Remembering Polycarp: A Cajun TV Show Host for Children

[I originally wrote this article for Wikipedia. Since the writing is my own, I repost it here on my blog. I include extra images below and I'll add more information as I find it.]

Polycarp (pronounced POE-LEE-CARP) was a fictional character who served as a local children's television show host. His program, "Polycarp and Pals," aired from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s on KATC Channel 3 in Lafayette, Louisiana.[1]

Rough print of
Polycarp promotional photo.
(Source: KATC-TV 3)

Background

Polycarp was portrayed by KATC employee John Plauché (27 July 1932 - June 1978),[2] whom KATC hired in May 1963 and whom it credited for the show's originality. "It is a land created through the wonderful imagination of John Plauché, who as Polycarp Phillipe Pecot Number 2, makes our lives a little happier, the world a brighter place [in which] to live."[3] (Polycarp would often jokingly warn viewers in his Cajun-accented English "Don’t ask for Number One ‘cuz dat’s my daddy and dey don’t like him anyway.")[4]

Polycarp on the studio set.
(Source: KATC-TV 3)

An avuncular Cajun dressed in a plaid shirt, waistcoat, and crumpled straw hat, Polycarp lived on a houseboat, the Narcisse Number 3, "somewhere way back in the Anse La Butte Swamp midway between the Parishes of Fantaisie and Réalité," as a KATC newsletter put it in 1967.[5] (In later programs Polycarp traded his houseboat for a general store.) KATC described Polycarp's imaginary world as "A modern-day 'fairytale' land of happiness and laughter for girls and boys and tall people . . . undoubtedly the happiest place in Acadiana." The station likened his program to "a cruise . . . [through] his small but laughing world of Cajun friends and swamp critters . . . [such as] Maurice Mostique, the giant mosquito with a wingspan of 13 ¾ feet, [who] sings a pesky song while Ole Blue, the 738 ½ pound junk-collecting catfish, thumps against the boat as we float along the bayou."[6]

Polycarp at the mic.
(Source: KATC-TV 3)

In addition to showing classic Warner Bros. cartoons, the program featured original skits and recurring characters. Those characters included T'Toot, a retired Indian fighter; the Crazy Professor, an inventor and graduate emeritus of UPI (University of Pecan Island); Tante Baseline, owner of the Anse La Butte Swamp Gumbo Factory; Joycie, a female filling station attendant "who's the world's champion dual-wheel semi-trailer flat-tire fixer"; The Headless Man, who "sent his head out to be cleaned and it was accidentally sent to the Avery Island Pickle Factory instead" and lived in the locked cabin of Polycarp's boat; Doctor Rollingstone, "the hipster swamp doctor who has a transistor radio stuck in his stethoscope"; and King Simon, "the duly elected boss of the swamp."[7]

Polycarp swamped by fan mail, 1967.
(Source: Acadiana [KATC-TV 3 newsletter])

Popularity

KATC noted that, "Polycarp's much loved pals . . . [are] as familiar to the children of Acadiana as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck" and claimed that Polycarp was "ranked as the top children's TV personality in the state."[8] As evidence of this popularity, Polycarp received over 3,000 letters and postcards from local children over a seven-day period during a fall 1967 Halloween costume giveaway promotion.[9] In October that year, the University of Southwestern Louisiana's Alumni Association, Athletic Association, and its band named Polycarp the first "Mr. Acadiana," an honor it bestowed annually during the school's homecoming football game to the USL alumnus who best "fosters the tradition and the ideals of the school and of the area. . . ." (Plauché had graduated from the university in 1957.)[10] By 1967 Polycarp appeared in Lafayette-area parades driving a restored 1935 International Harvester vegetable truck, dubbed by KATC the "Poly-Car."[11]

John Plauché on-set as Polycarp, being interviewed in 1967
for the forthcoming ABC children's morning program Discovery '68.
Source: State Library of Louisiana Historic Photograph Collection

In 1976, producer J. D. "Jay" Miller of Crowley, Louisiana, issued a 45 RPM record on his Yule Time record label featuring Polycarp reading “The Night Before Christmas.”[12]

Polycarp 45 RPM record, 1976.
Note that although his name is misspelled,
John Plauché is credited as the recording's writer.
(Source: Author's collection)

Theme song

Polycarp's eponymous theme song (rendered "Polycarp Phillip Pecot #II" on the 45 RPM record label) was recorded in 1966 by local swamp pop musician Johnnie Allan to the tune of The McCoys' 1965 Number 1 hit song "Hang On Sloopy".[13]

A 45 RPM record of Johnnie Allan's
Polycarp theme song, [1966].
Source:eBay.com

Broadcast schedule

In spring 1969, "Polycarp and Pals" aired for one hour each weekday and Saturday beginning at 7 a.m. CST (although on some weekdays it ran for an hour and a half, ending at 8:30 a.m.).[14] There is some evidence that a short-lived spinoff program, "The Polycarp Palace," aired on Tuesdays from 3:30 p.m. to 5:50 p.m. beginning in October 1967.[15]

TV Guide listing for "Polycarp & Pals"
from Wednesday, April 30, 1969.
(Source: Author's collection)

Demise

Plauché died prematurely in summer 1978 at age 45 "after an extended illness," according to his obituary in the Lafayette Advertiser. The newspaper noted, "a native of Plaucheville [in Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana], [Plauché] was the son of the late Sumpter Plauché and Ann Moreau. He had resided in Lafayette for the past 20 years. For over 15 years he entertained the children of Acadiana on Television Channel 3 as Polycarp, a character he invented himself."

