St James Parish Fall 2021

ST. JAMES Vol. 4, No. 2; Fall 2021

The faces, places and graces that make us proud.

Merry Christmas

Cover Photo by Randy Roussel

From the Editor

When our printing schedule was delayed for various reasons, we decided to make this a seasonal edition and filled it with heartwarming stories of our long-standing traditions.

Hours of strategizing and organizing are spent by many from various parish offices who plan for the safety of the thousands of visitors who come to our parish on Christmas Eve to join in our unique way of celebrating this Christian holiday. Sheriff Willy Martin is always willing to look at ways to ease vehicular traffic while allowing pedestrians to safely cross River Road to and from the levee. This year Sheriff Martin is introducing a contraflow traffic plan. He explains that concept in this edition.

We visited the first Festival of the Bonfires Queens to see where life has taken them since their coronation decades ago.

Cane farming has been a profitable part of our parish since before the invention of tractors and farm implements. Retired banker J. B. Falgoust of Vacherie compares what farming was like when he was a boy in the 1930’s, to the use of modern computerized harvesters today.

We are grateful to George and Rachael Vicknair who have purchased and are restoring one of the oldest homes along River Road in Lutcher. Read why this is such an important season for them.

A former COVID patient recently sat with St. James Parish Hospital CEO Mary Ellen Pratt to deliver a very important message.

Becky Foret shares her recipe for divinity fudge, a local holiday favorite.

Special thanks to Randy Roussel for allowing us to use his amazing photo for the front cover.

Enjoy this edition and Merry Christmas!

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ST. JAMES

Proud Table of Contents Here’s what makes us proud....

A Message from Parish President Peter Dufresne............3

The First Festival of the Bonfires Queens...........................5

Cane Farming for Generations.............................................9 Contraflow Proposed for Christmas Eve...........................11 “We Bought This House to…”.............................................12

Former COVID Patient Returns to Hospital......................15 Recipe for Divinity Fudge..................................................19

WILBUR REYNAUD, Publisher DAVID REYNAUD, General Manager/Photograher PAMELA FOLSE, Writer/Editor/Photographer CINDY ROUYEA, Creative Designer JENNIFER GLIDDEN, Advertising

St. James is published occasionally, inserted into the News Examiner - Enterprise, distributed to local businesses and available at the St. James Parish Welcome Center.

Subscriptions to the newspaper are: In Parish $27.16 Out of Parish $36.56 E-edition only $21.93 Copyright © 2021 Ruhr Valley Publishing, Inc. 2290 Texas Street • P.O. Drawer 460 Lutcher, LA 70071 PHONE: (225) 869-5784 • FAX: (225) 869-4386 EMAIL: ruhrvalley@earthlink.net WEBSITE: stjamesparishtoday.com

The First Bonfire Fest Queens

The Festival of the Bonfires has been a St. James Parish tradition for the past 30 years.

The first to wear the unique bonfire crown as Miss Festival of the Bonfires crowned in 1990 was Valerie Hymel Schexnayder.

“I had been in high school pageants and my sister made me enter the Miss Festival of the Bonfires pageant,” said Valerie from her current home in Livingston. At the time she became a contestant, Valerie was 20 years old and a medical assistant student. She and her family lived in Gramercy.

The requirements of the pageant were quite simple then, she explained. “The pageant was very low key at the time.

We wore casual wear down the runway and were not required to wear formals or perform a talent.” Valerie remembers there being 15 to 20 contestants that first year.

After winning the pageant, Valerie was introduced to the community on Sunday as she reigned over the Bonfire Festival Parade.

Since her time as pageant royalty, Valerie married and later divorced her high school sweetheart. She is mom to two sons, Adam and Eli, ages 19 and 16. In addition to working as a medical assistant, she is also a massage therapist and hair stylist. She has been a men’s hairstylist for three years in Denham Springs.

Valerie returned to the Miss Festival of the Bonfires pageant two years ago to see that it is much more professional now with both talent and formals as part of the competition. “I think that the pageant is now being handled more professionally,” said Valerie. “I think the pageant officials are doing a great job.”

