St. Bernard Parish, Day Two

Today I learned how to put up siding. In fact, I spent the better part of the day putting up siding. This was in addition to learning how to use a tool that contains a string covered in red chalk which twangs against a wall indicating where the studs are. Our foreman was a mysterious individual who goes by the unlikely sobriquet of Bob-Rob. Bob-Rob cultivates an air of mystery about him. He doesn’t like having his picture taken, and when asked questions about himself or his background, he gives vague answers. But he is amusing. And he appears to know what he is doing.

My theme for today’s blog is the history of St. Bernard Parish. (Full disclosure: much of this information is gleaned from Wikipedia, so if you are one of those cats who doubt the veracity of Wikipedia, I warned you.) It’s named after the saintly namesake of Bernardo de Galvez y Madrid, Conde de Galvez, who was the governor of Spanish Louisiana during the American Revolution. Galvez himself is the namesake of Galvez, Louisiana, which is located ten miles southeast of Baton Rouge. The area was largely settled (by white people, anyway) by Canary Islanders in the 1780s when Louisiana was a Spanish possession. You’ll see a lot of Spanish surnames around here. Today is election day, and the parish clerk of the court, Lena Torres, was reelected, while parish president Henry "Junior" Rodriguez, Jr. is headed for a run-off. Among the less-successful candidates were Randy Nunez and Troy Saavedra. The Canary Islanders are referred to as Isleños, and there is an Isleños Museum here as well as an Isleños Fiesta every march.

Maybe the Spanish influence explains the funky accent people have here. The locals couldn't be friendlier, and they can be so appreciative it's almost embarrasing. Even though New Orleans is less than 20 miles from here, the local accent is distinct. Hard would come out more like "hahd" in New Orleans, but in "Da Parish" it's more like "haud." And if here in New Orleans is "hyah," in St. Bernard it sounds like "heeyuh." If I knew more about linguistics I could explain this in terms of schwas and elongated dipthongs and whatnot, but then almost nobody would understand would I was talking about.

One of the most famous local Isleños is the late Leander Perez, Sr. This dude was a real son-of-a-bitch. During the first half of the 20th century, he was the local boss of the political machine that ran St. Bernard and neighboring Plaquemines Parish as well. He was the sort of cat who defined the corrupt political machine. Voters were physically intimidated, all sorts of fake names were included on voter rolls, and Perez’s candidates routinely one more than 90% of the vote. Then he decided to become a militant segregationist. "Don’t wait for your daughters to be raped by these Congolese" is a typical example of his vile rhetoric. To give you an idea of the depth of his corruption, after his death the parish government sued his heirs for $82 million dollars. One of the main roads in St. Bernard Parish is named Judge Perez Drive. The locals realized that this is not really the sort of person you want associated with your community, and today the road is named after a local judge named Melvyn Perez. Still, when people around here refer to "Judge Perez," the person, rather than the street, they are usually talking about Leander Perez, Sr.
Camp Hope, the spot where I’m staying, is housed in a once and future middle school named after P.G.T. Beauregard, the greatest of the Deep South generals. Beauregard was actually born on a plantation here in St. Bernard Parish. People in the South love naming stuff after Confederate figures. In my hometown there’s a street named after Jefferson Davis. Despite the fact that many people think my hometown is not terribly Southern (which of course is not really a town at all, but America’s smallest county), it’s named after Robert E. Lee’s house. You know, the one the Yankees turned into a graveyard purely out of spite. One of the main thoroughfares in Arlington is Lee Highway. In neighboring Fairfax County, you’ll find the Lee-Jackson Memorial Highway and J.E.B. Stuart High School. There are also a lot of spots named after the Confederate officer most associated with Northern Virginia, Colonel John Singleton Mosby. For those of you who object to naming stuff after Confederate officers, I’d like to point out that he graduated from West Point without a single demerit. While you can blame him for picking the wrong side, you can't call into question either his honor or his character.