John Plauché's obituary, 6 June 1978.
(Click to enlarge)

Notes

1. Shane K. Bernard, The Cajuns: Americanization of a People (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2003), p. 104.
2. Social Security Death Index, http://ssdi.rootsweb.com/
3. Patti Taylor, "Camera Angles," Acadiana, July 1967, p. 3
4. Debrah Royer Richardson, "Performing Louisiana: The History of Cajun Dialect Humor and Its Impact on the Cajun Cultural Identity," Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Theatre, Louisiana State University, August 2007, p. 197.
5. Patti Taylor, "Camera Angles," Acadiana, July 1967, p. 3.
6. Richardson, "Performing Louisiana, p. 197.
7. Patti Taylor, "Camera Angles," Acadiana, July 1967, p. 3.
8. Ibid.; "Polycarp 'Mr. Acadiana,'" Acadiana, November 1967, p. 1.
9. "Polycarp's Pals Keep Postman Busy," Acadiana , November 1967, p. 3.
10. "Polycarp 'Mr. Acadiana,'" Acadiana , November 1967, p. 1.
11. "This Is It . . . The Poly-Car," Acadiana , November 1967, p. 1.
12. Polycarp, “The Night Before Christmas,” Yule Time 45 RPM record 45-1000, 1976.
13. Johnnie Allan, "Polycarp Phillip Pecot #II (Hang On Sloopy)," Jin label (Ville Platte, Louisiana) #198, 1966. See Johnnie Allan Singles.
14. TV Guide, 26 April-2 May 1969 (Louisiana edition).
15. Patti Taylor, "Camera Angles," Acadiana , November 1967, p. 3.

The "Poly-Car," a vehicle in which Polycarp
appeared in parades around the Lafayette area.
(Source: Acadiana [KATC-TV 3 newsletter])

Addendum of 4 February 2012

One day around 1972 when I was about five years old my family and I were boating on Lake Henderson in the Atchafalya Basin. It was towards the end of the day and we were heading back to the landing.

As we crossed the stump-strewn lake Dad spotted a man in a small motor boat trying without success to start his outboard.

When the man saw us he waved for assistance, so Dad steered over to throw him a line. As we drew near I recognized the luckless boater. And I can imagine myself thinking with astonishment, "It's Polycarp!"

Of course, it was really John Plauché, but for me, as for many kids in Acadiana, Polycarp was not a character played by a local actor, but a real person.

To me the man I saw was Polycarp . . . in a boat . . . in the Atchafalaya Basin . . . and everyone knew from TV that Polycarp lived on a boat in the Atchafalaya Basin!

That was the day my family rescued Polycarp Phillip Pecot #II.

In Memoriam placed in the Lafayette newspaper
by Plauché's widow, summer 1978.

Addendum of 15 September 2014

I distinctly remember the pronunciation of the name "Polycarp" as POE-LEE-CAR in the Cajun French manner (with a silent final consonant). I have been told by a few people, however — including Johnnie Allan, singer of the Polycarp theme song — that the correct pronunciation, as used in the show, was POE-LEE-CARP. If you remember the pronunciation one way or another, please leave a note below describing how you said "Polycarp."

From Fighter Jets to Football: Origin of the Phrase "Ragin' Cajun"

As I've mentioned previously, I enjoy debunking myths.  One myth that came up recently is the claim that "UL Lafayette [the University of Louisiana at Lafayette] was the first [entity] to adopt the nickname Ragin’ Cajuns" (The [Lafayette] Independent, 17 January 2012).

Actually, according to archival documents U.S. Marine Corps Reserve fighter squadron VMF-143 adopted the nickname "Ragin' Cajun" as early as 1950. (Louisiana historian Carl A. Brasseaux made the discovery; I merely located a couple more documents that confirmed the finding.) Note that the squadron technically used the term in the singular tense; still, one sometimes finds the term applied to the squadron in the plural.

I found this Ragin' Cajun squadron logo in the National Archives;
note the date 1 December 1950 in the lower right corner.
(Source: National Archives and Records Administration,
Washington, D.C.)

In short, the U.S. Marines fighter squadron used the term over a decade before UL-Lafayette (known at the time as the University of Southwestern Louisiana, or USL, formerly Southwestern Louisiana Institute, SLI) informally adopted the nickname and about a quarter-century before the university formally adopted it.

Details from the back of the National Archives copy
of the Ragin' Cajun squadron logo, dated here 3 August 1956.
(Source: National Archives and Records Administration,
Washington, D.C.)

