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Feliciana Explorer • Tuesday, February 24, 2015 • Vol. 5, No. 8 • Published Weekly • Circulation 17,000 • felicianaexplorer.com • © 2015

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John M. Barry Addresses the St. Francisville RotaryActivist, scientist, author, educator and coach talks politics

Rotary President David Treppendahl, left, and Rotary past president Sam LeBlanc, right, thank author John M. Barry for his update of the Restore Louisiana Now lawsuit involving the Louisiana oil and gas industry.

By Patricia Stallman

At the St. Francisville Rotary Club meeting Tuesday morning, February 10, Sam LeBlanc cited, among the guest speaker’s accom-plishments: The New York Public Library, in 2005, named his book, Rising Ride: The Great Missis-sippi Flood of 1927 and How it Changed America, “one of the best 50 books in the last 50 years…and that includes fiction, non-fiction, and poetry.”

John M. Barry’s response, when he took the podium, began: “And I coached the 1973 Tulane team that beat LSU 14—nothing!”

Barry’s work to save Louisi-ana’s land, however, to protect it from the power of Nature, is dead-

All Nine Members of East Feliciana Police Jury

Attend State Conference

Survivor of Many Trials and Tribulations: Rosedown Baptist Church of St. FrancisvilleThis is the latest story in the Explorer's series of historical investigations into churches in the Felicianas.

In 1974, the present Rosedown Baptist Church on Highway 10 in St. Francisville re-placed the original 1901 wooden church at the same location.

By Patricia Stallman

Part 1 of 2 Week series:Ministers, Deacons, and Dea-

conesses of the Rosedown Baptist Church

The Reverend Lafayette Veal, Jr., during an interview at his home in Zachary on February 4, 2015, dis-cussed the history of the Rosedown Baptist Church in St. Francisville, where he has served as pastor for 37 years. His father, the Reverend Lafay-ette Veal, Sr., served for the preceding 15 years, from 1962 until his death in 1978. At his father’s funeral, Rev-erend Veal, Jr., recalls, Virginia Ves-sel, then the Mother of the Rosedown Baptist Church, spoke from the pews, looking directly at him:

“I’m looking at my next pastor, this young man sitting by his moth-er…because we called him and bap-tized him.”

As he had actually begun serv-ing alongside his father in 1975, the transition to his own ministry, he says, was a smooth one. When Virginia Vessel, who was born August 3, 1914,

passed away February 14, 2008, Rev-erend Veal says, “I had to ask God for extra strength to preach her eulogy.” She had attended Rosedown since the age of 5 and “served as a role model for the young women of the church, making certain that they continued the long tradition of wearing cha-pel caps and other dress appropriate for worship.” The caps, which were open-work or solid-material, veil the women’s heads, the minister says, as scripture requires.

The pastor notes that others who currently assist with the Rosedown ministry are the Reverend Iona Veal, his wife; the Reverend Linda Arm-strong; Minister Mary Cummings; and the Reverend Donald Milton.

The Reverend Veal, Jr., provided the following list of Rosedown Bap-tist Church ministers, the first six of whom, according to his best recollec-tion, served beginning in 1901, when the congregation moved from the orig-inal building behind the Rosedown

By JameS ronald SkainS

“This may not seem like a big deal to some people, but to be able to have all nine members of the East Felici-ana Police Jury attend the State Po-lice Jury Convention in New Orleans a couple of weeks ago was a big thing for our parish,” Dennis Aucoin, five- term president of the EFP Jury told the Feliciana Explorer.

“I really pushed for this to hap-pen because I feel there is so much information that a Juror can pick up at a convention that they would oth-erwise miss. I think my regularly at-tending the Police Jury Conventions have helped me to be a better Juror to serve the people in my district. By attending the convention, you get a chance to network with Jurors from

2 Tuesday, February 24, 2015

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BARRY continued from page 1

ly serious. After Hurricane Ka-trina, he served, his online biogra-phy notes, “on both the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Au-thority East (SLFPAE), which oversees levee districts in metro-politan New Orleans, and on the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority."

In discussing his role with those boards, he discussed the reason he has been much in the news: the lawsuit SLFPAE filed against 97 oil, gas, and pipeline companies over coastal land loss.

SLFPAE got involved, he said, because the disappearance of land outside the levees increased the storm surge against the levees, which made protecting people from hurricanes more difficult.

“So we started looking at the causes and found that while the oil and gas industry is not the only cause, it's one of the biggest,” the author told the Rotarians. “We looked at the threat to New Or-leans, (and) we thought we had no choice but to do what we did.”

