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Kings & Pawns: Part Two

Kings & Pawns: The Bloodlines of Bourbon-Orléans

Kings & Pawns:

The Bloodlines of Bourbon-Orléans

BY LAURA KUHN

2015



PART TWO:

Salle d’Orléans (The Orleans Ballroom)


Kings & Pawns: The Bloodlines of Bourbon-Orléans

             In today’s modern society, a traditional date night includes dinner and a movie. In 19th century New Orleans, it was theatre and dancing. Show business in the 1800s was on the upswing with the many opera houses booming French and Italian librettos. But after an evening of opera, ladies and gentlemen of Creole society had the urge to dance.

            There were numerous dance halls in town, including Salle de Conde on Chartres Street and Salle Chinoise on St. Philip, but the visionary genius of John Davis and Henry Latrobe had created a sophisticated Terpsichorean ballroom beside the Orleans Theatre in which social, military, and masquerade balls ensued for the next half century.

            This high-style ballroom called Salle d’Orléans, or the Orleans Ballroom in English, became the scene of lavish gaiety in the edifice beside Théâtre d’Orléans in late 1819. Within the walls of striking façade and brilliant lighting, elaborate mirrors, carpets, curtains, chairs, and chandeliers decorated Salle d’Orléans where theatergoers gathered after the show. This gilded palace overlooking Orleans Avenue became an icon not only for hosting the city’s most glorious social events, but also for its strategic position in the layout of New Orleans.

            When Bienville, founder of New Orleans, asked chief engineer Adrien de Pauger to design the city in 1720, Pauger envisioned Orleans Avenue as a thoroughfare. He designed it seven feet wider than any other street in the original city, making Orleans the Grand Rue cutting up the center from the bend in the Mississippi River. It became the pulsating vein at the heart of town, and Salle d’Orléans and Théâtre d’Orléans were the embodiment of its lifeblood.

            During this former age of decadence and dance, the noble class held balls at the high social season of autumn and winter. They celebrated special events such as engagements or weddings, and regularly scheduled masquerade balls delighted fashionable society with an admittance fee of only one dollar.

            The Orleans Ballroom was acknowledged to be the ornament and pride of New Orleans. Not only was the pitted floor and leveled stage of Théâtre d’Orléans renowned for its mastery in operatic staging, but the joining of theater and ballroom allowed dancers to drift from one room to the other as an orchestra filled the richly decorated hall with minuets and waltzes. The balls made Europe envious. The dances fed the soul of New Orleans society. Nights at the Orleans were agreed to be the most impressive galas held on American soil.

            While the music of Haydn, Vivaldi, and Rossetti wafting over the wooden-railing balcony overlooking Orleans Avenue, Salle d’Orléans illuminated each night with enormous crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, hundreds of candles aglow, shadows moving as dancers performed the dances from England and France. With a bow and a curtsey, the Creoles gracefully twirled and stepped to the music, promenading with delight. Figures and partners formed sequences with joining arms and circling steps as gentlemen escorted their ladies to the middle of the floor to begin the allemande, the contredanse, and the cotillion.

            As praises of the Davis Dance Hall flourished, Salle d’Orléans began booking many soirées to entertain distinguished visitors. Certainly the most sumptuous entertainment ever tendered within this building was in honor of Marquis de Lafayette, a French aristocrat and military officer who served as a major-general under George Washington during the American Revolutionary War.

            Nobleman Lafayette visited New Orleans in 1825, an occasion deemed worthy of hosting a grand ball at Salle d’Orléans. After an elaborate supper, some eight-hundred of the city’s most prominent ladies attended the party. Apparently, all were charmed by the aging yet gallant Lafayette. It is said that any glove worn the night of that ball is still a cherished heirloom in local families of ancient lineage.

            Although there is little evidence to support it, the rumor of Andrew Jackson attending the Orleans Ballroom continues to this day. Jackson, whose illustrious name rings heroically throughout the city, was a prominent political figure during the early 1800s after his triumph at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. After his name was nominated on a ballot for presidency, it is said Jackson announced his candidacy for President of the United States within the walls of Salle d’Orléans. Shortly after, Andrew Jackson won the election of 1828 and served as the seventh president for nearly a decade.

            The same year of Jackson’s presidential election, a fire burned the old Capitol Building and forced the State Legislature to find alternate means of housing. The ballroom provided the legislative assembly space, allowing the state senate and city officials to meet until a new Capitol was built in Donaldsonville.

            That was not the last time the ballroom was used as a political meeting space. From 1852 to 1881, the First District Court was in session at Salle d’Orléans. While housing the criminal court of Orleans Parish, cases were heard and justice prevailed within these stanch walls which seemed to serve as more than just an entertainment venue.

            However, the glory days of the old Orleans Ballroom did not last forever. After the opening of a grander ballroom at City Exchange Hotel in 1838, Salle d’Orléans was no longer the crème de la crème in New Orleans. City Exchange became known as the prominent St. Louis Hotel (currently called the Omni Royal Orleans Hotel), which was burned and rebuilt in the 1840s, thereby continuing to compete with Salle d’Orléans for the next twenty years.

            Throughout this era, the early years of Mardi Gras began in New Orleans. The development of this celebration had begun when the city was founded, its traditions crossing the Atlantic from Europe with its founders and early settlers. However, it wasn’t until 1838 that the first documented parade occurred in the French Quarter as maskers celebrated on foot, in carriages, and on horseback. As the party took to the streets, masqueraders threw trinkets to the crowds during the procession. In 1857, the very first Mardi Gras as we know it today began when mule-drawn floats of the Mystick Krewe of Comus introduced lit-torch processions known as “flambeaux” and thematic parades, creating the splendor and pomp of a cherished festivity still practiced in New Orleans each year.

            Generally, the grand finale of these iconic Mardi Gras parades came to an end with a ball at the St. Louis Hotel or Salle d’Orléans, at which only the aristocratic élite was present. At the Bals Masqué (masked balls), mock royalty was presented and honored, the fête reigned by king, queen, maids and dukes. This tradition is continued today during Carnival season.

            Mardi Gras parades rolled through the historic French Quarter for over a century. But as parade floats and crowds increased in size over the years, fire and police departments issued bans during the 1970s, rendering the streets of the original city too narrow for such a massive celebration. But the Orleans Ballroom still links itself to the genesis of Carnival and the great merriment of Mardi Gras, making it an exceedingly important part of the cultural history of New Orleans.

                It wasn’t until 1866 that Théâtre d’Orléans burned yet again, but thankfully the Orleans Ballroom remained untouched by the fire. The ballroom continued its existence for another fifteen years, until its purchase by the Sisters of the Holy Family in 1881, converting it into a convent. The glory and grandeur of the ballroom had been replaced by the sacrament and solidarity of a nunnery, and the social scene of New Orleans was never the same after the demise of Salle d’Orléans.



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