Memories of my sophomore Religion teacher, Brother Ivy Leblanc, SC.
Mr. Thomas Ridgley (SA ’51), his wife Elaine, and Brother Ivy LeBlanc, S.C., at the annual Prayer Breakfast, 2009.
Brother Ivy Leblanc, SC
I was devastated when I received an email last week, asking for prayers for Brother Ivy. The school shared that Brother was not doing well, and his doctors decided on palliative care, to ease his passing. He passed yesterday. Others will eulogize and honor a man who dedicated his life to the Institute and specifically, Brother Martin High School. Here are some personal thoughts and memories of a wonderful man.
The “cool young Brother”
I first met Brother Ivy in the fall of 1973, as a tenth grader. I walked into one of the classrooms in the downstairs Resource Center, finding a younger teacher directing us to sit anywhere for that day. He introduced himself, and that led to a fun year. My fondest memory of Brother Ivy the teacher was the second or third day of the class. Catholic school, just about every class started with a prayer. Brother Leo Godin, SC, always said a Hail Mary. Other teachers, a Glory Be. Brother Ivy starts with the Sign of the Cross, then pauses, rather than offering further prayer. He said, “You know, the Sign of the Cross is, in itself, a complete prayer. So, let us begin, In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”
Talk about things that stick with you, fifty years later.
Vice-Principal
My classmate Bill McGreal (BMHS 1976) did sketches of the administrative team for the 1976 edition of Yesterday, the school’s yearbook. As I assembled images for the book, including Bill’s sketches was a no-brainer. At this time, Brother Ivy was in his second year as Vice-Principal (Discipline). In the 1974-75 school year, Brother Collin Dugas, SC (another great teacher and man of faith) stepped down as Vice-Principal (Academics). He and Mr. Louis Levy were the assistants to the first two BMHS principals, Brother Mark Thornton, SC, and Brother Brice Hendrick, SC. (Brother Brice later left the Institute, but as with everything I use to document the history of the school, I go with who these men were at a particular point in time.) So, I got to the school in the 1971-72 year. It was Brother Brice, Brother Collin, and Mr. Levy. By 1974, Brother Collin struggled with health issues and retired. Mr. Levy moved to Academics, and Brother Ivy stepped into the Disciplinarian role. Bill sketched Brother Ivy a year into what is arguably the hardest job on campus. He caught Brother’s electricity.
Principal, President
Brother Brice left BMHS at the end of the 1974-75 school. So, Brother Donan Berry, SC, came down from Catholic High in Baton Rouge, becoming Brother Martin’s third principal. Brother Donan left in 1978, and Brother Ivy moved into the top job. This 1987 photo shows Brother and Mr. John Devlin, Assistant Principal, displaying an “Excellence In Education” banner awarded the school by the Department of Education. In 1988, the school created the position of President. Brother Ivy became the first in that role, with Mr. Devlin taking over as Principal. This marked the first time a lay person ran the school.
Provincal
This 1999 photo shows Brother Ivy (left), Mr. Tom Benson (St. Aloysius 1944), and Brother Jean Sobert, SC, inspecting the progress of the “St. Aloysius Class of 1944 Gymnasium” and the Ridgley Fine Arts Center. Brother Ivy had moved to the position as Provincial, in charge of the United States Province of the Institute. Mr. Devlin moved up to President, and Mr. Gene Tullier became Brother Martin’s second principal. There’s a bit of a story behind this photo. As I put together this chapter of the book, the Development Office asked if I could work in a photo of Tom Benson. Benson was a controversial figure, as a businessman and owner of the New Orleans Saints. I came across this photo in Mr. Spellman’s office and thought, this is perfect. Brother Ivy and Brother Jean were both icons.
Legacy
Brother Ivy LeBlanc guided both the school and the Institute through a period of incredible change. His memory will bless the school for generations.
“Al Scramuzza Way” at Johnny Bright Playground in Metairie, courtesy WGNO-TV
Al Scramuzza passes at 97
So, we lost Al Scramuzza, the owner of the late, lamented Seafood City, yesterday. He was 97. It was hard to avoid Seafood City’s television ads back in the 1980s. Scramuzza’s aggressive promotion of crawfish over crabs and shrimp increased the popularity of the mudbug. Crawfish were more of a Southwest Louisiana thing up until the 1980s. As their popularity increased, farm-raised mudbugs increased their availability and lowered their cost. Urban stores like Seafood City bought live crawfish from the the swamps. They boiled them, selling the spicy red crustaceans by the pound.
Seafood City became the city’s go-to for live and boiled crawfish. Boiled crawfish on a lenten Friday? Seafood City took care of you. You wanted to have a boil at your house? Go see Al.