As I wrote in my book The Cajuns: Americanization of a People (2003):

South Louisianans who comprised Marine reserve squadron VMF-143 expressed ethnic pride by nicknaming themselves the Ragin' Cajuns, the earliest known use of this now familiar phrase. The squadron's emblem was a charging cartoon pelican (the Louisiana state bird) bedecked in boxing gloves and carrying a lighted bomb in its mouth. According to former squadron commander Carol Bernard, the Marine Corps activated several Ragin' Cajun pilots during wartime, transferred them to other squadrons, and sent them on combat missions over Korea in new jet fighters.

VMF-143, the Ragin' Cajun squadron, evidently posing somewhere
outside south Louisiana, given the hill in the background.  (Source: Carol Bernard, New Iberia, La.)

As for when UL-Lafayette began to use the "Ragin' Cajuns" nickname, I noted in The Cajuns:

During this same period [1974], USL officially renamed its football team the Ragin' Cajuns, a name it had informally adopted in 1963, when the school's student newspaper noted, "USL football fans are coining another nickname. . . . Instead of the official Battling Bulldogs, Southwestern boosters have started referring to Coach Russ Faulkinberry's squad as the Raging [sic] Cajuns" because nearly all the players were south Louisianians.  The school's other athletic teams soon were donning the name on their traditional red and white uniforms.

I date the official change of the team's name to 1974 because of the headline "Augie's Doggies Turn Cajun" appearing in the 1975 USL L'Acadien student yearbook.  The article featured the previous year's football season;  "Augie"  referred to then coach Augie Tammariello.

Although UL trademarked "Ragin' Cajuns," the Discovery Channel is now using the term as the title of a new "reality" program about Louisiana shrimpers.

A clearer version of the Ragin' Cajun fighter squadron logo (no date).
(Source: Carl A. Brasseaux Collection,
Southwestern Archives and Manuscripts Collection,
UL-Lafayette, Lafayette, La.)

Addendum of 11 April 2012:

I recently received an e-mail from John Hornung, a former member of the Ragin' Cajun squadron.  Mr. Hornung has written a memoir of his time in the Marine Corps, called Private 1543868 (available for purchase from Barnesandnoble.com by clicking here).  Below is an excerpt about the squadron from Mr. Hornung's book:

[O]n May 6, 1956, I enlisted in the US Marine Corps Reserve and joined VMF 143, the Ragin Cajuns. VMF 143 was a Marine Fighter Squadron stationed at Naval Air Station New Orleans on Lake Pontchartrain. As you entered the front gate of the Naval Air Station you passed under a large sign proclaiming, The Home of the Ragin Cajuns. The air base was located one and a half miles from my home.

An F4U Corsair, the original fighter plane
of the Ragin' Cajun squadron.
(Source: NASA.gov)

Since I would be going off to boot camp in a few weeks, I was assigned jobs requiring short learning curves. One of those jobs was conducting aircraft preflight checks and engine tests while our pilots attended briefings in the ready room. The aircraft of VMF 143 was the famous F4U Corsair of WWII in the Pacific. It also served with distinction in Korea. The fun part for us mechanics was strapping into the pilot seat and starting up the massive engine. Once warmed up we put the engine through its paces and conducted tests to check the engine’s condition. We checked oil and hydraulic pressures, instrument readings, and placed a load on the engine by increasing the pitch of the prop under increasing levels of RPMs. Once we completed our check out and shut down, the Corsair was ready for its pilot. I’m sure we had a swagger in our walk as we returned to the flight shack. . . . 

An AD4 Skyraider, which the
Ragin' Cajun squadron flew beginning in late 1956.
(Source: NASA.gov)

After returning from boot camp in December 1956, VMF 143 was relieved of its F4U Corsairs and given AD4 Skyraiders. AD4s were the largest single prop driven aircraft ever built. They carried the largest load of arms of any single engine aircraft. They served in the Korean War and in the Vietnam War. One shot down two Russian MiG jets in Vietnam. These were wonderful birds. We mechanics enjoyed working on them and checking them out for our pilots before takeoff. In 1957, while stationed for two weeks training at Cherry Point Marine Corps Air Base North Carolina, VMF 143 set a unit record for total flying time. In January 1958 VMF 143 became VMA 143 and we received our first jet aircraft, F9F Cougars. The fun in the pilot seat ended. The F9Fs didn’t require any warm up and cockpit check out. We strapped our pilots in their seats and they taxied off with us covering our ears from the loud wine of the engine.

An F9F Cougar, the jet fighter to which the
Ragin' Cajun squadron would graduate in 1958.
(Source: NASA.gov)

Source: John Hornung, Private 1543868 (Williamsburg, Va.: Jack be Nimble Publishing, 2010).  Thanks to Mr. Hornung for permission to publish this excerpt.

More on the Elusive Andre Massé, Early Settler of the Attakapas District

In his books Athanase de Mézières and the Louisiana-Texas Frontier, 1768-1780 (1914, as editor) and Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century: Studies in Spanish Colonial History and Administration (1915, as author), historian Herbert Eugene Bolton provided valuable information about Andre Massé, the earliest known European settler in the Attakapas District of south Louisiana.

