Photo by Sarah Andert

I graduated from Marion Abramson High School and can't remember ever knowing who Marion Abramson was. Where could I go to find out who she was and why a school was named after her?

George

Dear George,

The answer to your question is: right here to Old Blake. Read on and you will learn of the woman who was honored with a school named for her.

Marion Pfeifer Abramson was an amazing woman. She was born in New York City on Aug. 29, 1905, but was raised in New Orleans. She was educated at Isidore Newman School and Sophie Newcomb College. In June 1925, she married Louis Abramson Jr.

Her most significant achievement came in the 1950s when she began planning an educational television station for New Orleans. The brilliant idea became a reality when station WYES opened on Oct. 23, 1957. Marion Abramson then chaired the board of directors for the station.

She also was involved in politics and served on the Orleans Parish Democratic Executive Committee. In addition, she was a member of the Independent Women's Organization and in 1959 was elected Parish Democratic Executive Committeewoman for Ward 14 in New Orleans.

After a life of community service, Marion Abramson died on Nov. 30, 1965. It was more than fitting to name a new high school after her.

Hey Blake,

Is it true that the famous writer William Makepeace Thackeray came to New Orleans?

Benny

Dear Benny,

Yes, indeed. During the decade before the Civil War, there were a number of well-known scientists, theologians, historians and writers who delivered lectures that either captivated or bored the citizens of New Orleans.

English novelist and essayist William Makepeace Thackeray toured America twice, making his first visit in 1852. His second tour took him to New Orleans, and in March 1856 he lectured on the four kings named George. Thackeray was warmly welcomed wherever he appeared. He spoke before standing-room-only audiences, and a reporter wrote of the lectures as a 'graphically sketched panorama, the features of which passed before the eye in brilliant procession."

A banquet was given in Thackeray's honor at a restaurant on Lake Pontchartrain. It made a great impression on him, and he described his experience most favorably in a collection of essays titled Roundabout Papers: 'How hospitable they were, those Southern men! In the North itself the welcome was not kinder, as I, who have eaten Northern and Southern salt can testify. As for New Orleans, in spring-time " just when the orchards were flushing over with peach-blossoms, and the sweet herbs came to flavor the juleps " it seemed to me the city of the world where you can eat and dine the most and suffer the least. At Bordeaux itself, claret is not better to drink than at New Orleans. It was all good from the half-dollar Medoc of the public hotel table, to the private gentleman's choicest wine. Claret is, somehow, good in that gifted place at dinner, at supper, and at breakfast in the morning. It is good: it is superabundant " and there is nothing to pay. Find me speaking ill of such a country! When I do, pone me gigris campis: smother me in a desert, or let Mississippi or Garonne drown me! At that comfortable tavern on the Pontchartrain we had a bouillabaisse than which a better was never eaten at Marseilles: and not the least headache in the morning, I give you my word; on the contrary, you only wake with a sweet refreshing thirst for claret and water. They say there is a fever there in the autumn; but not in the spring-time, when the peach-blossoms blush over the orchards, and the sweet herbs come to flavor the juleps."

And by the way, pone me gigris campis is from one of Horace's odes and translates as 'put me in the barren plains."