And the commercials! So wonderfully local. Al stood tall, along with other local icons like The Special Man.
Talking Baseball
So, throughout my college years in the late 70s and teaching in the 80s, I experienced Al Scramuzza like most folks, watching the commercials and picking up crawfish for gatherings of friends. That changed in the late 90s, however. My now-36 year-old firstborn played soccer at Lafreniere Park and other sports at Johnny Bright Playground, on Cleary Drive, just off Veterans (behind the McDonald’s, if you know #themetrys).
The firstborn enjoyed soccer. I insisted he branch out, however. He played basketball and baseball at the playground. It wasn’t that I dreamt of him playing for LSU or anything. I just wanted him to have basic skills so that he wouldn’t be totally useless in a pickup game later in life.
All-Stars
When he got to Under-10 baseball, things got a bit more serious. At the younger ages, coaches/dads pitched to the boys. Eight-year-olds used a pitching machine. By U-10, however, they actually pitched. Additionally the kids moved into the world of inter-playground all-star teams. That’s when I met Coach. I saw him come over to the field where my boy’s team practiced, to talk to the coach. A mom turned to a dad and asked, is that Al Scramuzza? The dad said, “yes, they call him ‘The Commissioner.’ He handles all the all-star team stuff.
Scramuzza was that grandpa who stuck with the playground, even after his family aged out. He offered the continuity Johnny Bright Playground needed when coordinating with the other neighborhoods.
My boy only played all-stars that one summer, his U-10 season. I’m glad he benefited from having “Coach Al” around.
NORTA and NOPB meet in the Riverfront Railroad Convergence.
NORTA 2004, a 2000-series Von Dullen Streetcar, operating on UPT-Riverfront (Infrogmation photo)
Riverfront Railroad Convergence
Railroads and street railways regularly crossed and ran in parallel. At their peak in the 1920s, New Orleans boasted of over 200 miles of street rail track. Railroads criss-cross streets to this day. As street railway lines decreased in the 1920s to the conversion of the Canal Street line in 1964, By 1988, we had a return of activity in the Riverfront Railroad Convergence.
From 1964 to 1988, New Orleans Public Service, Incorporated (NOPSI) and the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (NORTA) operated a single streetcar line, St. Charles. In the late 1980s, NORTA (which took control of the city’s transit operations in 1984) planned a new streetcar line. They constructed “Riverfront” as a tourist line. This line operated separate from St. Charles. Riverfront’s original route ran from the Morial Convention Center to the French Market. NORTA renovated one of the old L&N/Seabord Coast tracks along the river. They installed standard-gauge trucks on arch roof streetcars they recovered from various sources. The line opened in August of 1988. Since then, railroads and street rail operate in parallel along the river. The New Orleans Public Belt Railroad operates most of the regular railroad traffic along the riverfront.
Streetcars
NORTA 451, one of the original Riverfront cars. (AC Transit photo)
After the expansion and modifications made to Riverfront in the late 1990s, the line morphed from tourist-only to part of the city’s transit system. The line now operates as Route 49, UPT-Riverfront. The line starts at the French Market. It runs along the Riverfront to Canal Street, where it turns lakebound. At Elk Place, the line turns to continue on Loyola Avenue. It terminates at Union Passenger Terminal (UPT), the city’s Amtrak station. So, the current line no longer connects the Convention Center. This was a major shift from Riverfront’s original purpose. It now focuses on moving locals and Quarter tourists rather than conventioneers.
New Orleans Public Belt
NOPB power parked by the NORTA Ursulines Street Station, 2017. (Infrogmation photo)
Meanwhile, NOPB keeps on rolling! While the number of wharves along the riverfront dwindles, the original mission of the Public Belt continues. NOPB maintains the tracks from the Huey P. Long Bridge in Jefferson to the Industrial Canal. Those tracks enable wharf access to all railroads in the metro area.
Vintage “business car” parked on NOPB tracks, 2014. (Infrogmation photo)
Additionally, the NOPB parked their vintage business car by the Old US Mint, until the car was sold.
We’re talking about the Krewe of Proteus, a Lundi Gras tradition.
Mobilius in Mobili photo
Podcast 41 – Krewe of Proteus.
Happy Lundi Gras! The Krewe of Proteus first rolled the streets of New Orleans in 1882. While they’re not the oldest Carnival organization, they’re the oldest that still parades. Here’s the video of the history of Proteus:
Of the three krewes that withdrew from parading in 1992 (Comus, Momus, and Proteus), the Krewe of Proteus returned to the streets in 2000. As we discuss in the pod, Proteus had stronger reasons to return to public view. While the other two krewes hold seniority, Proteus held visibility. Momus paraded on the Thursday before Mardi Gras. That spot now belongs to the Knights of Babylon. Babylon traditionally paraded on Wednesday, and moved up in the pecking order. Or did they? After all, Thursday night now belongs to the Krewe of Muses, one of the super-krewes.
