Take our virtual visit for a brief look around before your actual visit:
Beau
Bassin
This house, a blend of Creole and
American Greek Revival styles, was built about 1840 of colombage (a
half-timber wall framing system) and bousillage (a mixture of mud and
Spanish moss). The exterior staircase leads up to the garçonnière,
where the older boys in the family slept.
Spinning, weaving, quilting and textile crafts are demonstrated in Beau Bassin. In Canada, Acadian women wove in wool and flax. In this new land, they learned to weave cotton.
La
CabaneThe trapper's cabin, la cabane, is a replica where crucial early survival skills: boat building, net and trap making, and decoy carving are demonstrated. The Acadian settlers lived near water and used the bayous for transportation, communication, hunting and fishing. Even the "prairie Acadians" chose home sites near the bayou because the tree line at the bayou's edge provided firewood, lumber and shade from the brutal summer heat.
L'Académie
de VermilionvilleL'Académie de Vermilionville, a reproduction, is typical of 1890s schoolhouse architecture. In l'Académie, you may see the lines "I will not speak French in school" on the blackboard, recalling the time in the early 20th century when Louisiana law forbade the speaking of Southwest Louisiana's principal language - even on the school playground!
La Maison Mouton
La Maison Mouton is a reconstruction of an 1810 house: a basic four-room Acadian home with a detached kitchen. There were no glass windows; only shutters locked securely against weather and possible intruders. La galerie or porch served as an extra room in good weather and was a marvelous place for social activities.
The cabinet making and other woodworking skills demonstrated here were the essential tasks for the Acadian man. Besides cypress wood, oak and walnut were available. No tools arrived with the Acadians from Canada, but they were given tools by the Spanish government and the blacksmith fashioned new ones as needed.
La Maison
Acadienne
La Maison Acadienne is
unfinished. This little house was probably built as slave quarters - not a
two-room cabin for one slave family but a double cabane for two
families. Look for bousillage and colombage construction.
La
Forge
In the isolation of les
vacheries (the ranches) every household needed someone skilled in
smithing. The blacksmith shop was generally near the center of each community,
sometimes near the church. The smith fashioned agriculture and construction
tools, wagon wheels, hinges and nails. The 'tit fer (a contraction of
petit fer, i.e., little iron) - a triangular shaped musical instrument,
is made at la Forge.
La
Maison Buller
The beautiful Buller home was built c. 1803, its hipped roof the crowning glory. The steeply-pitched roof is typical of Creole construction. One small room opens into the parents' bedroom for the daughters, and the other opens to the porch with no entry to the interior house. This "stranger's room" was available for travelers in the days before commercial lodging. The roof trussing permits the front porch to be supported without columns. All of the major structural members are secured with wooden pegs.
La Chapelle des Attakapas is a reproduction thats style is based on the Catholic churches at Pointe Coupée (1760) and St. Martinville (1773). Catholicism was the only religion tolerated in Louisiana before the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Since the Roman Catholic Acadians and Creoles loved their religion and the priests visited infrequently, they often celebrated la messe blanche (a prayer service conducted by laymen). Slaves practiced the religion of their masters and sat in small pews on the side aisles. Free people of color enjoyed social prestige, were economically independent, engaged in many trades and worshipped at the same churches as whites.
Le
PresbytèreThe tiny cottage attached to the chapel is an example of primitive Acadian architecture. The rafters in the attic are tree trunks left rounded. The rear room was originally a porch. The (rebuilt) fireplace is rough and simple. In a primitive house such as this, one more likely would have found a mud or clay chimney.
Next to the chapel is a simple cemetery. Grave markers were generally made by the local blacksmith of recycled materials. A wreath of flowers made from dyed paper dipped in wax - often hung from the top of the cross.
The Boucvalt house (c. 1880) is a classic 19th century small Acadian/Creole house. Glass transoms let light in and hot air out. The louvered shutters are adjustable. The kitchen and bathroom were added around the turn of the century. Treadle machine sewing and rosary making are crafts that are often demonstrated in this house. The rosaries are made of the seed of the coix lacryma jobi plant, known as Job's Tears.
La Maison Broussard
Fausse Pointe was once the home of
Amand Broussard. Amand arrived in
Louisiana from Canada at the age of
eleven. His father was the famous Acadian resistance fighter, Joseph dit
"Beausoleil" Broussard who died only months after bringing 250 Acadians to
Louisiana after the time of exile from their homeland, le Grand Dérangement.
Amand lived with his brother until he married at the age of sixteen and
registered his first cattle brand the same year. The following year, his wife
died in childbirth leaving him with a son. At eighteen, he was given a land
grant. Four years later Amand married again. Thirteen children were born to
him and Anne Benoît. He was a patriot of the American Revolution and fought in
the Battle of New Orleans during the War of 1812 at the age of 58. When he died
six years later, left an estate worth over $65,000.