Nine years later, in 1999, Libby Taylor Hotard was crowned the first Teen Miss Festival of the Bonfires. A 15-year-old student at Lutcher High at the time, Libby had no pageant experience. She was a member of the high school dance team, Beta Club and the newspaper staff. Her friends had been in pageants, and Libby wanted to enter. “Much to my delight and my surprise, I won,” said Libby. “It was a whirlwind after that and so exciting.”

She quickly learned all she could about St. James Parish history and the importance of our region to the rest of the state and the country. “My family traveled with me, and together we soaked up the culture and learned about every region of our state,” she said. “We attended other pageants and welcomed new queens into the sisterhood of pageant queens. Those are some of my best memories.”

At her pageant in 1999, contestants competed in morning interviews dressed in business suits. Later in the day was the evening gown competition and each contestant was given a question to answer on stage. “My question was, ‘If you could choose a color to represent St. James Parish, what color would you choose?’ I chose white because it’s a sign of purity and we have sugarcane here. It must have been a good answer because it worked, and I won the pageant.”

Libby now lives in Convent with her husband John and her 12-year-old daughter Emma. After earning a bachelor’s degree in accounting and a master’s in business administration, Libby became certified in human resources. She worked 11 years in St. James Parish government before going to work for Marathon’s MPLX facility, which allows her to work from home. She is involved with the 3 L’s organization and serves as a board member for the River Region Chamber of Commerce.

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Cane Farming For Generations J. B. Falgoust is well known and well respected for his long and stellar career in banking. The 94-year-old Vacherie resident has an even longer history of sugarcane farming.

“I grew up in the sugarcane business,” Falgoust said from his home office filled with pictures of his eight children on one wall, plaques, awards, and certificates from his banking career on another wall, and memorabilia from his years of cane farming and harvesting on another wall.

“When I was in high school, I would wake up at midnight to go and feed the mules,” he recalled. “The men started work at four in the morning because the cane was cut by hand then and loaded with difficulty into cane wagons pulled by mules. I did that. It’s very hard work.” Later cane carts had steps, making it easier for the worker to step up and place the cane inside. The loaded mule-driven wagons took the cane from the field to the sugarhouse on the plan- Michael, left and Chuck Falgoust own, manage and tation. Just about every plantation had its own sugarhouse. Falgo- operate J.B. Falgoust Farm in Vacherie. ust’s father farmed Shell Hill and Anita Plantations, and both had sugarhouses.

After the manufacture of gasoline-powered engines, trucks were used to transport cut sugarcane to regional sugarhouses like Armant in Vacherie and St. James Sugar Cooperative in St. James, which led to the closure of the small plantation mills.

Motorized derricks mechanized the off-loading of cane from wagons and then onto large cane trailers for transportation to the sugarhouse.

“My dad bought the first Allis-Chalmer tractor in Vacherie and I think everyone in Vacherie came to see it,” Falgoust said with a chuckle. Eventually the tractors replaced the mules.

“In those days,” Falgoust added, “you didn’t have to be educated to be a farmer, but you had to have a strong back. But now you have to have an education.”

Falgoust’s father planted about 165 total acres of cane at Anita and Shell Hill. After graduating from St. James High School in 1945, J. B. went to Soule Business College in New Orleans and worked for New Orleans Public Service. His father asked many times that he come back to Vacherie. “I loved my daddy, so I came back home and went to work at the Bank of Vacherie making $150 per month.” He also did all the book work for the farm. When their father died, Falgoust’s brothers took over and later decided they no longer wanted to farm. By that time, Falgoust’s son Michael wanted to take over the farm.

J. B. Falgoust Farms began in 1978. The payroll ledger for that year show’s that the men earned $2.75 per hour for a gross salary of about $200 for two weeks. The statement of earnings for that year shows a total loss of $46,161.05 because he had not yet received payment for his crop. Farmers are paid partially when their crop is taken to the mill and then monthly the next calendar year as their cane is taken to the refinery.

