Longfellow-Evangeline State Park

One of the great things about travel is how it helps you refresh things you learned long ago and forgot. Yesterday's lesson was to renew and expand our knowledge of Longfellows poem Evangeline and its connection to the Acadian culture in Louisiana. Apparently Longfellow heard the possibly mythical story of a young woman displaced from Canada as part of the deportation of the Acadian settlers from Nova Scotia by the British government, which feared them as an unstable (Catholic and French speaking) influence as they took over Canada. Many of them ended up in this part of Louisiana, an area of bayous to the northwest of New Orleans. Though Longfellow was never here, the story caught on and there is now a state park named after him and his lead character, which features Acadian (often termed Cajun) history in the area. We saw a plantation house where the landowner lived (not huge, like the Nottoway), and smaller houses that the farmers lived in. The larger red house is the plantation house, the weathered wood house is the smaller one. In one picture you see Spanish moss hanging out to dry. It was an important commodity, pulled from the trees and processed to be used to stuff chairs, mattresses and even horse collars! Finally there is a large old oak tree that legend says is where Evangeline met her love.

On to The Johnson space center in Houston today.