One of Bolton’s sources about Massé was a 1756 petition that Massé wrote to the Viceroy of New Spain in Mexico City, per the governor of the province of Texas at Los Adaes (near Natchitoches in present-day Louisiana), to ask permission to move from the Attakapas to the presidio of San Agustín de Ahumada in southeast Texas.

No images of Andre Massé are known to exist,
but I like to think he looked something like this.
(Source: Frederic Remington, 1880 [public domain])

What was Massé's reason for wanting to move from French to Spanish territory?

Intriguingly, he wanted to free his slaves (more difficult to do in French territory than Spanish) and to leave them part of his estate.

Massé did eventually free his slaves, not in Texas, but in Louisiana, because the Viceroy of Mexico — no doubt suspicious of a Frenchman wanting to reside in the Spanish Empire — rejected his petition.

Last year I decided to track down Massé’s original petition to see if it contained historical information not mentioned by Bolton.  According to Bolton, the original document sat in the Archivo General de la Nación, the Mexican national archives in Mexico City. Bolton even gave very specific locations for this document, noting that it lay in the Correspondencia de los Virreyes, vol. 1, Amarillas, 1, 1755-1756, or, more specifically, in Correspondencia de los Virreyes II, serie i, folio 264.

I know one person in all of Mexico and she happens to be a professor of history in Mexico City, fluent in Spanish and well familiar with the Archivo General. At my request she went to the Archivo to search for Massé’s petition — and could not find it! The collection, she stated, was a terrible mess.  Nothing was where it was supposed to be.

It had been a hundred years since Bolton had examined Massé’s petition in the Archivo General. Who knows what could have happened to the document in the meantime?

Instead of giving up the search, I checked to see if Bolton did not leave behind his research notes. As it turned out, he left his notes to UC-Berkeley, which had compiled an extremely detailed finding aid for the collection. After studying the finding aid, I hired a graduate student at Berkeley to go to Bancroft Library and look in one particular box.

Title page of one of Bolton's books (1914).

According to the finding aid, that box contained documents pertaining to the incursion of Frenchmen onto Spanish soil.

Sure enough, there was Bolton’s typewritten transcript of Massé’s 1756 petition to the Viceroy of New Spain.

Below I post a translation of Massé’s original document, or, rather, of Bolton’s transcript of Massé’s original document.  The original was written to the Spanish in French, and not by Massé, but by his friend, the troubled French cleric Abbé Didier. (I’ll explain later why I say “troubled.”) The translation is by my acquaintance, Dr. Judith Rygiel of Carelton University in Ottawa, and myself.  (That is, I tweaked her translation.)

I might eventually post a transcript (per Bolton) of the original French document and, for comparison, a transcript (again per Bolton) of the official Spanish translation prepared in 1756. Indeed, in a couple of instances Bolton’s transcript of the original French document appears to contain typographical errors, and the only way I could figure out a misspelled or missing word was to consult the Spanish translation.

Here is the translation (which I consider a work in progress):

Monsieur Massé, settler, distinguished and by his birth and merit, presently on his cattle ranch in the Attakapas, a dependent of New Orleans, arriving finally at an advanced age without having effected the intention of giving liberty to his slaves, and at the same time to leave them his goods after his death, is forced and obliged to turn to his Excellency, the Illustrious Monseigneur, Viceroy of Mexico, to put him and his dependents under his strong protection. This is directed, by the intervention of Monsieur the Abbé Didier, secular priest, his partner in his cattle, to Monsieur le Gouverneur of the post of Adays, to take the action most suitable to the matter so that the affair does not transpire until after its entire execution. The said Sieur Massé reserving the right to deduce from His Excellency the legitimate reasons that commit him to this change. 

The said Monsieur le Gouverneur of Adays, to whom the said Sieur Massé is not unknown, knows well the advantages which will result from the retreat of the said Sieur Massé and of the establishment, which he can form, by himself, in the St. Augustin post, without it being necessary of the said Sieur Didier to actually describe them. That which he can truly assure is that His Majesty will find in one and the other as much and affection as in his most loyal subjects. 

1st. The said Massé possesses in common with the said Abbé Didier a considerable number of cattle, cows and horses, which can be easily transported to the citadel of St. Augustin, which will be a great benefit for the inhabitants of the post.  

2nd. The large and the small Attakapas, entirely devoted to the said M. Massé and who have their village on the other side of the River, are sure to follow him, by means of which no one will have to fear any enemy of that side. 

3rd. His male Negroes, which are for the most part already married to his female Negroes, and who have children, are one seed, these same all transported to the place, having [no] need to take them further. 

4th. The said M. Massé knows the strength and the foibles of the [Indian] Nations of the North, such as the Tavayages, the Laitas, Patoca, Icara, and Panis, because he has visited them. He is able to give a most faithful account and also the means to secure them. 

5th. The said M. Massé does not demand any recompense except the protection of his Excellency, Monsieur le Viceroy, and to be able to enjoy, he and his dependents, the same advantages as the other subjects of his Majesty, the King of Spain. 

