1868 Submarine Find -- Conflicts with other information on this page--see 1878 The February 15, 1868 New Orleans Picayune, morning edition, reported: A torpedo boat, which was built in this city...is to be sold at public auction today, by the United states authorities....the boat....was sunk in the canal about the time of the occupation of the city by federal forces, in 1862. It was built as an experiment and was never fully perfected, and is only valuable now for the machinery and iron which is in and about it.' The Picayune afternoon edition claimed the torpedo boat was indeed sold as scrap...for $43. Source: Lake Pontchartrain Basin Maritime Museum Photograph by George Francois Mugnier c. 1890

1870 Milneburg Port declines but Jazz flourishes In 1870, the port declined when it lost much of its cargo to the New Orleans, Mobile and Chattanooga Railroad After 1870...the area (Milneburg) evolved into an entertainment district, as the city's passenger train, the Smoky Mary, carried more middle-class visitors to the resort. Entertainment included jazz, with Sidney Bechet, Louis Armstrong and Danny Barker performing. An Excerpt from the 1999 Land Use Plan New Orleans City Planning Commission. Pictured is Sidney Bechet, a child prodigy in New Orleans. He was such good clarinet player that he featured by some of the top bands in the city, when he was still a child. Bechet's style of playing clarinet and soprano sax dominanted many of the bands that he was in. He played lead parts that were usually reserved for trumpets and was a master of improvisation. In 1939, Bechet played saxophone & sang with Jelly Roll Morton's New Orleans Jazzmen.

1870 The Lake House is destroyed in a fire Lake House Hotel and Restaurant Lake House was a popular hotel at Lake End [i.e., West End] from 1838 until it burned on June 30, 1870. Two kitchen employees of Charles J. Hoyt, the manager of the hotel, were arrested for setting the fire, which leveled one of the city's most popular destinations. It "burnt like a tinderbox," the Times-Picayune wrote, and went on to reminisce about its hospitality: Arrived at the Lake House, the finest cuisine in the land, and a bar supplied with every delicacy and refreshment awaited them. Added to these were the bath houses, the pistol gallery, and a garden shadowed by avenues of fine old trees and blooming treasures. . . . It is like wiping out one of the old landmarks with its storied memories and unforgotten pleasures. Source:http://nutrias.org/~nopl/monthly/sept2000/stereo37.htm posted 2002-04-07 posted 2002-04-10

1870 The Smoky Mary begins transporting citizens from the city to the lake After 1870...the area (Milneburg) evolved into an entertainment district, as the city's passenger train, the Smoky Mary, began carrying more middle-class visitors to the resort. Entertainment included jazz, with Sidney Bechet, Louis Armstrong and Danny Barker performing. An Excerpt from the 1999 Land Use Plan New Orleans City Planning Commission http://int.new-orleans.la.us/cnoweb/cpc/1999_dist_six.htm Photo Credit:http://www.saveourlake.org/lessons/chpt10/

1870 West End 1870-Stereoview card by Woodward Albee Publisher Old, circa 1870-1890, "1558 Avenue West Enda Park, New Orleans, La (Louisiana)". Photo Stereoview card by Woodward Albee Publisher Rochester NY. 7"x 4.25".

1871 Land is reclaimed at West End Beginning about 1871 and fully developed by 1880 the man-made land of West End near the entrance to the Basin, with its park and pathways, bandstand, pavillions and various fun-making features, rivaled the similar recreations of Spanish Fort at the mouth of Bayou St. John.

1873 - Plan plan for the redevelopment of the south shore Source: http://nutrias.org/~nopl/exhibits/ccmem/10.htm This is a detail, showing the West End area, from a remarkable 1873 plan for the redevelopment of the south shore of Lake Pontchartrain in Orleans Parish. The larger plan provides us with several memories: the old, irregular shoreline prior to construction of the seawall, the Spanish Fort amusement park, and the Pontchartrain Railroad pier that allowed the 'Smoky Mary' to take its passengers all the way to the lake. Though never realized, this plan marked the beginning of the planning process that led to the Orleans Levee Board's 1920s reclamation project. [City Archives. Streets Department Records]

1873 Spanish Fort & Bayou St. John From an article article titled "THE GREAT SOUTH: OLD AND NEW LOUISIANA," by Edward King from Volume 7 Number 1 in the November 1873 issue of "Scribner's Monthly." posted 2002-11-17

1874 Mark Twain writes about Spanish Fort in Life on the Mississippi There are good clubs in the city now--several of them but recently organized--and inviting modern-style pleasure resorts at West End and Spanish Fort. Thousands of people come by rail and carriage to West End and to Spanish Fort every evening, and dine, listen to the bands, take strolls in the open air under the electric lights, go sailing on the lake, and entertain themselves in various and sundry other ways. The Entire Novel from Project Gutenburg

1874 Mark Twain writes about the Shell Road in Life on the Mississippi Thence, we drove a few miles across a swamp, along a raised shell road, with a canal on one hand and a dense wood on the other; and here and there, in the distance, a ragged and angular-limbed and moss-bearded cypress, top standing out, clear cut against the sky, and as quaint of form as the apple-trees in Japanese pictures--such was our course and the surroundings of it. There was an occasional alligator swimming comfortably along in the canal, and an occasional picturesque...person on the bank, flinging his statue-rigid reflection upon the still water and watching for a bite.