Barry emphasized that he’s "not against the industry" and like many in Louisiana once worked for it. But he quoted a study by the Mid-Continent Louisiana Oil and Gas Association, the trade association for major oil compa-nies, which concluded that in the parts of the state where land loss was greatest "the overwhelming cause" of land-loss was industry operations.

"That's not me saying it," he pointed out. "The industry's own study said it—that the industry

was ‘the overwhelming cause.’” He also quoted a 2006 Department of Natural Resources study that blamed 76 percent of land loss in the Barataria and Terrebone basins on industry operations. The DNR study reads:

“The dominant mechanism for land loss in the identified resto-ration areas was altered hydrol-ogy associated with oil and gas exploration and drilling (64 per-cent). The second largest process contributing to land loss was the direct removal of wetlands during the dredging of exploratory canals and wellhead access canals (12 percent).”

Next he cited laws going back to 1920—laws that, over the years, grew increasingly explicit—which required the industry to avoid damage and to repair any damage it caused. Since 1980 the law has said that the industry, after finish-ing its operations, must “restore” coastal lands “to the pre-existing conditions."

During his Tuesday morning address, Barry reminded the Ro-tarians that the lawsuit asks the industry "to do what you hope all

parents teach their kids: Keep your word, obey the law, and take re-sponsibility for your actions.”

He told the audience that eight months before SLFPAE filed the lawsuit, he met with Garret Graves, now the new congressman who was then Governor Jindal's top coastal adviser and who has many times said publicly that the industry is liable. Barry told Graves what SLFPAE was consid-ering and suggested meeting with industry leaders to try to work out a statewide deal without litigation. According to Barry, "Graves said, ‘I already tried that. They're not there yet.’ That was the clincher for our board in deciding to go for-ward with the suit. They wouldn't come to the table. How do you get them there?”

Initially Barry hoped Jindal would use the suit as leverage to get the industry to negotiate. In-stead, Jindal removed Barry from the board and worked hard to get the state legislature to pass a law retroactively killing the lawsuit.

Barry stepped up to the political challenge by forming a nonprofit, Restore Louisiana Now (restore-

Tuesday, February 24, 2015 3louisiainanow.org) to fight back. He says, "Whether you agree with the lawsuit or not, the idea that an industry thinks it's above the law, that it can go to politicians and have them tell the courts what to do, that it can have a legislature kill a lawsuit that's already been filed…that has to offend every American. Nobody is above the law."

Had the industry followed the law, Barry said, there would be no lawsuit. He also pointed out that taxpayers are now paying to do what regulations required the industry to do. “Why,” he asked, “is the taxpayer being used to fix the oil and gas companies’ dam-age? The current Fiscal Year 2015 plan has the taxpayer paying $39 million in just one project to fix what the oil and gas industry did—and there are dozens of proj-ects.” Another of many examples Barry provided of the industry’s ignoring the law is a dry well that a company dredged in 1984. The permit required the well to be “plugged within 90 days." It wasn’t plugged, and 30 years later taxpayers paid $5 million to plug it, he said.

A consensus of experts agrees that if nothing is done, much of the remaining Louisiana coast will disappear. A map used by the state's Coastal Protection and Res-toration Authority projects what the coast will look like in year 2100. Barry pointed to it and said, “You’ll have to get from the New Orleans airport to New Orleans by ferry. Dulac will be gone. Coc-odrie…forget Cocodrie.”

Restore Louisiana Now is “not against the industry, but we have a real problem that the industry (was

heavily involved) in creating” the land-loss problem…“and we think it should be held responsible.”

Barry noted that a Rotary stan-dard is to ask, “Is it the truth?” and cited one industry representa-tive who has for years claimed that lawsuits against it would “drive the industry out of Louisiana,” costing jobs. During a deposition under oath, however, the execu-tive could provide “no evidence that what he was saying was true.” When the questioner asked him, “Are oil and gas companies leav-ing?” he answered “Yes.” When the questioner asked him to name one, he answered, “I can’t.”

Last year the legislature did pass a law killing the lawsuit, but a court has already thrown that out, Barry notes. The industry is going to ask the legislature again this year to pass another bill to kill it. “It should offend you,” Barry said, “that the oil industry went to the legislature to kill a lawsuit that has already been filed. That is offensive.” Senate Bill 1, the first bill of the 2015 session, “is against the lawsuit” that would hold the oil industry responsible for the actions the results of which few dispute. “It is not the business of the legislature,” Barry said, “to tell people they are not supposed to go to court.”