Le Sieur Abbé Didier, who asks for the same grace for himself, is able to prove his perfect submission and indefatigable zeal for the growth of God’s domain and of the State of Spain. He will offer every day vows to God all-powerful for the prosperity of his most serene Monseigneur le Viceroy of Mexico, for whom he has the most profound respect. 

At Adayes 19th July

1756 

The most faithful, the most humble

and the most obedient servant, 

Didier, Secular Priest

Note: It is interesting to note that Didier — if Bolton’s transcript is true to the original — renders Massé’s name as I do here with an accent aigu over the “e”.  A friend of Massé, Didier presumably would have known how Massé pronounced his name and how to properly render that name in French. In short, Massé apparently did not pronounce his name as MASS or (as I’ve been pronouncing it) MAS-SUH, but MAS-SAY.

La Chute: A Waterfall on Bayou Teche?

I became aware of claims that a waterfall once emptied into Bayou Teche while examining one of the first extremely accurate maps of Louisiana — Barthélémy Lafon’s "Carte générale du territoire d’Orléans," printed in New Orleans in 1806. On the Teche above New Iberia, and a little upstream from the site of present-day Loreauville, Lafon printed in minuscule type the word "chûtte."

The "chûtte" as shown on Barthélémy Lafon’s

"Carte générale du territoire d’Orléans" (1806).

I've labeled the present-day sites of New Iberia,
Loreauville, and Spanish Lake.
(Source: Library of Congress)

In French chute means "waterfall."

A waterfall on the Teche?  In flat coastal south Louisiana?

Later I examined a report on Bayou Teche by former British soldier and spy (and, after switching sides during the American Revolution, official geographer to the fledgling United States) Thomas Hutchins. He had gathered intelligence on the bayou from circa 1772-1784, when Spain, a major rival to the British in nearby West Florida, held much of present-day Louisiana, including the Teche country.

Title page of Hutchins' 1784 book containing
his report on Bayou Teche.

As Hutchins guided his reader up the Teche, he observed:

About 3 leagues above la Nouvelle Iberia [New Iberia] is la Force Point [Fausse Pointe]. . . . Then to la Shute branch, which passes over a fall of about 10 feet, near to where it enters the Tage [Teche] river, it is 3 leagues. . . .

Moreover, Hutchins prepared a hand-drawn map of the Teche, which shows the approximate location of the fall or “shute” (or “shout” as he spells it on the map).

Detail of Hutchins' ca. 1780 map of Bayou Teche
showing the "Shout" (chute).  I've labeled New Iberia,
the present-day site of Loreauville, and the Teche itself.
(Source: Author's collection.)

That Lafon and Hutchins both mention the chute and show it at roughly the same location may not, however, be evidence of corroboration. I increasingly believe that Lafon used Hutchins’ report as a source in making his map. (Hutchins’ report and Lafon’s map share a few idiosyncrasies; moreover, Hutchins’ report had been published in 1784 and would have been available to Lafon.)

Enter fellow researcher Don Arceneaux, a native south Louisianian and trained biologist who works in the forests of the northwestern U.S. Don had been looking into the history of the Attakapas region and, as I had, noticed the one or two known references to the chute. But he also found another chute reference, namely, in an early-nineteenth-century land record mentioned in Glenn R. Conrad’s Land Records of the Attakapas District. That land record refers to the chute as sitting on the property of a specific landowner — which allowed Don to pin down more precisely the chute’s location.

In fact, Don believes that modern topographical maps and aerial photographs show the remnant of the chute. And that assumed remnant sits right in the area where the Hutchins, Lafon, and Conrad references said the chute had been located over two centuries ago. The feature in question is no longer a waterfall, its dirt or clay drop (no rock in south Louisiana!) having eroded away or having been removed by human activity. Rather, it is a coulee (our local word for creek) flowing into the Teche from two main branches, one coming from the direction of Spanish Lake to the west and another coming from the neck of land formed by a meander in the Teche near Loreauville.

Topographical map showing the assumed site
of the chute (coulee at middle flowing north into the Teche).  (Source: TopoZone.com)

Don theorizes that in the eighteenth century the Teche’s natural levee acted like a dam, turning this jutting neck of land into a bowl that flooded with rainwater during the region’s semitropical downpours. The water found its way through a narrow gap in the levee, and it was there that the chute poured into the Teche.

Interestingly, the word “chute” describes a particular kind of waterfall. According to James R. Penn’s Rivers of the World: A Social, Geographical, and Environmental Sourcebook (2001), a chute is "[a] ‘shortcut’ across a meander bend” or “any narrowing of a channel through which water velocity increases. In this way, water confined by protruding rocks in waterfalls or rapids produces chutes." While it is possible that the chute on the Teche was merely "[a] ‘shortcut’ across a meander bend" (since the assumed spot is indeed on a meander in the Teche), Hutchins, however, recorded that the chute had "a fall of about 10 feet," indicating clearly that it was a waterfall.

