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Cajun Food, Louisiana History, and a Little Lagniappe

~ Preservation of traditional River Road cuisine, Louisiana history & architecture, and the communities between Baton Rouge & NOLA

Cajun Food, Louisiana History, and a Little Lagniappe

Tag Archives: Tractor Barn

Repurposing Swampland

04 Tuesday Feb 2014

Posted by jnewhart in Ascension Parish/River Parishes

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Ascension Parish, Baton Rouge, beignets, boutique shops, Café au lait, Cajun, Coffee, Coffee House, Cypress, cypress logging, Donaldsonville, football field, forest, logging, Louisiana, Louisiana citrus trees, New Orleans, oak tree, Oliphant Images, pond, Red Beans and Rice, Shopping, Sorrento, swamp, swampland, The Cajun Village, tractor, Tractor Barn, tupelo trees, wood duck boxes, wood ducks

Wood Duck BoxThere is a large pond tucked back in the woods behind The Cajun Village. To get to it, you walk between Oliphant Images and the Old Tractor barn, down a freshly cut path through the swamp forest lined with young cypress trees. As it winds its way through oaks and tupelo trees, a feeling of seclusion overcomes you. Nothing but you, the birds, the forest, a peaceful quiet away from the world outside.

Just as soon as you started down the path, it opens up out of the forest into pond about the size of a football field. The pond is surrounded by some secondary growth (Sorrento and most of the swamp land between New Orleans and Baton Rouge was prime-time cypress logging territory until the logging of cypress was banned in the 1920s). The Roberts have diligently landscaped around the pond for the last two year. They’ve planted live oaks, water oaks, the aforementioned cypress, citrus trees, grass.

The goal is to create a park-like setting back in the woods. A perfect place to wander to with a to-go cup of café au lait and belly full of beignets from the Coffee House. A place where you can commune with nature and escape the hustle and bustle of the real world for a few minutes. In fact, the Roberts just installed wood duck boxes around the pond in hopes that we attract some future short-term winged tenants.

White Crane over PondThere aren’t too many parks to be found in Ascension Parish where you can wander around and while away an afternoon. This is mostly due to the layout of the parish – it’s about half rural, half developed, but it has no real cohesiveness in terms of community areas. It truly is a vehicle-oriented area, unless you are in Donaldsonville on the West Bank, which is such an architecturally cohesive town that parks abound throughout it. Which is why the pond at The Cajun Village is such a  blessing. It has been wrested from swampland in which it sat, beautified, and paired with a unique set of boutique shops that already have you walking about and exploring. 

Next time you stop by The Cajun Village, make sure you take a peek back through the woods at the pond – it’s a perfect place to walk off big bowl of Red Beans and Rice!

Antique Tractors

03 Tuesday Sep 2013

Posted by jnewhart in Ascension Parish/River Parishes, Historic Preservation

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Coffee House, Direct-haul Plows, Farmstead, Historic Preservation, Local Farming Tradition, Old Tractors, Oliphant Images, Ploughing, River Parishes, Rural North America, Steam Engine, Steam-Powered Traction Engine, Steam-Powered Tractor, The Cajun Village, Threshing, Threshing Rig, Tractor Barn, World War I

Steam-powered TractorIf you’ve ever wandered around The Cajun Village, you may have noticed a barn in the back next to Oliphant Images that is stocked with antique tractors. One of those tractors is particularly ancient. It is an old steam-powered traction tractor, built and used in the late 19th century. As I’ve written in the past, the Roberts have an affinity for saving and preserving the rich local farming heritage of the River Parishes, which is the main reason why the steam-powered tractor and its younger brethren are on display in the barn.

You’ll notice in the pictures that the steam-powered tractor looks quite different than the tractors we are used to nowadays; in fact, it resembles the steam engine on a train more than it does a tractor. That is mainly due to the fact that technology and machinery had not developed enough to adapt the various designs of machines to their specific task. Around 1850, the first traction engines were developed and were widely adopted for agricultural use. Where soil conditions permitted (as in the United States), steam tractors were used to direct-haul plows. 

The first steam tractors that were designed specifically for agricultural uses were portable engines built on skids or on wheels and transported to the work area using horses. Later models used the power of the steam engine itself to power a drive train to move the machine and were first known as “traction drive” engines which eventually was shortened to “tractor”. These drive mechanisms were one of three types: chain, shaft, and open pinion. The open pinion became the most popular design due to its strength. Later improvements included power steering, differentials, compounded engines, and butt-strap boiler design.

The steam engine was gradually phased out by the mid-1920s as the less expensive, lighter, and faster-starting internal combustion (kerosene, petrol or distillate) tractors fully emerged after World War I. These engines were used extensively in rural North America to aid in threshing, in which the owner/operator of a threshing machine or threshing rig would travel from farmstead to farmstead threshing grain. The immense pulling power of steam tractors allowed them to be used for ploughing as well.

So next time you visit The Cajun Village, don’t forget to wander around back and check out the old tractor barn. It is truly a unique setting!

Old gasoline powered engine
Missing the steering wheel!
Steam-powered traction engine

The Coffee House is only a few steps away!
This tractor has seen better days
Rubber tires were not used on the steam powered engines until WWI

Gears
Driving platform of the steam-powered engine
Steel spikes were used to gain traction instead of treaded tires

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