450
$
WOMEN IN BUSINESS • COVINGTON FOUNDERS • MAGNOLIA VODKA • URSULINES IN NEW ORLEANS
MAY-JUNE 2017 VOL. 32, NO. 3
May-June 2017
Vol. 32, No. 3
Publisher Lori Murphy –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Editor-in-Chief Anne Honeywell Senior Editor Jan Murphy Managing Editor Leah Draffen Editorial Intern Meredith Gelpi Contributors are featured on page 16. –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Art Director Brad Growden Graphic Designer Jennifer Starkey Production Intern Madison Hutson –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Business Manager Jane Quillin Senior Account Executives Poki Hampton Candice Laizer Barbara Roscoe Account Executives Lisanne Alack Barbara Bossier Jonée Daigle-Ferrand Amy Taylor Advertising Coordinator Margaret Rivera Sales Intern Faith Saucier –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– For advertising information phone (985) 626-9684 fax (985) 674-7721 email sales@insidepub.com –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Please send items for Inside Scoop to scoop@insidepub.com. Photos for Inside Peek, with captions, should be sent to peek@insidepub.com. Submit items for Inside Input or Dining Guide to editor@insidepub.com. –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Contact Inside Northside P.O. Box 9148 Mandeville, LA 70470-9148 phone (985) 626-9684 fax (985) 674-7721 website www.insidenorthside.com Subscriptions 1 Year $18 2 Years $30 email subscriptions@insidepub.com ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
On the cover Artist Mary Helen Seago Fall Beauties
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– INSIDE NORTHSIDE MAGAZINE is published bi-monthly (January, March, May, July, September, November) by M and L Publishing, LLC, PO Box 9148, Mandeville, LA 70470-9148 as a means of communication and information for St. Tammany and Tangipahoa Parishes, Louisiana. Bulk Postage paid at Mandeville, LA. Copyright ©2017 by M & L Publishing, LLC. No part of this magazine may be reproduced without written consent of publisher. Publisher is not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts and artwork. Inside Northside Magazine is created using the Adobe Creative Suite on Apple Macintosh computers.
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Inside Northside
page 34
page 74
contents table of
page 40
Features 18 Lyrical Abstractions Cover Artist Mary Helen Seago 34 Raising the Roof The 2017 NHBA Raffle House 40 Covington’s “Dynamic Young Pioneers” page 50
50 Trailblazing Women of God The Ursulines in New Orleans 62 A Foundation for the Future Local students. Local scholarships. 120 Spirits for the Southern Palate Distilled in the Delta
Women IN Business Follows page 82. 8
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contents table of
page 69
Departments
12 Publisher’s Note
page 146
14 Editor’s Note 15 Reader Resources 16 Contributors 24 INside Scoop 33 IN Other Words The Grandparent Club 69 Flourishes Extraordinary gifts and home accents 74 INside Look Summer Citrus 116 Travel 137 INside Peek O Danube So Blue... Featuring Cruise with St. Tammany West Chamber Celebration Woofstock Festival 126 IN Great Taste Northshore Heart Walk Fresh Herbs Brighten Spring Dessert Stem Campus Ribbon Cutting 128 At the Table St. Patrick’s Parade and Celebration Prom Night Chef Soirée 132 INside Dining 146 Last Word 136 IN Love & Marriage
page 126
Port Orleans Brewery
“In a digital world, there is still nothing quite like tangibility.” by Lori Murphy
- Christopher Brown
The noise can be unbearable. Things we look for online are buried so deep into things others want to say, it is exhausting to wade through the static. As a marketing professional, I understand the desire to tell you everything that I possibly can in the seconds that you afford me while going from place to place in the digital world. As a consumer, it makes me crazy, and I have to say, uncomfortable. When a search on my desktop computer is recalled through advertising during a visit to Facebook on my cell, it is creepy. I long for the tranquil time of tangibility. What I can see and touch will never be superseded by images on a computer screen. Are there copies of all of our Inside Northside and Inside New Orleans issues online? Absolutely. Can you read a story from an issue several years back? Yes. But that doesn’t come close to replacing the honor of our place on your coffee table. We are happy to wait for your leisure time, your feet up on the ottoman. Where you can immerse yourself in the pages of our issues. Horacio Silva said in an article for Departures Magazine that luxury and technology are a contradiction in terms. “True luxury is predicated on scarcity and permanence, technology on ubiquity and transience.” I prefer to spend time in my niche. A place where my life and interests co-mingle with those of my community. I am not anti-digital, but there is a time and place for it. Search for news about what is going on in cities I care about, order paper towels for the office—cases like that, why not go digital? But when I want a dress that makes me feel like the belle of the ball, I yearn to feel the fabric, see the workmanship and the way the color looks against my skin. It needs to be tangible. When given the choice to be personal, tangible and connected … I will. And so will each issue of Inside Northside and Inside New Orleans.