The real goal of the lawsuit is “a state-wide deal which would release the industry from liability on the condition that it work out a reasonable solution." As Rotary stands for “good citizenship,” he said, “I urge you to talk to your state legislator. "

Of the Governor’s role, Barry said, “All he has to do is pick up the phone and call some execu-

tives and say, ‘Let’s work it out.’”In lieu of that simple option,

citizens who love Louisiana, Bar-ry said after the meeting, may do-nate to Restore Louisiana Now at RestoreLouisianaNow.org or at: Restore Louisiana Now, 6221 S. Claiborne Avenue, Box 626, New Orleans, LA 70125.

Publishers Note: With regard to the wetlands damage lawsuit, which the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority—East filed against more than 90 oil com-panies, U.S. District Court Judge Nannette Jolivette Brown dis-missed the case on Friday, Febru-ary 13, several days after Author John M. Barry’s address to the St. Francisville Rotary Club.

The suit asked that the oil and gas industry repair the damage

it has caused to wetlands and to levee effectiveness through its ac-tivities, which have included the construction of navigation canals. Restore Louisiana Now President Barry says that the ruling will be appealed to the 5th circuit.

“This was going to involve an appeals court sooner or later ei-ther way,” Barry says. “This rul-ing means that that involvement is going to come sooner rather than later."

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Plantation main house to the present location that fronts on Highway 10, still on the grounds of the plantation. The first six ministers are: the Rever-end Gus Hayes, the Reverend Richard Ball, the Reverend Eli Perkins, the Reverend Willie Hall, the Reverend Ned Dixon, and the Reverend John Johnson.

Next came the Reverend Major Payne (b. 1886—d. 1980), a veteran of World War I, who, the church history notes, “served (Rosedown) faithfully until his failure in health caused him to resign in 1962.” Church Member Dor-othy Armstrong notes that the Rev-erend Payne served both Rosedown and “Violet Pate’s church, Afton Villa Baptist Church,” which is the oldest African American church in the area. He is buried at the Rosedown Baptist Church on Highway 10. Ms. Arm-strong also wonders whether some of the first six pastors could have begun their service on the grounds at the first church.

Following Reverend Payne in 1962 came Reverend Lafayette Veal, Sr., through whose efforts, the history reads, as well as those of the “coura-geous men and women of vision” he served, “Rosedown’s blessings have been preserved.”

The Reverend Veal, Jr., lists as trustees, or deacons who served un-der his father in the 1900s: Washing-ton “Wash” Berry (b. 1894—d. 1978), Eddie Brooks, Jerry Brooks, James Dunbar, James Hardy, Ernest Neal (b. 1920—d. 1972), and Calvin Veal (a younger brother of Reverend Veal, Jr.).

Trustees in the Reverend Veal, Jr.’s, administration include: Bruce Brooks, Eddie Brooks, Robert Brooks, Willie Irvin, Calvin Veal (until he left to min-ister his own church in Port Allen), and Jones Veal (the namesake of his pater-nal grandfather).

Deaconesses during both the Rev-erend Veal, Sr.’s and Jr.’s, adminis-trations include: the Mother of the Church Alice Smothers Armstrong, Sister Mary Armstrong, Sister Pearline Armstrong, Sister Adeline Cummings and her daughter Elnora Armstrong, Sister Charlotte Davis, Sister Dora Da-vis, Sister Nell Dunbar, Sister Matilda Haile, Sister Rosetta Lee, Sister Laura Moncrieff, and Sister Virginia Vessel.

Mother of the Church Alice Arm-strong’s Family History

Mother of the Church Alice Arm-strong reports that her parents were Anna Smith Smothers of Napoleon-ville and the Reverend Major Smoth-ers, who pastored the Afton Villa, St. Luke, St. Andrews, and Hollywood

churches and perhaps the Wyanoke church as well. He worked as a car-penter in St. Francisville. The surviv-ing Smothers children are: Alice S. Armstrong and Emily S. Williams of St. Francisville; Richard Smoth-ers, George Smothers, and Georgia Smothers Shropshire of New Orleans; and Sarah “Sissy” Smothers Bowden. The eldest son, Major Smothers of St. Francisville, is deceased. The remain-ing five children died as infants.

When she was 16, Alice Smoth-ers Armstrong married Johnson Arm-strong, whose parents were Mary Louise Jones Armstrong and Gaston Armstrong.

