Podcast 58 – 601 Chartres in the #FrenchQuarter
Description
The Creole townhouse at 601 Chartres was built in 1793.
601 Chartres Street
This townhouse from the Spanish Colonial period offers a look into the entire 19th Century in the Vieux Carré. The first floor’s retail space tells many stories.
The Pod
Before the fire
Street grid from 1722, only a year after de Pauger drew up the plan. The plan shows the original house at 601 Chartres. Follow Chartres Street left from the church to Toulouse.
Post-rebellion
The house held a number of retail businesses prior to the Southern Rebellion. As the Sicilians expanded their influence in the Quarter, Creole shops and stores gave way to Sicilian groceries. Such were the differences in diet and taste between the communities that the Sicilians didn’t merely take over existing shops. They re-shaped French Quarter commercial space. Here’s Victor Valentinian’s Grocery in 1890.
Prohibition
Like many retail outlets in New Orleans, Victor’s continued to sell alcohol after the passage of the 18th Amendment. Victor’s branded as a “soft drink saloon” during Prohibition, but still kept beer in the cooler. Additionally, the store sold “Punch Boards,” an early form of modern-day lottery “scratch-off” tickets.
Victor’s Cafe
This 1937 photo of the townhouse contains interesting elements, most notably, the sign advertising “Boiled Crawfish.”
This is the earliest we’ve encountered the spelling “crawfish,” as opposed to “crayfish” in New Orleans.
Postcard
From the 1910s into the 1960s, businesses from restaurants to amusement parks printed postcards. Travelers and business people communicated with folks back home/at the home office via postcard. Victor’s planted the visual in the minds of potential new visitors with this 1940 postcard.
“Miss Lady”
Winifred Moore performed regularly at Victor’s after World War II. She attracted a strong following in the Victor’s cocktail lounge.
Ground Pat’i
By the 1970s, Victor’s was no more. The upscale burger restaurant chain, Ground Pat’i, leased 601 Chartres.
For Lease
via Google Maps
More-recent tenants of the townhouse included Chartres House and Willie’s Chicken Shack. Both businesses moved to other Vieux Carré locations. Not sure if the landlord wants a high rent, or if the other locations offered something different.
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