ps … Congratulations to the Women in Business featured in these pages. They are my heroes, mentors and guideposts. We are the community we are because you are the people you are. Thank you.
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Editor’s Note by Anne Honeywell celebrat e: 1. ackno wledge with a socia l gathering or enjoyable activity. 2. honor or pra ise publicly . At Inside Northside, we love to celebrate. And in this issue, we are celebrating quite a few things. First and foremost, our fabulous Women In Business, who contribute so much to the success of their companies. See page 83 to learn more about how they do it! We will celebrate them again with a luncheon in mid-May. We are also celebrating our cover artist, Mary Helen Seago. This local talent’s graceful works are a springtime inspiration to us all. Her story as told by Linda Dautreuil can be found on page 18. Several other talented artists have been on our covers this year, and we are excited to celebrate all of them on May 17 from 5:30 to 7:00 p.m. at the NHBA “Raising the Roof for Charity” Raffle House in Money Hill. Come by and see this gorgeous house, have something to eat and drink and see some beautiful original art. As we celebrate mothers and fathers on special days in May and June, Ann Gilbert helps us remember some of Covington’s earliest “mothers and fathers” in a very interesting read on page 40. We are also happy to share with you Karen Gibbs’ celebration of the “Trailblazing Women of God— the Ursulines of New Orleans” on page 50. These months bring graduations, which are often called “commencements” because they mark the beginning of a new phase of life for students. On page 62, we celebrate three northshore high school graduates who have gone on to further their education after having been awarded scholarships through the Northshore Community Foundation. These students are doing great things while in college and have impressive post-graduation plans to positively impact our community. I hope you enjoy this celebratory issue of Inside Northside—and always remember to celebrate the things you love in life every day!
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Meet cover artists
Reader Resources Contact Us: You may contact us by mail, phone, fax or on our website:
Cindi Guillot Gretchen Armbruster Craig Brumfield Mary Helen Seago
Mail: Inside Northside P.O. Box 9148 Mandeville, LA 70470-9148 Telephone: 985-626-9684 Fax: 985-674-7721 Website: insidenorthside.com Receiving Inside Northside in Your Mailbox? You are on our mailing list, and you will continue to receive Inside Northside every other month at no charge. Please join us in thanking our advertisers, who make this possible. Pick Up a Copy: At one of our advertisers’ locations or at Barnes & Noble, 3414 Highway 190, Premier Centre, Mandeville, La. Subscribe: To subscribe to Inside Northside, to our sister publication Inside New Orleans, or if you have a question about your subscription, please contact us by telephone or e-mail us at subscriptions@insidepub.com. Subscriptions are $18 for one year or $30 for two years. To change your address, please send us both your old address and your new address. The post office does not forward magazines. Advertising Information: For advertising information, please contact us by telephone or e-mail us at sales@insidepub.com. Inquire and Share Ideas: Do you know a person, organization or endeavor we might consider featuring in our pages? Or a great storyteller who might want to write for us? Please contact the editor@insidepub.com.
and see some of their favorite works on display at the
Northshore Home Builders Association’s “Raising the Roof for Charity” 2017 Raffle House 320 Steeplechase Drive in Money Hill off Hwy. 435, Abita Springs, La.