The children of Johnson and Alice Smothers Armstrong are: Lily Mae Armstrong of New Orleans, Helen Armstrong and Mildred Armstrong of St. Francisville, Shirley Smoth-ers Williams and Francina Smothers Jones of Baker, and Dwight Arm-strong and John Fred Armstrong of St. Francisville. When Johnson Arm-strong died young in 1964, the baby was 7 and the oldest child 12.

The Reverend Lafayette Veal, Jr.’s, Family History

The Reverend Veal, Jr., says that his paternal grandparents were Jones Veal of St. Francisville, who died at age 84 (the year is unknown; however, his tombstone is at Afton Villa Bap-tist Church) and Edna Sheffield Veal of Napoleonville, who died at age 86 (the year is unknown; however, she also is buried at Afton Villa Baptist Church). He recalls his grandmother’s great happiness when, at age 78, the Reverend Sam Marshall Johnson of Afton Villa baptized her. She “knew a lot about church work and fellow-ship, as my dad used to talk to her all the time about why she had not joined through baptism, and she would say, ‘I’m going to do it someday.’ And she did.”

Although the Reverend Veal, Jr., does not remember the names of her brothers and sisters, he remembers her sisters visiting her in St. Francisville.

Of his paternal grandfather, Jones Veal, the Reverend Veal, Jr., knows only that Jones Veal served as a trust-ee for Afton Villa Baptist Church and that Willie Veal was his brother.

He recalls the happy days when his siblings and he stayed with their grandmother Veal while their parents worked.

Of the family of his mother, Elmina Johnson Veal of St. Francisville, Rev-erend Veal, Jr., knows little beyond the names of her parents: Alex John-son, who died at age 56 (the year is unknown; he may, however, be buried at Afton Villa) and Sallie Smith John-son. He recalls that his grandmother’s sister, “Doll,” couldn’t hear or speak

“but could make the best cakes…and could call my grandmother’s name, ‘Sallie.’”

Of the Reverend Veal, Sr.’s, 10 children, he himself baptized eight, while the Reverend Veal, Jr., baptized the youngest, and the eldest was bap-tized in Cleveland, Ohio, as he had gone to Cleveland when a teenager to live with his Auntie Fannie Anderson.

The seven boys and three girls, in order of their birth, are: Jerry Johnson of St. Francisville, retired from “the mud plant down by the Mississippi River; the Reverend Lafayette Veal, Jr., of Zachary (since 1970), a 1967 graduate of John S. Dawson High School and a circa 1998 graduate of Christian Bible College in Baton Rouge, retired from Crown Zeller-back; Melvin Veal of Boston, a South-ern University graduate who is the vice president of a bank; Diane Davis of Zachary, a teacher with Livonia High School; Calvin Veal, now a minister in Port Allen, but who also worked at Rosedown and at Crown Zellerbach before his ministry; Bernadine Veal, retired from East Feliciana State Men-tal Hospital; Deloris Veal Baker of Baker, assistant guidance counselor, St. Francisville High School; Jones Veal (named for his grandfather) of Zachary, a teacher with the East Feli-ciana Parish school system in Clinton; Chet Veal of Houston, a truck driver; and Patrick Veal, a manager and truck driver for Domino’s.

The Reverend Veal, Jr., recalled his father’s sermons. “Daddy, when he delivered a message, he would rely on the Holy Spirit to move the con-gregation, and did they move! They would be shouting all over the place. My father was both a teacher and a preacher.”

The Owners of the Plantation From Which the Church Grew

As many of those giving the oral history of Rosedown Baptist Church refer to the plantation from which it grew, a brief lineage of the plantation owners follows:

“The contribution of slave labor to the construction and upkeep of the plantation, as well as to the agricul-tural prosperity and wealth accrued by Daniel Turnbull, was immense. Dur-ing peak years of cotton production, Daniel owned 444 enslaved persons with around 250 working just at Rose-down.

The couple had three children—William, Sarah and James Daniel. James Daniel died of yellow fever in 1843 at the age of 7. William married Caroline Butler and had two children, William and Daniel. In 1856, William drowned in a boating accident while crossing “Old River.” He was 27. That left their daughter Sarah. She married James Bowman from the nearby Oak-ley Plantation. They moved into Rose-down and had 10 children, eight girls and two boys. In 1859, Martha and Daniel retired to a wing in the back of the house to accommodate Sarah and James’ growing family.