Penn is concerned with the modern definition of chute, but what did the word mean in the eighteenth-century?  Chute in French literally meant "fall" (as it still does today) and could be used in reference to any number of things. For example, "la chute de l’empire romain" — "the fall of the Roman Empire." But in a hydrographic sense, chute — used primarily in French at the time — did in fact denote a waterfall. In The Royal Dictionary (1773), for example, the English waterfall is translated into French as chute d’eau. Likewise, Le grand dictionnaire géographique, historique et critique (1768) observes, "Waterfall, dans la langue du pays, signifie chute d’eau." ("Waterfall, in the language of the land, signifies chute d’eau.")

Aerial photograph showing assumed site of the chute.
Click image to enlarge. (Source: Google Maps)

Hutchins, by original training a surveyor and cartographer, had explored the former French territories of Illinois and Ohio.  As such, he might have known the word chute before traveling to the Gulf Coast around 1772. Along with the word’s local use by francophone Acadians and French Creoles, Hutchins prior knowledge of the term would explain his use of “shute” in his report and on his bilingual (English and French) map of the Teche.

At this point Don and I cannot say for certain that the present-day coulee flowing into the Teche near Loreauville is the remnant of the eighteenth-century chute. But this modern geographic feature seems to us the only clear candidate for the chute.

Don has recently examined the area by kayak, and I plan to go there shortly by canoe.

Addendum (of 1 December 2011):

I think we just solved the puzzle!  While examining a digitized U.S. Geological Survey map, I noticed that the USGS provided a name for the present-day coulee that Don has suggested as the chute’s former location.  And what does the USGS call the present-day coulee?  "Bayou La Chute"!

Screen shot showing the identification of the assumed site
of the chute as "Bayou La Chute" (Source: TopoZone.com)

Can you imagine that?  The memory of an over two-hundred-year-old waterfall preserved in the name of a present-day waterway on the same spot!

I think this pretty much closes the case in Don's favor!

Addendum (of 4 December 2011):

Yesterday I canoed to the site of the chute with Keith Guidry and Don Arceneaux.  Don had already been to the site six days earlier, but Keith and I had never been there.  Actually, Keith had canoed passed it previously, but didn't know its significance at the time.

The entrance to Bayou La Chute and the location
(or approximate location) of the eighteenth-century
waterfall known as "the chute."
(Photo by the author)

What we saw at the site of the chute was the entrance to a small bayou [30.03667, -91.786284], about thirty-five feet wide at its mouth, running through a deep cut in the natural ridge that follows the Teche.  The banks at this spot are higher than any others I've seen along the Teche, rising about eight to ten feet above the water on the left side of the cut and about three to five feet on the right.  A prominent grassy hill or ridge tops the bluff on the right, rising perhaps another twenty-five to thirty feet above the surface of the Teche.  One can imagine a chute here two hundred years ago, spilling into the Teche over a drop that at the time connected the high lands to either side of the waterfall.

Heading upstream on Bayou La Chute.
Note the cypress trees and cypress knees
(and someone's fishing chair) on the left bank.
(Photo by the author)

As mentioned, there is no waterfall at the site today, the drop having eroded away or having been cleared by human activity.  As such, one can now canoe directly into the chute's remnant, a waterway called Bayou La Chute, and navigate a fair distance up it and its tributaries.  Kevin, Don, and I followed Bayou La Chute for about a quarter mile upstream from the Teche, stopping — though the depth of the water would have permitted us to go farther — only when we reached the fork where the bayou's tributaries turned east onto the neck of the Teche meander and west toward Spanish Lake.

Fork in Bayou La Chute, one heading east (left) onto the neck
of the Teche meander and one heading right (west) toward Spanish Lake.
(Photo by the author)

Although there is a small amount of garbage, an occasional drainage pipe, and some non-indigenous ornamental bamboo along its banks, Bayou La Chute is otherwise wild in appearance, very beautiful, and well worth diverting from the Teche for a side trip up its narrow, winding course.

Addendum (of 7 December 2011):

As lagniappe here is a detail of an 1846 plat map for the area T12S R7E (just below the Teche) showing the bayou in question as "Bayou La Chute."  Its intersection with the Teche does not appear because that feature lies slightly to the north in the next township (T11S R7E).

(Source: Office Of Public Works Plat Map
for District Southwestern T12S R7E [1846],
Louisiana Office of State Lands)

Even better: below is an 1850 copy of a 1795 French-language map of the same area, showing "la chute" as lying on the property of Monsieur Claire Dauterive Dubuclé (Dubuclet) — something Don Arceneaux pointed out to me a couple weeks ago in Conrad's land records book.  I only found the below map today, however, in the Louisiana Office of State Lands.  (Thanks to Michael Marie for telling me how to search the office's records!)  Interestingly, the surveyor who made the original 1795 map was none other than François Gonsoulin, whom I mention in a couple of previous blog articles.  By the way, the below map is oriented so that north is to the lower left.  (In other words, the map is more or less upside down.)

