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This illustration shows the devastation in the Vieux Carrą caused by the Great Fire of 1788.
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Courtesy of New Orleans: An Illustrated History
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Hey Blake,
From N. Rampart Street to the river, why are the street names on the east and west sides of Canal Street different?
Gina Schulte
Dear Gina,
To confuse anyone who wasn't born here! Just kidding. There really is a reasonable explanation.
Since our city was founded as a Crown colony, promoter John Law gave explicit instructions to Adrian de Pauger, assistant engineer, who drew up the first general plans for a town. Law said to "call it New Orleans." This name, of course, was to honor the Duc d'Orleans, Regent during the infancy of Louis XV.
Law also made sure that the new town would be associated with the crown by naming streets to flatter the French court and the Catholic Church. Along with Bourbon, Royal, Burgundy, and Orleans were Conti, St. Peter, St. Ann, St. Philip, St. Louis, Toulouse, and Dumaine. The naming of the streets was described as a "masterpiece of 18th-century diplomacy."
The little settlement established by Bienville in 1718 was nearly wiped out by a hurricane in 1722, but it was rebuilt and laid out in a grid pattern of streets around a public square and grew in population.
Forty years later, the French surrendered the city to Spain, a decision not popular with many of the locals. However, the Spanish government hung on, and the city grew in both directions. The Spaniards even named a few new streets themselves.
In 1788 came a disaster that almost destroyed the city a second time: the Great Fire on Good Friday, March 21. About 1,000 buildings were destroyed in less than six hours.
Soon after came the Spanish governor from 1791-97, Francisco Louis Hector, Baron de Carondelet, who built and strengthened fortresses around the city and dug a canal that ran from Bayou St. John to the back door of the city. He also added a rampart at the back of town. And today we have Carondelet and Rampart streets.
Beyond the city were the commons, and beyond these were the huge upriver plantations belonging to the Jesuits. This land was located on the uptown side of the Canal Street we know today. Near the end of French rule in Louisiana, the Jesuits were banished, and their property was confiscated.
Six men purchased the property. But the biggest slice of the property eventually ended up in the hands of Marie and Bertrand Gravier who, in 1788 after the big fire, laid out four rows of lots along Tchoupitoulas Street, the Royal Road. Six years later there was another fire in the city, and Gravier added more lots. Because of the two fires, many people were interested in moving to Gravier's new subdivision which he called Ville Gravier and later renamed Faubourg St. Marie in his wife's honor when she died.
For the most part, the first streets in Gravier's subdivision were named for various landmarks such as Magazine Street, Commons Street and Camp Street. Of course, there was a Gravier Street. Poydras Street is named for Julien Poydras, who claimed that it was he who suggested to Gravier to divide up his lands. Poydras persuaded Gravier by promising to buy the first lot. He kept his promise and paid $1,000 for the corner spot on Tchoupitoulas and today's Poydras Street. Another street, Girod, was named for another investor who bought property from Gravier: Nicholas Girod. Julia Street, as the legend goes, was named after a slave, Poydras' cook. But in reality, Julie was the nickname for Julien, and on early maps the name of the street is Julie. A street also honored the Baron Carondelet's wife, the Baronne. And St. Charles Street, like one of the forts around the city, was named for the King of Spain.
Canal Street, as we know it, did not come into being for many years. Originally meant to be a canal that would connect the one dug by Carondelet to the Mississippi River, it never happened. But from the beginning, it was the dividing line that separated the French in the original Vieux Carre and the Americans in the Faubourg St. Mary.
And forever after, the streets on each side of Canal Street continue to cause confusion.
