Negotiated Geographies of New Orleans’s Place d’Armes, 1789-1852

Abstract

Today, New Orleans’s Place d’Armes (now known as Jackson Square) is a tourist attraction, a must-see in the city’s French Quarter (Figure 1). The square and its surrounding structures look much as they did in 1852, when the debonair designs of Baroness Micaela Almonester de Pontalba, daughter of an influential New Orleans colonist, came to fruition. In the high season, hundreds to thousands o f tourists visit the celebrated plaza to not only have their picture taken in front of St. Louis Cathedral and the statue of General Andrew Jackson, but also to browse sidewalk artists’ works, for Tarot card or palm readings, to listen to street musicians, and to watch magic shows and mimes. These activities in the Jackson Square area have been highly contested for decades and seemingly undermine (to some) itstrue historical, renowned, and genteel status and image of New O rleans. Nevertheless, as I show in this article, such activities, people, and contestations may also be interpreted as a continuation of the square’s past. It is my hope that this historical analysis will serve to support more inclusive perspectives concerning what, and who, are “authentically” part of Jackson Square specifically and public spaces generally. In 1721, France officially platted New Orleans with Place d’Armes as the single and central public square (Figure 2). 1 France planned the colony to be a commercial endeavor in transporting goods to and from the North American continent and intended Place d’Armes to be its cultural, economic, political, religious, and social center. As New Orleans developed into a commercial hub, so too did the status of Place d’Armes. By 1734, the Catholic Church, police, governor, court, and military established buildings along the square. Thus early on, urban order and progress resided literally and symbolically in Place d’Armes, as the open expanse and the b uildings bordering it articulated the location of urbanity and authority in the colony. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, as administrative powers and ownership changed between nations (France, Spain, and the United States), Place d’Armes continued to serve as the functional and symbolic center of New Orleans. Even when, after the Louisiana Purchase, the economic core began shifting from the French Quarter to the American area uptown, Place d’Armes still remained the

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