“After Daniel’s death in 1861, the family saw a steady decline in a way of life that could no longer be support-ed. Rosedown and two other Turnbull plantations were ravaged during the War both by the invasion of Northern troops and by the emancipation of the slave labor workforce. The Turnbull-Bowman family stayed at Rosedown throughout the War, protecting and farming the property as best they could with 250 sharecroppers.

“Martha Turnbull died in Septem-ber, 1896, leaving Sarah in sole pos-session of Rosedown. After Sarah’s death in 1914, her four unmarried daughters (Corrie, Isabel, Sarah, and Nina) took over the plantation. In the

Tuesday, February 24, 2015 5

See ROSEDOWN CONT. on page 8

1920s they decided to open the house to tourists interested in the remnants of the prosperous cotton culture. The sisters made extraordinary sacrifices to hold Rosedown, and when Miss Nina, the last surviving Bowman sis-ter, died in 1955, there were no bills or mortgages outstanding on the property and they still had 3,000 acres of land, the 28 acres of gardens, and the house with all its furnishings. The family was Episcopalian and its members are interred at the Grace Church cemetery in St. Francisville.” (Wikipedia)

Dorothy Armstrong, the sister-in-law of Alice Smothers Armstrong and a member of the Rosedown Baptist Church congregation, recalls that the sisters—she remembers Miss Sarah’s call name as “Miss Pet”—used “water from the creek” and oil lamps through-out their tenure.

“After Miss Nina’s death, Rose-down passed to her nieces and neph-ews, who sold the old plantation. In 1956, Catherine Fondren Underwood, herself an enthusiastic amateur horti-culturalist, purchased it and began an eight-year, $10 million restoration of the house and formal gardens. The Underwoods returned Rosedown to function as a working cattle farm, and restored the old home to its former grandeur. They opened the house for tours in 1964.” (Wikipedia)

During the time of Mrs. Under-wood, whom Reverend Veal, Jr., re-members as “a very nice lady,” both his father and he worked on Rose-down Plantation. Reverend Veal, Sr., was “foreman over the farm and the

mechanic” who repaired all of the machinery as needed. The Reverend Veal, Jr., from the age of 12 until he entered Southern University in Janu-ary 1968 (his father wanted him to major in religion; he completed a year and a half and says now, “Thank God it all worked out”) worked alongside his father or in the flower garden or with the man who served as carpenter and pipefitter.

Then, after the death of Mrs. Un-derwood, a not-so-nice fellow pur-chased the property and did his best to do away with Rosedown Baptist Church.

That test of the congregation’s faith, Reverend Veal, Jr., says, resulted in a proof of the power of prayer and a reminder that St. Francisville’s people respect their shared history, which, for most, is grounded in faith.

Rosedown Baptist Church His-tory

Church Member Helen Armstrong, whose mother is Alice Armstrong, the current Mother of the Church, contrib-uted a history of the church, author un-known, which reads in part:

“Rosedown Baptist Church, a small African-American church lo-cated on the Rosedown Plantation in rural West Feliciana Parish in south-eastern Louisiana, was established initially as a slave church on the Rose-down Plantation in the 1800s. Like many African-American churches in the South, Rosedown Baptist Church had its roots in a religious congrega-tion that was organized on a plantation during the time of slavery. It is signifi-

cant, however, that this church is one of the few African-American churches still located on a plantation.

“It has survived many trials and tribulations over a period of almost 200 years. It survived the oppres-sion of slavery, the hardships of the neoslavery emancipation period, the racial and economic strife of the Re-construction period, and the social and economic changes of the 1970s and 1980s.

“The church has also survived ma-jor structural changes in the Rosedown Plantation system, including changes in the social and economic organiza-tion and the succession of plantation owners….

“(In the 1800s), the Rosedown slave church emerged as a subordi-nated system of the Rosedown Plan-tation. The dominant relationship be-tween the Rosedown Plantation and the Rosedown Baptist Church during slavery (1800s to 1865) was super ordination—subordination…(which) defined the limits of the roles, privileg-es, and power between the plantation and the church, (and) which occurred in a number of forms.

“First, during the early period of slavery, slaves of the Rosedown Plan-tation were permitted by their owner to attend white churches. For example, Grace Episcopal Church of St. Fran-cisville permitted slaves to worship in a separate or partitioned section of the church, (a practice that) reinforced racial segregation and subordination. Also, (in the 1800s) the owner of Rosedown Plantation granted slaves permission to form, on the plantation, a religious congregation that func-tioned as a subordinate system with the larger plantation system.

