This week's episode is a crossover with sister podcast "Beyond the Beads" from New Orleans Magazine. Since the early 20th Century, the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club has been a prominent figure in Carnival culture. From the meeting of…
John Burke knows about swamps. He spends time living close to the Atchafalaya swamp near Patterson, Louisiana. Earlier in his career he was involved in a business of making caviar from the roe of the choupique, a native fish whose…
Why are people from Louisiana leaving? Well, not all of them are, but there has been a subtle decline enough to make people wonder. “Jobs” is usually the answer, but there is some good news for the future, including in…
Dennis Woltering had a long and distinguished career as the nightly news anchor on WWL tv, Ch. 4. Since retiring, he is still frequently in front of a camera and has lots of stories to tell. Acting as an independent…
There are lots of questions raised by numbers; fortunately, many answers have been found. Allison Plyer, chief demographer for the New Orleans-based Data Center, looks at both sides including analyzing why Louisiana’s population is declining and why there is…
From crawfish and Heavenly Hash to conjuring spirits and exploring the rhythm of America, we've covered a lot this year on "Louisiana Insider." For the final week of the year, we're shining some light on some of our most popular…
Gordon “Nick” Mueller once had a conversation with Stephen Ambrose, a history professor colleague at the University of New Orleans. What Ambrose had to say would make history itself. He proposed a project to build a museum focused on the…
Louisiana has a rich literary history. All authors conduct interviews as part of their craft, but only one wondered what it would be like to interview a vampire. As another Louisiana author, Kate Chopin, might have said about Anne Rice’s…
When driving into Baton Rouge, one can be amazed by the object in the distance that looks like a rocket ship on a launch pad about to take off. The building, of course, is the state capitol, the tallest…
Jessica Harris has twice won James Beard Foundation awards, including one for Lifetime achievement. Rather than just being in the kitchen, she has proved herself to be especially skilled at blending sentences and paragraphs and then seasoning the mix with…
Suppose your job is to take care of a tiger – a real tiger with jaws and claws and that is physically fit. David G. Baker is a veterinarian who for several year had the responsibility of overseeing the most…
One of the great green spaces in America is New Orleans’ City Park. In 2005, the flood waters from Hurricane Karina turned it into a gray space that was muddied, overcome with fallen trees, deprived of joy and hope. Robert…
Who better to talk about the Day of the Dead celebration than a Vodou priestess? Also known as Día de los Muertos, the celebration has different roots than Vodou, which worked its way through Haiti. It is also Hispanic in…
Barbara Sillery has her favorite haunts, not just to visit but to write about. She has written several books about hauntings including in Louisiana, Mississippi (as well as its Delta country), Cape Cod and Nantucket. Sillery joins Louisiana Life Executive…
In 1873, though little known throughout the state, the Shreveport area suffered one of the greatest tragedies in Louisiana history. The region faced what is recorded as the third largest Yellow Fever epidemic in the nation’s history. In the course…
Jim Brown has had quite a career including terms as Louisiana’s Secretary of State; Insurance Commissioner and a state senator. He is also a publisher, a columnist and a font of knowledge about the state and its politics. Brown joins…
Millions of people listen to music on the radio. Over a half million people listen to radio each week to hear Nick Spitzer talk about music. Spitzer’s pioneering broadcast American Routes is way more than a D.J. spinning songs but…
A teenager named Abraham Lincoln was once part of the crew of a packet boat bringing goods downriver to New Orleans. As they approached the city they camped on the river banks up shore from New Orleans. There were rough…
Whenever polls are taken of Louisiana’s most popular restaurants Commander’s Palace in New Orleans is usually near or at the top. That’s quite an accomplishment for a state already known for its great restaurants. Ti Martin, co-proprietor of Commander’s Place,…
There are thousands of hurricane stories. Some stories are tragic, others are heroic and many are truly compelling, especially for podcast listening. A documentary recently released by Louisiana Public Broadcasting, the statewide public broadcast system, entitled “Cajundome City” tells the…
Remember the comedian George Carlin? In 1958, when he was an airman at nearby Barksdale Air Force Base, his first appearance on a stage was in Shreveport. Carlin was the star of the Shreveport Little Theatre’s production of “The Happiest…
There are two things, among many, that we all need to do – eat, and be fit. The problem is that sometimes doing one contradicts the other. Fortunately, there are some dietitian who keep and eye on that sort of…
If you confuse the Louisiana Children’s Museum for a boat permanently docked alongside a small bay that is understandable. The museum, located in New Orleans’ City Park, is a masterpiece of whimsical design and learning creativity. It is as much…
New Orleans was once a fertile area for developing championship boxers. Mainly because of the large Italian immigration many of the boys who came from poor families and grew up in tough neighborhoods were attracted to boxing. Not only were…
