New OrleansSights

Cultural Building sights in New Orleans

  1. A

    Latter Memorial Library

    Poised elegantly above shady strands of palm on St Charles Ave, the Latter Memorial Library was once a private mansion residence, passed along from the Isaac family (owners 1907–12), who installed Flemish-style caved woodwork, Dutch murals and French frescoed ceilings, to aviator Harry Williams and his silent-film–star wife, Marguerite Clark (1912–39), to a local horse racer named Robert S Eddy, then finally, in 1948, to the Latters. The latter (sorry) converted the mansion into its current form as a library. The bottom floor and the entire exterior facade remain as stately as ever.

    reviewed

  2. B

    Hogan Jazz Archive

    Jazz heads, and really anyone interested in New Orleans music, should pop into the Hogan Jazz Archive; most of its great wealth of material is not on exhibit; the librarian will retrieve items from the stacks for you. That collection includes stacks of 78rpm recordings like early sides by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1917. More casual visitors may enjoy the Storyville Room, with its emphasis on Jelly Roll Morton (who played piano in the district’s bordellos during the early 20th century).

    reviewed