Where did the people come from?

Where do the people of New Orleans come from? Everywhere! The original inhabitants of the city were Native Americans from a number of tribes that lived along the coast and on Bayou St. John—the connecting bayou between the lake and the area that would become the first European settlement in New Orleans. French settlers arrived in the crescent on the river in 1718 and began building the French Quarter on a grid pattern beginning at the river.

Figuring that it is better for settlers to work together than apart in this harsh environment, the early French government encouraged cooperation among the various ethnic groups that settled the city. More than any other American city at that time, New Orleans was multicultural. Native Americans traded with the new settlers along the river. Africans, both free and slave, interacted with various residents of the city, oftentimes startling northerners who settled in the city. Slaves of the French were often given Sundays off and could often be found dancing to drum beats in Congo Square outside of the French Quarter. Public dance is still important to all residents at parades and festivals. The Spanish ownership of the city influenced much of its architecture, especially after the great fire that destroyed most of the buildings in the French Quarter in 1788.

The arrival of 10,000 French and free black and slaves from San Dominique in 1809 forever changed the makeup of New Orleans and gave the city a unique new ethnic group —Creole. This group of French speaking free blacks prided themselves on their education and sophistication. They bought various spices from the West Indies and combined them with the French roux and okra to give New Orleans one of its most renowned dishes—Gumbo. Unlike other American cities, the Creoles intermingled freely with the whites and were a political and economic force in the city.

When the English arrived in the mid-1800s, they were baffled at the scene of the cultures mixing and the French language being spoken. The English tended to be wealthy northerners hoping to take advantage of the cotton and other port business. A tension developed between the English and other groups in the city, so the English decided to settle upriver in an area now known as Uptown. A streetcar that still runs today connected the areas. A ride on that streetcar illustrates the vast difference in architecture from the French and Spanish styles of the Quarter to the Victorian styles of the Lower and Upper Garden Districts in the Uptown section. These families often hired Creole women to cook and clean, which helped spread the new taste of New Orleans cuisine into that area of the city.

A great influx of Irish, Italian, and German immigrants in the early 1900s brought European craftspeople and laborers who settled along the river in an area known as the Irish Channel. These immigrants would become the butchers, bakers, machinists, and longshoremen of the city. The large Irish population were also hired to dig the extensive canal system in the city where thousands died of diseases contracted in these swamps.

New Orleans is a great gumbo of people and cultures and is unique among American cities. Although not perfect, it shows that when various cultures can appreciate what the other brings to the table, something new and better can emerge.