“The Turnbulls, then the owners,

allocated a plot of land for the church, and a small cemetery to bury its dead. Materials were also provided for the construction of a small ‘praise house’ in the slave quarters north of the ‘big house’ and just past the carriage barn, in an area that is now heavily wooded. The slaves provided the labor to build the church and the owners provided old songbooks and other religious ma-terials.

“Several accounts reveal that some slave masters permitted clergymen to preach to the slaves and some even hired preachers for this purpose. Ac-cording to the minister of the church, the owner of the Rosedown Plantation hired a black preacher, under the direct control and supervision of the owner or the overseer, to serve the spiritual needs of slaves. He was a ‘black fire and brimstone’ preacher who taught that slaves who rejected salvation and were disobedient to their master would be doomed to hell’s fire and eternal damnation.”

Rosedown State Historic Site Re-cords the Oral History of Church Members

Trish Aleshire, the current manager of what is now Rosedown State His-toric Site, also reported in a January 2015 interview that plantation own-ers in the South often used preachers, including white preachers, as a means of controlling enslaved persons. Rose-down Plantation employees provided a copy of notes “according to written material received from the Rosedown Baptist Church.” That history con-cludes: “The full history of the Rose-down Baptist Church probably began in the 1830s or 1840s with the building of the first church by Daniel Turnbull for his slave community.”

6 Tuesday, February 24, 2015

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Births • Engagements • Weddings Obituaries • Anniversaries • ReunionsMilestones

Jessica Ann Morris and Travis John Aslin were married in a 4 p.m. ceremony on October 11, 2014, at The Bluffs Golf Resort in St. Francisville. Pastor Les Colvin, of First Baptist Church Zachary, officiated the ceremony.The bride is the daughter of Russell and Kathy Morris of Pride. She is the granddaughter of Alvin and Betty Morris of Denham Springs, and the late William and Alice Powers of Erwin-ville. The bridegroom is the son of Joe and Connie Aslin of Zachary. He is the grandson of Mildred Aslin of Ethel, the late Rayburn Aslin, and the late Roy and Gladys Hadden of Zachary.

The bride was attended by her matron of honor, Brittany Spinks, and bridesmaids Letrez Cole and Amber Hopkins. The groom was attended by his best man and father, Joe Aslin, and groomsmen Mike Fresina and JaVaughn Joseph. Ushers were Dustin Aslin, the groom’s brother, and David Crapanzano, the bride’s brother. On the evening before their wedding, the groom’s parents hosted a rehearsal dinner at The Bluffs.

Following a honeymoon to Gatlinburg, Tennesee, the couple resides in Zachary.

Jessica Ann Morris and Travis John Aslin wed October 11, 2014

Eager to Serve Christian Center Prayer Breakfast on Saturday

Women Eager to Serve of Breath of Life Christian Center will host its 2nd annual Women’s Prayer Break-fast on Saturday, February 28, 2015, at 9:00 a.m. The church is located at 11214 Bank Street, Clinton, Louisi-ana (directly across from the DMV) The guest speaker will be First Lady Sheilta S. King of the McKowen Bap-tist Church, Dr. Burnett G. King, Sr., Pastor. Tickets are 5.00. Bishop Ed-ward L. & Lady Karen Brooks, Jr., Overseer. To purchase a ticket please call 225-368-7500.

Karen B. Brooks

Boater Safety Course set For February 28

A boater safety course sponsored by the 20th Judicial District Attor-ney’s office will be held on Saturday, February 28, 2015, from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the American Legion Hall in Clinton located 12024 Lib-erty Hwy. Contact the District Attor-ney’s Office at 683-8563 to pre-reg-ister now, limited seating available!

To submit your MILESTONEfor publication in the Feliciana

Explorer, please e-mail it to info@felicianaexplorer.com

Tuesday, February 24, 2015 7

EVENT RENTALS SAFETY CLASSES

ELECTRONIC REPAIR

SPORTING GOODS

BUSINESS DIRECTORY | CLASSIFIEDS

ARTS, DANCE & MUSIC

AUTOMOTIVE

ANTIQUES

ACCOUNTING/TAXES

CONSTRUCTION

CUSTOM DRAPES

BAIL BONDING

225-936-8649

Fabrics, Slip Covers, Custom Drapery, Roman

Shades,Shutters & Upholstery

Credit cards accepted

“We come to you, FREE estimates”

DOG CARE

INSURANCE

JEWELRY/ACCESSORIES

LAW SERVICES

REAL ESTATE

RESTAURANTS

HOME & LAWN

HEALTH/FITNESS

“God is first in all we do”