Michael and Chuck Falgoust currently run the farm, one of a handful of sugarcane farms on the west bank. More land was acquired over the years and now they farm a little less than 2,000 acres, in different phases of the planting and growing process.

The farm recently purchased a new cane harvester which is being used for the first time to cut this crop. The $550,000 machine has capabilities beyond the imagination of those unfamiliar with farming.

The onboard GPS tells the operator the number of acres cut, the acreage remaining to be cut, the yield of sugarcane and waste from what is cut and a whole lot more.

“There’s no comparison today to the old days of cane harvesting,” Falgoust concluded. We would not be in the sugar business if it would not be for automation—harvesters, tractors, and wagons.

Those who are still in farming are there because it’s in their blood.

It’s handed down from generations in their families. Things changed over the years, but we were happy then and we’re happy now.”

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Sheriff’s Office Proposes Contraflow For Christmas Eve

December is quite a busy time for the St. James Parish Sheriff’s Department, especially on Christmas Eve. Each year, well before Thanksgiving, St. James Parish Sheriff Willy Martin and his staff meet with the Festival of the Bonfires planners to develop strategies for the four-day non-profit event that pays for the liability insurance required by the levee board. The insurance covers all bonfire permit holders during the building process and everyone on the levee for Christmas Eve. Deputies are assigned to the bonfire festival, more in the evening than during the day. Sheriff Martin and Captain Sidney Berthelot were part of the planning for this year’s event.

During one of the planning meetings, Sheriff Martin announced that they will try a contraflow traffic pattern on Christmas Eve. Traffic will flow from downriver north allowing only right Sheriff Willy Martin and Colonel Sid Berthelot review contraflow turns into the Town of Gramercy, the traffic plans for viewing the bonfires on Christmas Eve. Town of Lutcher and other points along river road. Traffic approaching river road from any of the arteries will also turn right.

Martin estimates a larger-than-usual crowd this year since the lighting of the holiday pyres was cancelled last year because of the virus. Of the hundred sheriff’s office employees, a few more than half will be working on Christmas Eve. Martin and Berthelot both said that last year was the first time they were off on Christmas Eve over the past 30 years.

Martin said he does his best to handle both the bonfire festival and the holiday event without asking neighboring sheriffs to send assistance on Christmas Eve. However, he doesn’t refuse the help if offered. He assigns the visiting officers to monitor the traffic and the crowd in certain locations, freeing local deputies to watch the hot spots. The levee board helps with patrols on the levee and state troopers handle major traffic accidents. Officers on ATVs move freely on the levee and the batture, the land between the levee and the river. Officers from the two towns watch over their own areas.

Martin said Christmas Eve for his officers and for him begins with roll call and a meal together before receiving their assignments. Prior to that time, officers on duty set up traffic and pedestrian barricades along the river road while others watch to see that visitors park in designated areas and that permit holders are following the restrictions set forth by the permits. A full staff of officers remain on duty until 10 p.m., when some are dismissed to go home. Officers on regular duty that evening patrol other parts of the parish.

“We like to see people on the levee having a good time,” Berthelot said.

“We maintain slow movement of traffic along river road throughout the evening,” ST. JAMES said the sheriff. “There are lots of people crossing river road to get back and forth from the levee and lots of people just driving through.”

Martin estimates that the population of St. James Parish doubles on Christmas Eve, especially prior to Hurricane Katrina when 27 full buses came to join holiday revelers on the levee.

Proud

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“

George and Rachael Vicknair bravely accepted the unique but challenging opportunity to restore a Lutcher and Moore Cypress Lumber Company house on River Road in Lutcher for a very special purpose. “We bought this house to do bonfires and bring the family back together again,” said Rachael with a glimmer in her eye.

“In the morning when we wake up, we’ve got to pinch ourselves because we can’t believe we’re in this house,” George says proudly.

The house has a long history along River Road. Historical notes on the original house at the same site claims that the structure was used when Pierre Chenet, the developer of the world-famous Perique tobacco, was buying Perique tobacco, between 1789 and 1800s. Historical accounts also connect the building to Lutcher & Moore Cypress Lumber Co., whose sawmill was built on the Chenet plantation.

