CREOLE HERITAGE CENTER Northwestern State University

Creoles
of
Cane River

Sharecropping Era

Isle Brevelle / Melrose Communities

Post-Reconstruction ushered in profound changes in American society. In the late nineteenth century, nearly all, rural Louisianians worked the land. Many impoverished people endured a hard life of hoeing, plowing, and picking cotton.

The Sharecropping system varied across the South, and differed from one parish to the next in Louisiana. In the Cane River region of southern Natchitoches Parish, the sharecropping system directly and indirectly shaped many of the Cane River Creole customs and traditions that remain in place today.

CANE RIVER, Louisiana.
By J. Rodney W. Meziere

For more information: contact Janet Colson, Executive Director, 318-357-6686
CreoleCenter@nsula.edu
Last modified on: May 19, 2010