DRY CLEANERS

HAIR & MAKEUP

FORMAL WEAR

EVENT PLANNING

CHIROPRACTORSGUN RANGE

All Breeds Dog BoardingObedience & Retriever Training

www.y-farms.com • 225-445-5012

4908 Main St.; Ste. A • Zachary, LA • (Next to O'Reilly's Auto Parts)

Elegantee’ Hair Salon

$5.00 Off for SU & LSU Alumni & Students

Ask for Annesia Quiettor Alisha Jarreau

Shampoo Style, Highlights, Relaxers, Style Cuts & Weaving

Walk-Ins Welcome www.Elegantee.com

(225) 286-4010

MORTGAGE

8 Tuesday, February 24, 2015

ROSEDOWN CONT. continued from page 5

In 1901, the Rosedown church moved from north of the plantation’s main house to its current location, plan-tation property that fronts on Highway 10 in St. Francisville. Material gleaned from interviews that the Rosedown State Historic Site conducted in 2001 with church members Virginia Ves-sel, Eddie Brooks, Lily Pinkney, and William Gilmore verifies the existence of the original church “near the main house” on the grounds of Rosedown Plantation.

Vessel and Brooks said that “the church was built of wood (approxi-mately 20 by 40 feet) on brick pilings, with a large brick fireplace and chim-ney, and that a cemetery for the slaves was either located on one side of, or encircled the church building. Accord-ing to Vessel, the congregation moved to Highway 10 because ‘Mrs. Bowman said there was too much noise from the church.’ After the church moved…the original church building on the Rose-down grounds was apparently used for the storage of horse hay… (and) dur-ing the 1956—1964 restoration of the plantation, the Underwoods demol-ished it.”

In fact, Brooks, in a 2001 inter-view with Rosedown’s Polly Luttrull, said that the Underwoods had “tasked” him, “during the restoration, to dis-mantle the original Rosedown Baptist Church.”

Brooks, the interview continues, “took Rosedown Plantation staff to an area in the woods to one side of the Gift Shop building near the parking area. Found there were numerous piles of old handmade brick and some old boards—all that is currently left of the church building. Brooks also direct-ed staff…to one cast-concrete grave marker with an unreadable inscription.

“Mrs. Vessel recalls that in her childhood she saw wooden crosses and pasteboard markers on graves at the old church building. Though only the one concrete marker remains to-day, there are many shallow depres-sions in the ground around the area that indicate the possible presence of additional gravesites, though the wood and pasteboard markers have likely disintegrated over time.”

Brooks described the church as made of wood with a corrugated tin roof. He said that the church had either “a large brick foundation or pilings be-cause of the number of leftover bricks” and reported that the bricks making up the walkways around the kitchen came from the original church.” He stated further that at the time the Un-derwoods purchased the property, “no

existing evidence of the slave cabins” remained.

The Reverend Veal, Jr., however, says that although all the slave cabins were gone when his dad began pastor-ing, “you could tell where they had been, because you could see the Easter lilies growing in the pastures, circling where each cabin had stood.”

Though Rosedown Curator Polly Luttrull’s interview includes church member George Armstrong’s report that the church was brick, the Rever-end Veal, Jr., remembers “a brick wall alongside a wooden church.”

Rosedown State Historic Site em-ployees are protecting the original church and cemetery site, as it is, they say, “sacred ground.” In the future, ar-cheologists will carefully examine the site to determine the placement of the graves.

The Move to Highway 10Under Reverend Veal, Sr.’s ad-

ministration, the wooden church on Highway 10, according to Dorothy Armstrong, was covered with a gritty material, a rough siding that gave the impression of a brick outer construc-tion. Then, in 1974, Reverend Veal, Sr., oversaw the tearing down of the wooden church and the building of the present-day brick church in its place, though about 15 feet further west of the cemetery.

If the question of demolishing the original 1901 church “had come un-der my administration,” the younger Reverend Veal says, “it would still be standing. It was beautifully made, and it was historic.

“That old wooden church was tightly built. They didn’t use saws to build it; they used axes to hew out the lumber for the seals that went under the church. Those seals were still solid when they took the church down in 1974. No wind or rain came through that foundation or through the walls. The only way you could tell when it rained was hearing the rain strike the tin roof.”