Map showing "la chute" near the "Rivière Thex" (Teche). Click to enlarge.
 (Source: Claim Papers S.W.D. T12S R3-7E, Vol. 24,
Louisiana Office of State Lands [1850 copy of 1795 original])

On That Word "Gumbo": Okra, Sassafras, and Baudry's Reports from 1802-1803

As I mentioned in an earlier blog article, some maintain that the word gumbo derives from the African term guingombo, meaning "okra"; while others maintain gumbo comes from the Native American (Choctaw) word kombo ashish, meaning "sassafras."*

Recently I examined some evidence that in my opinion — for whatever that is worth . . . I am not a linguist — adds weight to the alleged African origin of gumbo. This evidence appears in Louis Narcisse Baudry des Lozières' late-colonial-era travelogue Second voyage à la Louisiane (Paris: Chez Charles, 1803).

Title page from Baudry's 1803 book.

In one passage Baudry recorded:

Il n'est point de substances adoucissantes employées dans les affections de poitrine, qui, dans les Colonies, soient plus multipliées que celle du Gombeau. C'est une espèce de ketmia; ses fleurs, ses fruits et ses feuilles sont très-adoucissans. Ils sont souvent employés en tisanes et en cataplasmes. Toutes les parties du gombeau entrent dans les ragoûts des naturels des Colonies, et les européens comme les créoles, trouvent dans le fruit de ce petit arbuste, un aliment excellent. M. Dazille le recommande beaucoup aux arrivans d'Europe. C'est le moyen d'éviter les maladies inflammatoires qu'il leur est si difficile d'éviter (page 308).

Which translates as:

There are no soothing substances used in diseases of the chest that in the Colonies are more numerous than the Gombeau. It's a kind of ketmia: Its flowers, fruits and leaves are very soothing. They are often used in teas and poultices. All parts of gombeau are used in the stews of natives of the Colonies, and Europeans as well as Creoles find the fruit of this small shrub an excellent food. Mr. Dazille recommends it very much to arrivals from Europe. This is the way to avoid inflammatory diseases that are so difficult to avoid.

Note that Baudry says that this "Gombeau" is "a kind of ketmia." Ketmia is a name given by some to okra.

Ketmia as a synonym for okra.
Source: Philip Miller, The Gardeners Dictionary
(London: Self-published by Miller, 1754)

What is interesting about Baudry, therefore, is his reference not to a soup or stew called gombeau, but his reference to a plant, evidently okra, called gombeau — though intriguingly he did mention that this plant was used "dans les ragoûts des naturels des Colonies" . . . in the stews of natives of the Colonies.

This early association of the word gombeau with okra, in my opinion, lends weight to the assertion that gumbo traces its origin to an African term meaning "okra," as opposed to the Native American term for "sassafras."

Filé (powdered sassafras)
purchased from a modern supermarket.
(Photo by the author)

This etymological issue aside: It's interesting to note that Baudry mentioned in a previous book, Voyage à la Louisiane, et sur le continent de l'Amérique (Paris: Dentu, 1802), the use of filé (powdered sassafras leaves) in gumbo — still a common practice in present-day south Louisiana. Although he did not actually use the term filé, he referred in that book to:

le sassafras, dont les feuilles séchées et réduites en poudre fournissent une espèce de gombeau aromatique vraiment délicieux (page 169).

Or in translation:

sassafras, whose dried and powdered leaves furnish a type of truly delicious aromatic gombeau.

In this instance it appears that gombeau does refer to a soup or stew, into which sassafras would be placed to season and thicken the dish.

My personal gumbo recipe.
If you can read it, you can steal it.

Addendum:

Here is yet another, more detailed early reference to gumbo, this one from Observations sur la physique, sur l'histoire naturelle et sur les arts (1788, but which also appeared in a 1784 edition). This book quotes a certain Monsieur P. de la Coudrenière, author of a short tract titled (in translation) "Observations on the Sassafras, Tree of America":

The sassafras [tree] or Iroquois laurel is well-known for its aggreable smell & its medicinal properties. . . . [I]n Louisiana, they . . . use its leaves, gathered in July, which are dried until dark & in the open air, and then they pulverize it roughly. 

These leaves are used in sauces . . . and give them a pleasant taste. . . . The gummy principal is so sticky that a pinch of this powder is enough to make a viscous broth. This dish is known as American gombo. But we must distinguish this American stew from the one called gombo févi.** The latter is made with the pods of a species of large mauve, known to botanists under the name of sabdariffa [okra]. All parts of this plant contain a viscous juice; and the pods, when they are green, make the water even more sticky than do the leaves of sassafras.

Title page of Observations (1788). 

The first time that one eats gombo, one feels a strong repugnance because of this viscosity; but when one tastes it two or three times, the repugnance passes & then one would then wish to eat it everyday, principly with sassafras, which is much tastier than the févi. The Creoles of Louisiana love it so passionately, that they cannot eat any other soup than this one made with broth, pepper, sassafras, & corn or rice cooked in water. Admittedly, this soup is much healthier & better tasting than our soups of bread. They make gombo with all kinds of meat, poultry & fish. They also make it with shrimp & crawfish. That of cabbage is less esteemed; it is eaten, as is that of shrimp, in the evening, and is often served instead of dinner. 

