Jefferson Parish: The Bicentennial
If I would tell you that Jefferson Parish is the second most populous parish in Louisiana, that might not be a surprise. The assumption would be that neighboring parish, Orleans, is the largest. Ah, but here is where the assumptions go wrong.
Orleans is not first but third. East Baton Rouge has the largest population (448,467); Jefferson has 421,771 and Orleans (which consists entirely of the city of New Orleans) rounds out the top three with 364,136.
There was a time when Orleans’ numbers were in the 600,000 category, but the nationwide population movement, of the ‘60s and ‘70s, from inner-cities to blossoming suburbs took its toll and Jefferson absorbed many of the newcomers. Hurricane Katrina took a whack out of Orleans too and that helped make neighboring parishes, including East Baton Rouge, bigger.
Another number that is relevant to Jefferson these days is 200 because this is the year on the parish’s Bicentennial. In 1825 Governor Henry S. Johnson signed legislation that in effect created Jefferson Parish.
Geographically, it is a diverse land. At its northern end is Lake Pontchartrain. The gulf’s beaches make up the southern end. The distance for top to bottom is about 60 miles but if you plan to drive, you will have go through Terrebonne parish for a stretch. Whichever way you go, you will at some point take a high bridge across a wide Mississippi river.
There have been lots of characters who have plied their trade in Jefferson including Jean Lafitte, who traded pirated good from a base in the Barataria swamps and Carlos Marcello identified by Wikipedia as a “Crime Boss.” (Though when asked what he did for a living by a Senate Committee, he replied that he “sold tomatoes.”) He worked out of an office at a Metairie area motel.
Culinarily, the parish claims to be the King Cake baking capital of the world, (there are lots of bakeries) and it has been the headquarters for the Popeye’s chicken empire.
Like many suburbs, it was a hot bed for the evolution of the modern Republican party, yet one of its most popular, and effective, politicians was Harry Lee, a Democrat Chinese American Sheriff.
Politically, the parish is distinguished at the national level too. No other American county can claim to have been the neighborhood of a House Majority Leader, Steve Scalise, and a Supreme Court Justice, Amy Coney Barrett.
When the Saints and the Pelicans play home games, they do so in New Orleans, but they train at the LaSalle tract complex in Jefferson.
Metairie is the best-known community in the parish. It is an unincorporated area which saves the need of building a City Hall and electing a mayor to put in it, not so for the cities of Harahan, Gretna, Lafitte, Grand Isle, Westwego, and Kenner. The latter is the parish’s largest city and number six (behind Lake Charles and ahead of Bossier City) in the state. It was also the home of national R & B star Lloyd Price, who in 1959 had a million selling hit with “Personality” and another success with “Stagger Lee.”
Overall, the parish does what it supposed to do—be suburban, offering urban amenities but in more casual lifestyle neighborhoods. Its residential land is mostly fully developed now. Locals say that when they travel and are asked where they are from, they always say “New Orleans” but they are comfortable that the real home is across the parish line.