The Reverend Veal, Jr., also regrets the sale of the old pews, which, he says, “were beautifully made,” and, especially, the sale of the black horse-drawn hearse, which had “glass on the sides” so that the casket was visible, and “a black seat across the front for the driver.” Though the church bought the hearse under the administration of the Reverend Payne and had stopped using it by the time of his father’s ad-ministration, the Reverend Veal, Jr., remembers seeing it in a shed to the back and right of the church.

To be Continued in the March 3 edition...

JURY continued from page 1

all over the state. You hear about what is working and not working in other parishes.”

“We have some very informative sessions that are helpful to managing the parish. The equipment vendors keep us up-to-date on all the new equipment plus there are plenty of videos to watch on new equipment. There are plenty of opportunities to learn how to be a better Police Ju-ror at these conventions if you want to take advantage of them. I was re-ally pleased that for the first time in memory, all Police Jurors from the Parish attended the state convention the same year.”

The 2015 Police Jury Convention was held at the New Orleans Mar-riott on January 29-31. Others from EFP Jury attending the convention included John “JR” Rouchon, Parish Manager, Edward Brooks, Sr., Keith Mills, Chris Hall, Jason McCray, Larry Beauchamp, Louis Kent, Sean P. Smith, and Dwight Hill. Signifi-cant number of vendors who do busi-ness with Police Juries all over the state had exhibits at the convention.

“One interesting possibility that I heard at the Convention was that some Parishes were taking advan-tage of the low asphalt prices due to low oil prices,” Aucoin pointed out. “You can get a mile and a half of road laid now for the cost last year to lay just one mile. In my opinion, this is a good deal even if a Jury had to bor-row the money to lay the asphalt at the lower prices.”

“This is an opportunity that I think a lot of Police Juries around the state are doing. I think the East Feliciana Jury should take a serious look and have discussions about laying asphalt on roads sooner than later when pric-es have gone back up. Another issue that was talked about was how dif-ferent Parishes we handling their lit-ter pick-ups. We’ve already started a more aggressive program to help that issue with our Sheriff.”

Aucoin, who has attended all but one State police Jury Conventions held since he took office as a Juror, noted; “We had plenty of outside speakers at the convention. Buddy Caldwell, our state attorney Gen-eral was there and spoke. All the an-nounced candidates for Lt. Governor and Governor were there and spoke. Billy Nungesser seems to have a real passion about wanting to be Lt. Gov-ernor.”

“There seems to be a good group of candidates for Governor. John Bel Edwards is an impressive guy. Dur-

ing the Katrina clean-up he was very helpful to East Feliciana. He repre-sents the eastern portion of the parish in his House of Representatives Dis-trict. It will be a long race to the finish line next October 24 when we go to the polls to vote for Governor. Even though he has been a very good State Representative, I think he will have an uphill fight because he is running against a sitting US Senator and the current Lt. Governor. Plus Edwards is a Democrat in a Republican state.”

Aucoin as well as all eight other EFP Jurors will be up for re-election in October. Aucoin’s district runs from south of Clinton east on Hwy. 63 to the parish line and then down Plank Road to the East Baton Rouge Parish line.

“I think we have a good efficient dedicated Police Jury at the present time in the Parish,” Aucoin elaborat-ed. “We have good committees and people on them who take a real inter-est in the Parish.”

“Some people have asked me why we don’t go to a Home Rule Charter type government in the Parish. My first response is that we are a small parish in terms of tax revenue. The first thing we would have to absorb is the cost of making the change and then we would have to pay the Presi-dent Parish a pretty big salary. Of the 64 parishes in the state, 41 are still Police Jury type governments. Of the 23 Home Rule Charter Parishes, most are in the more populous par-ishes with a much bigger tax base.”

“I know there is a little contro-versy brewing over sales tax that was not collected on out of state sales by some of our industries here in the Parish,” Aucoin explained. “I’m con-fident that that situation will work out in a manner that neither the parish nor its industries are hurt financially.”

“One of my big concerns is the upcoming big truck traffic coming out of Gloster, Mississippi hauling pellets to the Port of Baton Rouge. One of the first things that I asked the Drax company representative was if they had considered re-establishing the old Glastonian Railroad. The an-swer was no, which leaves our Parish in the forefront of a huge amount of truck traffic once Drax goes into pro-duction. Our roads will suffer a lot of wear and tear without us getting any money back to repair the roads.”

“My goal for the East Feliciana Parish police Jury for the rest of 2015 is to pursue our road resurfacing pro-gram that we have already started. I want to see us do more to clean up the litter in the parish and to be as fiscally responsible with the Parishes money as possible.”