We [in France] still do not make use of sassafras; but it is very aromatic, and I think it must have other good qualities, which are perhaps greater than those of the wood and root of this tree. We might also draw oil or wax from its berries, for they are similar to those of the laurel, and contain like them a fatty substance. It is surprising that no attempt has been made to introduce the sassafras on the isle of Corsica & in the southern provinces of France, where it would succeed just as well in Virginia, Florida & Illinois. It is a beautiful tree, and which is always green: indeed, this would free the nation of a tribute it pays annually to the foreigner, to procure this wood, especially since we no longer have Louisiana.

Here is the original French text:

Le sassafras ou laurier des Iroquois est très-connu par son odeur agréable & ses propriétés médicinales. . . . [À] la Louisiane, on se sert . . . de ses feuilles, que l'on cueille en Juillet, que l'on fait sécher à sombre & au grand air, & que l'on pulvérise grossièrement. 

Ces feuilles employées dans les sauces . . . & leur donnent un goût agréable. . . . Le principe gommeux qu'elles contiennent est tel, qu'une pincée de cette poudre suffit pour rendre un bouillon visqueux. C'est ce mets que l'on nomme en Amérique gombo. Cependant il faut distinguer ce ragoût américain, de celui qu'on nomme gombo févi. Celui-ci est fait avec les gousses d'une espèce de grande mauve, connue des Botanistes fous le nom des sabdariffa. Toutes les parties de cette plante contiennent un suc visqueux; & les gousses, lorsqu'elles font vertes, rendent l'eau plus gluante encore que ne le font les feuilles de sassafras. 

While Coudrenière may have erred in his use of the word sabdariffa,
he was not far off the mark: Okra and sabdariffa are both
members of the hibiscus family. Source: David Hosack,
Hortus Elgimensis (New York: T & J. Swords, 1811).

La première fois que l'on mange de ces gombos, on sent une forte de répugnance, à cause de cette viscosité; mais quand on en a goûté deux ou trois fois, la répugnance passe & l'on voudroit ensuite en manger tous les jours, principalement du sassafras, qui est beaucoup plus savoureux que le févi. Les Créoles de la Louisiane l'aiment si passionnément, qu'ils ne peuvent manger d'autre potage que celui qu'ils font avec du bouillon, du piment, du sassafras, & du maïs ou du riz cuit à l'eau. Il faut avouer que ce potage est bien plus sain & bien meilleur au goût que toutes nos soupes de pain. On fait du gombo avec toutes sortes de viandes, de volailles & de poisson. On en fait aussi avec des chevrettes & des écrevisses. Celui de choux est le moins estimé; il se mange, ainsi que celui de chevrette, le soir, & tient souvent lieu de souper.

Coudrenière's report, from an earlier edition of his work. 
Source: Observations (1784).

 

On ne fait aucun usage de l'encore de sassafras; cependant elle est très aromatique, & je crois qu'elle doit avoir d'autres bonnes qualités, qui peut-être font supérieures à celles du bois & de la racine de cet arbre. On pourroit aussì tirer de l'huile ou de la cire de ses baies; car elles sont semblables à celles du laurier, & contiennent comme elles une substance grasse. Il est surprenant qu'on ne cherche point à naturaliser le sassafras dans l'Isle de Corse & dans les Provinces méridionales de la France, où il réussiroit tout aussi bien qu'en Virginie, à la Floride & aux Illinois. C'est un bel arbre, & qui est toujours vert: d'ailleurs, ce seroit affranchir la Nation d'un tribut qu'elle paie annuellement à l'étranger, pour se procurer ce bois, sur-tout depuis que nous n'avons plus la Louisiane.

________

*See Barry Jean Ancelet, Cajun Country (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1991), p. 141; Peter H. Wood, Strange New Land: Africans in Colonial America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 55.

**The Dictionary of Louisiana French (2010) defines gombo févi as both "okra" and "okra gumbo" (févi in itself meaning "okra").

Addendum of 30 October 2020

Seen below in a 1724 book (a memoir of a ca. 1694 voyage to the New World), this word guingambo, also spelled guingumbo, is said to be the source of our word gumbo. As used here, guingambo is what we call okra, itself also known (as I point out elsewhere in these blog essays) by the names gumbo or févi or even gombo févi. 

This same 1724 reference notes farther down the page in question that "our Creole girls and women [apparently in the French Caribbean, not necessarily Louisiana] . . . put [guingambo] in a stew that is unique to them and that we call Callarou. . . ." (Here is the original quote: "nos filles & femmes creolles . . . mettent dans un ragoût qui leur est particulier & qu'on appele Callarou. . . .") I wonder if this "Callarou" is a forerunner of our gumbo? On first reading a description of it (found elsewhere in this same book), it does not sound much like gumbo to me, except insofar as it's a sort of stew made with meat and okra — but who knows.

Source: GoogleBooks.com

Quoted material and the scanned page shown here are from: Jean Baptiste Labat, Nouveau Voyage aux Isles de l'Amerique (La Haye [the Hague, Netherlands]: Husson, Johnson, Gosse, Van Duren, Alberts, & Le Vier, 1724), p. 374-75.