential sections, parks planted with shrubs and flowers, and a general air of comfort and well-being. Saturday in Minden finds the streets, stores and theaters crowded with farmers and their families in town for their weekly shopping and recreation. In the vicinity are numerous small lakes and streams affording excellent fishing, boating and picnicking sites.

Minden was founded in 1836 as a real estate promotion by a German-American named Charles Hance Veeder; it was named after a town on the Weser River, in northern Germany, the birthplace of Veeder’s parents. The town’s founder deserted it to participate in the California Gold Rush.

Favored by fertile land and transportation facilities by way of Bayou Dauchite, Lake Bistineau, and the Red River, the town grew steadily sharing in the general prosperity that preceded the War Between the States. The Minden Academy, co-educational, was opened in 1838, but divided in 1850 into the Minden Male Academy and the Minden Female Seminary; the latter developed into an outstanding women’s college, but was closed in 1886.

In 1933 Minden suffered a series of disasters. First a cyclone took heavy toll of life and property; a few weeks later a fire destroyed the business district and many homes; finally the funds of the citizens and business establishments were frozen during the Nation-wide bank holiday. The discovery of oil and natural gas in the vicinity shortly afterward aided materially in recouping Minden’s fortunes.

POINTS OF INTEREST

At the MINDEN COMPRESS (visitors admitted), foot of S. Broadway St., opposite the depot, cotton bales pressed at rural gins are further compressed to half t heir original size. In addition to giant steam presses, there are 4 acres of covered warehouse space, enough for 8.500 bales of cotton

CITY PARK, made up of 3 squares in the neutral ground of S. Broadway St., south of the courthouse, has a bandstand about which hundreds gather every Friday evening during the summer to hear free concerts presented by the Municipal Band, and take part in community song-fests. At the south end of the park is a CONFEDERATE MEMORIAL.

WEBSTER PARISH COURTHOUSE, Pearl and S. Broadway Sts., is a two-story stone and buff-colored brick structure with an octagonal white dome. Each side has a small portico with four Ionic columns.

FERGUSON MEMORIAL TABERNACLE (Baptist), Murrell Ave., between N. Broadway and Pennsylvania Sts., is an open-sided structure somewhat resembling an airplane hangar. During revival meetings the floor is usually covered with sawdust, and converts “hit the sawdust trail.”

FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, 310 N. Broadway St., S.E. Corner Broadway and 1st Sts., is a three-story cream-colored brick adaptation of Classical Greek architecture, built in 1925. Four embellished Ionic columns frame a recessed pedimented portico on the façade. The auditorium seats 1000 persons.

The ADA JACK CARVER HOME (private), 412 Webb Court, a one-story white frame cottage, is the residence of Mrs. Ada Jack Carver Snell, author of The Cajun, Red Bone and other stories and plays, most of which have as their locale Natchitoches and its vicinity.

MINDEN SANITARIUM (visiting hours 9-11 a.m., 2-4 p.m.), N.W. corner Monroe and Cedar Sts., housed in a four-story red brick structure was established in 1926 as a semipublic institution. There are 18 private rooms and four wards, with facilities for 35 patients.