Isleños: The Canary Islanders of Louisiana
Permanent Exhibition
In 1778, a Spanish ship arrived in New Orleans transporting a group of Canary Island immigrants. Eventually, nearly two thousand Canary Islanders stepped foot in Louisiana and made their home in St. Bernard parish and along Bayou Lafourche. This exhibit commerates these settlers and their hertiage, focusing on their settlement of Galvez Town, which was located in what was once considered Iberville Parish.
Louisiana High School Boxing Hall of Fame
Permanent Exhibition
This exhibit commemorates Louisiana High School Boxing. Considered Louisiana’s “forgotten sport,” boxing was one of the state’s most popular sports during the early decades of the 20th century. High school boxing began in 1931 and flourished for three decades, before ending in 1958. Louisiana was among the nation’s greatest amateur boxing states, producing some of the greatest fights and fighters in prep boxing history. This exhibit uses a variety of artifacts, images, and documents to present the story and impact high school boxing had on Louisiana’s culture during the 1930s through the 1950s.
Exhibit created by: Don Landry
The Life of Virginia Campbell
Permanent Exhibition
This exhibit features some of the artwork of a distinguished Plaquemine resident, Virginia Campbell. Campbell was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1914 to Jacob L. Hortenstein and Carrie B. Schwing. However, after the untimely death of her mother in 1921, Campbell moved to Plaquemine to live with her maternal grandmother, Sarah Wimberley Schwing, while her father worked as a civil engineer on the Panama Canal.
After graduating from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1934, Campbell worked on and off Broadway before moving to Hollywood in 1939, where she co-starred in a number of films, including Cecil B De Mille’s Unconquered (1947), Lubitsch and Preminger’s That Lady in Ermine (1948), and Home Town Story (1951).
In the 1950s, she switched careers and began to paint, first in watercolor, then working with gouach and oil. Her artwork was exhibited across Europe and she illustrated two children’s books, New Feathers for the Old Goose (1959) and Near Tragedy at the Winter Fall (1964).
Campbell died on her 102 birthday in 2016.
Life Along the Atchafalaya Basin (Coming Soon)
