About

LouisianaHistory.info, an entirely non-commercial website, presents timelines based on original documents, academic works, transcripts, media articles, newspapers, academic journals, and a host of other materials that provide the sources for the timelines the site maintains. The timelines are divided into the following seven time periods:

1) The Colonial Period – events prior to the Louisiana Purchase on 5/2/1802;

2) The American Period – from the Louisiana Purchase to the beginning of the 20^th century;

3) The Modern Period – Jan 1, 1900 to 8/22/2005;

4)The Warnings – from the formation of Tropical Depression 12 near the Bahamas on 8/23/2005 through 8/28/2005;

5)The Storm – 8/29/2005 until the city was “drained” on 10/11/2005;

6)The Recovery – from 10/12/2005 until 9/30/2015;

7) The Contemporary Period – from 10/1/2015 to the present.

This site is an outgrowth of our original site KatrinaArchives.org and expands upon the history and culture of Louisiana.

The following items should be noted:

The history of Louisiana does not begin with Europeans and their explorations. For a detailed analysis of the indigenous presence in the area, refer to the works of Daniel H. Usner, Jr. of Vanderbilt University. https://as.vanderbilt.edu/history/bio/daniel-usner In addition, we are currently adding entries on the Indigenous population located throughout Louisiana.
The language we use to talk about Katrina and its aftermath brings an immediate bias to our understanding of the event. How we frame our narrative determines how we understand the history. If Katrina was a natural disaster, we improve our weather gathering services and evacuation policies. If Katrina was a levee failure, we demand the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers build bigger and better levees. If we identity Katrina as a confluence of events dealing with race, climate, economics, geography, and other factors, we begin a deeper understanding of the term “Katrina.” For a nuanced analysis of how we talk about Katrina , see Richard Campanella’s article, “A Katrina Lexicon.” https://placesjournal.org/article/a-katrina-lexicon/
The Timelines presented here are sometimes best estimates of the exact time or day an event occurred. The estimated times are designated by the abbreviation [T.E.*]. The estimates are sometimes based on the context of the record and other factors. In some instances, when sources provide just a month and year, we use the first of the month as our entry.
Accuracy: Every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the data presented here. Since the website contains over 2,000 records with multiple fields, we would appreciate any corrections. Please email corrections to admin@louisianahistory.info.
Keywords: We have attempted to categorize events based on Keywords which are subject matter categories to aid in the search process. These Keywords can be used in the search boxes on the Timeline pages. For site-wide search, use the Keywords displayed on the bottom of the Home Page. These Keywords are subjective, and improvements are appreciated. Write admin@louisianahistory.info.
Commercial Sites – users are encouraged to refer to the primary sources referred to in this site. For academic books, we have included links to Alibris and, less frequently, to Amazon. We do not receive any consideration for presenting these or any other links on the site. Whenever possible we have linked out entries to publicly available documents. Some links, however, such as the New York Times, JSTOR, and Times-Picayune archives are only available through subscriptions. Access to archives of the Louisiana Historical Association is available to members as part of membership. Times-Picayune articles can sometimes be found through local libraries. See St. Tammany Parish Library. We will gladly provide help to any user who is seeking sources. We cannot provide access to fire-walled documents, however. Finally, users are encouraged to use the Internet Archive when seeking source material. This invaluable service has archived billions of web pages and is available at no cost.

We welcome your feedback. We can be reached at research@louisianahistory.info