An Atmospheric Video of New Orleans French Quarter

This great video montage made of New Orleans French Quarter conveys a lot from the local atmosphere. I like walking in the French Quarter especially when the weather is fine. There is jazz swirling in the air, easy going atmosphere, and lots of time on your hands, smiles on the faces. I like to hear 'sweetheart' when buying a cake, hear the ships on the Mississippi river, and, just to be, exist, listen, learn, talk, dream, have fun.




If you wish to learn more about the history of New Orleans French Quarter, check out this site for further info. In a nutshell:

Founded as a military-style grid of seventy squares in 1718 by French Canadian naval officer Jean Baptiste Bienville.

In 1762 the indifferent Louis XV transferred Louisiana to his Bourbon cousin Charles III of Spain.

Francophile colonists staged a revolution in 1768, squelched by Alejandro O'Reilly with a firing squad at the Esplanade fort.

1803 Louisiana Purchase transferred the colony to the US

The "glorious victory" of the 1815 Battle of New Orleans fixed loyalty to the American nation.

Golden era followed as cotton, sugar and steamboats poured into the city. American, Irish, German, African and "Foreign French" immigrants swelled the population of New Orleans

Civil War and Reconstruction: creoles moved to Esplanade and later Uptown, and famine-driven Sicilian immigrants found cramped lodging in the grand spaces of French Quarter mansions of the 1890s.

The 1900 birth of jazz in nearby Storyville nurtured musical legends Louis Armstrong, Buddy Bolden, Nick LaRocca, and other jazz and ragtime greats.

By 1920 the legacy of a storied past attracted artists in increasing numbers. William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote etc. were attracted to the French Quarter for its creative stimulus.

1936 marked the onset of regulatory controls in the form of the state-sanctioned Vieux Carré Commission to preserve the quaint and distinctive character of the old Quarter.

1960s traditional jazz in decline, Preservation Hall emerged to serve beleaguered musicians.

2005 Hurricane Catrina

Historical facts based on the Brief History of French Quarter by Sally Reeves