The original house, which was eventually purchased by the Lutcher & Moore Cypress Lumber Co., was destroyed by fire. The existing house, built by the cypress company in 1935, became the residence of Arthur Grant Gearhard, Sr., who was employed as co-manager of the mill. Rafters uncovered in the renovation bear the names of Leroy Cambre, Tony and Charley, believed to be the carpenters.

Generations of the Gearhard family lived in the house until it was lost in a tax sale and purchased by Tom Bridges and his wife Colleen. Despite a long succession of owners, the home was never vacant for very long.

Bridges decided to sell because of health issues. When George and Rachael learned of its availability, they decided to make it their new home.

Prior to their purchase, the Vicknairs worked hard renovating their daughter’s home on Second Street in Lutcher. The on-the-job training gave them some experience needed to undertake such a major project.

George began by clearing and grubbing the overgrowth of vegetation surrounding the house and 1.29 acres of property. He built a metal building behind the house to store his tools, tractor, and other equipment he needed in the restoration. He added a new concrete driveway and pavement to give access to the home and property.

Rachael cleaned the inside, clearing the rooms of empty boxes and other rubbish.

Together they gutted all the walls, and remodeled parts of the interior based on their own need. A bedroom was repurposed to add a pantry in the kitchen, a walk-in closet for the bedroom, and a walk-in shower in a bathroom.

When Rachael found a chandelier that she really liked for the front parlor, the ceiling was recessed to add height for the light to hang safely.

George said that work on the house is moving much more slowly than hoped. “It’s kind of good that we are working slow, because we’re making decisions as we go.”

The home is lovely, both outside and in. The natural wood grains of the door and window frames, as well as the floors, are amazing. Old lavatories, bathroom fixtures and glass doorknobs are fitting touches.

Clearing the shrubs and bushes revealed the rock niches in the front and on the sides. Some believe that the rock is a by-product of the tobacco

”

curing process. They also cleaned out the fruit cellar beneath the main structure. Work on the second story is ongoing.

George once thought he would have someone paint a mural to hang on an empty wall above a table in the dining room. Someone in his family offered him a large picture of his grandparents taken on their 50th wedding anniversary, along with their nineteen children. It is the only known picture of Noe’ and Elma Ordeneaux Vicknair with their sixteen boys and three girls. He supported his children on the pay he received from working as a baker. Elma remarried when her husband died.

Historical records show that the Gearhard family purchased the home, one of a few known as Lutcher & Moore’s Executive Row, for $10,000. The Vicknairs have thus far invested $400,000 in the property, house, concrete, new roof, complete new electrical wiring, plumbing and much more.

The Vicknairs are looking forward to excitement to hosting a Christmas Eve celebration at their home and building a bonfire on the levee. The family once built a bonfire on family property at the end of Mears Road in Lutcher. The recipe for George’s Christmas Eve gumbo of 2000 included 90 pounds of chicken leg quarters, 30 pounds of sausage, 15 pounds of andouille and 15 pounds of smoked turkey necks. The last year they celebrated as family was 2003.

“This year will be a big celebration,” Rachael said with excitement. The Vicknairs have two daughters, Courtney Becnel and Brittany Vicknair. “We’re looking forward to having everyone here to celebrate with us.” They surely have reason to celebrate.

Every day in Louisiana’s River Parishes, the sun rises and sets over the Mighty Mississippi. Despite whatever challenges we face, our story continues with new initiatives highlighting the courageous spirit of the people who call this place home. Our hearts remain strong, and we’re ready to welcome guests back to experience real flavor, real history, and real adventure.

14 | ST. JAMES

Former Covid Patient Returns to Hospital to Say “Thanks”

Karin Ritvo returned to St. James Parish Hospital recently to do something she’s wanted to do for more than a year and a half.

She went to say thank you. A resident of Vacherie and the art teacher at Cypress Grove Montessori School in Lutcher, Ritvo was the second person admitted to St. James Parish Hospital with COVID its first wave in March 2020.