Comus paraded on Mardi Gras night. When they began in 1857, the Mystick Krewe were the only parade in town. Over a century, however, other krewes out-shone the oldest organization. By the 1980s, the Comus parade was essentially glorified transportation to their ball. Worn out from a day of marching clubs, Zulu, Rex, and the truck floats, the majority of Uptown carnival-goers gave up before dusk.
The Comus ball, held for decades on one side of the Municipal Auditorium on Mardi Gras, is still the Big Deal in “society” circles. Even Rex defers to Comus by leaving his own ball and closing out the season with Comus. So, the members of the Mystick Krewe didn’t lose much sleep over not returning to parading. That’s ironic, of course, since they eventually did prevail in court over the city.
Proteus, on the other hand, had the most prominent position of the three. Even before “Lundi Gras” was an event in itself, they embraced the anticipation and excitement of the evening, leading into the big day.
Artist Donabeth Jones captured a common New Orleans scene #watercolorwednesday.
Dona
Donabeth Jones – Riding the St. Charles Avenue Streetcar
Watercolor by artist Donabeth Jones. The painting presents a family on the streetcar. Here’s the record in the LDL:
Interior view of a streetcar showing a woman holding a baby and a girl sitting on a seat. Behind them is a man dressed in blue shirt, pants and baseball cap. The woman wears a pink dress, yellow hat and earrings and gray shoes. The small boy in her arms is dressed in yellow; the young girl wears a blue dress, pink hair ribbon, white anklets and white Mary Jane shoes.
While Jones painted this watercolor in 1997, the well-dressed mother and daughter harken back to earlier times. Perhaps this family rode the streetcar to church. Folks shopped casually in 1997. Canal Street declined as a shopping destination by the 1980s.
The streetcar
The St. Charles Streetcar line switched to the 1923-vintage arch roof streetcars towards the end of the 1920s. Under New Orleans Railway & Light (NORwy&Lt), the 400-series arch roofs ran on this line. So, both were designed by Perley A. Thomas. Thomas designed the arch roofs for Southern Car Company. He started his own company to fill a second order for arch roofs in 1923. New Orleans Public Service, Incorporate (NOPSI) operated the transit system at that time. So, they continued using the design.
The New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (NORTA) continues operation of the arch roofs to this day. Additionally, NORTA maintains the streetcars to the specifications of their National Historic Landmark designation. Mom, daughter, and baby sit on one of the wooden bench seats. The back of the seat is hinged. So, when the streetcar changes from outbound to inbound, riders can flip the sit to sit forward. The young man behind them sits on a bench seat mounted into the side of the streetcar. Those seats are right behind the operator. He would be expected to give up that seat close to the door for a rider with special needs.
Designers created a red costume for Queen Zulu 1997. (cross-posted to krewehistory.info)
Queen Zulu 1997
Costume for Queen Zulu 1997. Here’s the LSM record for the watercolor:
Costume drawing for queen’s costume, Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, queen was Mercedes Antoine-Robert (wife of king), standing figure in large costume in watercolor shades of pale red, gold scrolls, wearing “Z” headpiece, signed “Colombo” l. r.
This illustration is part of the extensive Carnival Collection at the Louisiana State Museum.
Zulu Royalty
Carnival organizations use a number of methods to choose their kings, queens, and other “royalty.” For example, the School of Design’s choices for King of Carnival (Rex) are usually civic leaders. They don’t necessarily have to be a member of the organization. Endymion chooses their king via a lottery. Members desiring kingship pay a fee, their name goes in a hat, and the last name remaining in the hat as they draw them out becomes king.
Zulu holds an election for their king. Candidates for the position “campaign” by holding lavish parties and dinners for voting members. The club votes, and the man elected chooses his queen. Many Zulu kings select their wives to be their queen. That’s what happened in 1997. Reigning as Zulu the King is an expensive proposition, between the “campaign” and actual expenses for the parade and ball.
Carnival artwork
This watercolor is signed “Colombo.” I haven’t researched who this artist is. If you have more details, please comment or drop me a note. These illustrations are incredible. They offer a vision to the costumers. Those folks build on that vision, lifting it from the page.
LSM Tour
While they don’t offer a tour every year, the tour of the LSM Carnival Collection is absolutely worth the price of admission. The tour is sponsored through the Friends of the Cabildo, so members of that organization get dibs on reservations. The curators pull out all sorts of interesting pieces from the collection that you can walk through and see up close. It’s a blast.
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