New Orleans As Divine Feminine

In 1915, New Orleans bungalow architect Morgan Dudley E. Hite (1882-1959) developed a map titled "New Orleans --Center of the World" (shown above). Mayor Martin Behrman's administration liked the map so much, it was used in a full-page advertisement the following year (shown below), accompanied by the passage:

"New Orleans is not content to rest secure and apathetic in her position as the center of the world, the center of world population, the center of world-production, the center of world-navigation.

"That much was done for the City of New Orleans by Nature.

"But to supplement this handsome and generous work of Nature the City of New Orleans is building for the future when the new industrial empire at her door will have been developed; when the wet lands at her door have been reclaimed; when the cut-over pine lands will have been turned to the plow; when the natural resources of her tributary section will have been made to yield the golden tribute of their promise."(1)

(1)"The Eyes of the World Are on New Orleans." Trade Index 28:6 (June 1916); recto of back cover. Louisiana Research Collection, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries.

Loewy in NOLA

French-born industrial designer Raymond Loewy (1893-1986) participated in a number of New Orleans-based projects spanning nearly five decades. He was consulted for the Canal Street Teche-Greyhound Bus Terminal (1936-37), designed interiors for the S.S. Cristobal (New Orleans-Panama Canal passenger vessel), the Trans World Airlines office Winds Aloft mural (700 Common Street), interiors for D.H. Holmes' flagship at Oakwood Mall  (for Curtis & Davis, 1966), and the Jim Bean for the C.F. Bean Corporation (in collaboration with Stephen Degnen and William Snaith, 1973, shown above).

The latter received the American Iron and Steel Institute's 1975 Design in Steel Award for the Best Engineering Transportation Equipment. Bean engineers designed the hull, and the massive cutterhead dredge was constructed at the company's shipyard in Plaquemine, Louisiana. After being christened at the Bienville Street Wharf on 29 November 1973, the Jim Bean was towed to its first job at Bolivar Roads, Texas.

Image above: Carolina [formerly Jim Bean]. From Dredgepoint.org as viewed 19 December 2014. URL:  https://www.dredgepoint.org/dredging-database/equipment/carolina