In her personal meeting with Hospital CEO Mary Ellen Pratt, Ritvo said she wasn’t feeling well on March 16, 2020, and had a family member drive her to Baton Rouge General. She was tested for the Corona virus outside on the sidewalk and then sent home to await the results, a process which took seven days at the time. The next day her paramedic granddaughter found her passed out on the floor, resuscitated her, and rushed her over to St. James Parish Hospital, where she was admitted and stayed for about two weeks in intensive care.

“Thank you for everything,” Mary Ellen Pratt and Karin Ritvo.

Ritvo told Pratt. “The nurses took such good care of me. All the staff, they were all excellent.” Ritvo said she was treated with hydroxychloroquine, a drug used to treat malaria caused by mosquito bites before COVID. According to Pratt, Louisiana was one of the first states in the nation to be infected with the first wave of the virus along with Florida, New York, and Washington State.

“There was just so much fear and unknown in those early days of the virus,” said the CEO. “We were having to make changes rapidly every day to keep up with the Centers for Disease Control guidelines.”

However, the effects of the virus compounded by the devastation caused by Hurricane Ida have taken its toll on hospital employees, according to Pratt. We are seeing the ramifications now in the form of staff shortage.

We are focusing on staff well-being and applying for grants to help staff with costs incurred by Hurricane Ida that are not paid by insurance or FEMA.” Pratt explained that the best thing for staff about St. James Parish Hospital is that they are taking care of friends, family, and community neighbors. The ST. JAMES worse thing is the same. So many of the nurses were affected because so many in their care died alone in the hospital because family members were not allowed to be with them.

“I’m so grateful for this little hospital,” Ritvo told Pratt. “I can’t imagine going anywhere else for testing and other services that I can do here.”

Proud

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Advent at St. Charles Catholic

During the liturgical season of Advent, the Comets are always invited to a deeper reflection into their own faith journeys, examining where they might make more room for Christ in their hearts and lives. This reflection is ongoing and presented to students in myriad venues. First, Religion classes incorporate bellringers, individual activities, and group discussions about the Incarnation of Christ and what that means for us today. Secondly, the daily morning prayer includes the lighting of the Advent Wreaths in each classroom, allowing for the study body as a whole to pray together through the weeks of Advent, focusing on the virtues of Hope, Love, Joy, and Peace.

Finally, the school holds a special schedule each year during Advent in order to facilitate the Reconciliation Service, a schoolwide prayer service in which the students examine their consciences and sit with priests from throughout the River Parishes to make their confessions and begin the new liturgical year with a fresh spiritual start. During the service, students are invited to come forward as they are comfortable to speak with a priest, to pray at the foot of the cross, and to speak with our campus minister, Ryan Foulon.

The SCC Fellowship of Christian Athletes also remembers Advent in a special way with their service project: Operation Christmas Child. Community members prepare gifts for children of various ages, wrapping each in a shoebox and preparing the gifts to be delivered before Christmas Day. In anticipation of Christmas, a schoolwide Mass will be offered on the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, and that evening, December 8 at 5 pm, the SCC Stagehands will host an evening of entertainment with their annual Comet Christmas—a free event on SCC’s campus for all families and friends of the Comets!

It is a gift to grow spiritually during the school day, one that the Comets are especially grateful for during this time of year.

For more information about St. Charles Catholic, contact Dr. Courtney Millet, principal, at (985) 652-3809 or by email at millet.courtney@stcharlescatholic.org.

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Cook sugar, Karo syrup, and water to 280 degrees using candy thermometer.

When sugar reaches 250 degrees, begin beating egg whites in separate bowl until stiff. When sugar reaches 280 degrees, pour slowly into egg white. This should take about two minutes. Continue to beat the egg whites and sugar mixture for another 5 to 6 minutes. Add almond and vanilla extracts and beat for 2 more minutes. Stir in pecans and beat by hand until mixture no longer drips from the spatula. Pour the mixture into a buttered or sprayed pan. Allow to dry so that it’s not sticky. Cut into desired sized pieces.

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