Thursday, May 17, 2017 5:30-7:00 p.m. For more information, call
626-9684
May-June 2017 15
Contributors Our contributors give Inside Northside its voice, its personality and its feel. Here we are proud to highlight a few of them so that you can put a face with a name and get to know them.
Ann Gilbert Ann Gilbert became immersed in history and architecture as a walking tour guide in the French Quarter, St. Louis Cemeteries and the Garden District. Previously, she was a newspaper lifestyle editor and worked in public relations. She now gives tours focusing on the art at St. Joseph Abbey. You will also find her at Bible studies and book clubs. Ann and Gene have three children and five grandchildren and enjoy summer in Western North Carolina. A feature writer for us for 15 years, Anne usually focuses on historic architecture or personalities from the past. In this issue, she introduces us to Covington’s pioneers (page 40).
Tom Fitzmorris
Karen B. Gibbs
Mimi Greenwood Knight
Tom Fitzmorris grew up in Treme, ate red beans every Monday from his CreoleFrench mother until he left home. Not long after that, he began writing a weekly restaurant review column that has continued 42 years. In 1975, he began a daily radio feature, which grew into his current three-hour daily talk show on 1350, 3WL. He is the author of several cookbooks, more than a dozen restaurant guidebooks, a daily online newsletter (nomenu.com), and joins us At the Table on page 128.
Longtime contributor and former managing editor of Inside Northside, Karen B. Gibbs enjoys writing about the fascinating people and places of New Orleans and the northshore. A contributor to Today.com and iVillage.com, Karen recently completed the biography of her father-inlaw, a WWII paratrooper. When not writing, she enjoys traveling with her husband and spoiling their grandchild. On page 50, she tells all about the Ursulines of New Orleans.
Mimi Greenwood Knight is a mother of four and a freelance writer with more than 500 articles and essays in print in national and regional magazines, devotionals and 50 anthologies, including two dozen Chicken Soup for the Soul books. She lives in Folsom with her husband, David, where she enjoys martial arts, gardening, Bible study and knitting. In this issue, Mimi writes about our featured Woman in Business, Erin Moore Cowser, on page WIB 4 and tells all about a new vodka distilled for southerners’ taste (page 120).
Other Voices: Gretchen Armbruster, Michelle Biggs, Linda Dautreuil, Candra George, Thomas B. Growden, Poki Hampton, Anne Honeywell, Yvette Jemison, Becky Slatten and Terri Schlichenmeyer.
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Inside Northside
Lyrical Abstractions Cover Artist Mary Helen Seago
WHEN MARY HELEN SEAGO presented her thesis exhibition in the fine arts department of Newcomb College in 1961, she displayed sculptures in bronze and plaster of paris. The bronzes became part of the Newcomb College Collection. Several other sculptures remain with her, including a striking relief sculpture hanging in her living room. Because of the limited number of pieces in this series and Mary Helen’s eventual move into painting, these early works are important markers in her artistic development. The theme of these abstractions reference birds and various aspects of flight, including lift off and destination. Titles such as Moon Sails and The Dance suggest a poetic sensibility that continues to express itself in 2017 in a different form and medium. I arrive at Mary Helen’s home for a conversation about her life and her art. A wide-open studio is filled with colorful large-scale paintings that catch >> 18
Inside Northside
photo: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
by Linda Dautreuil
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photo: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
my eye. These works appear to be in harmony with the springtime landscape of Southeast Louisiana. Mary Helen greets me in the gracious style of one born and raised in New Orleans. Her subtle accent is unmistakable and authentic as we discuss the modulation of color that creates mood and structure in her style of painting. To fully appreciate Mary Helen’s transition from sculpture to painting, it is necessary to consider early influences. In her words, “the likelihood is that a few artistic genes have filtered down through several generations.” Her family history dates to 1600-1700 in Northern England, Scotland and Ireland. Her ancestors came to Georgia, acquiring property and establishing themselves as plantation owners near Savannah before the Civil War. At the time, record keeping of business transactions and personal histories describing everyday life was a common practice. Many such records were destroyed in the Savannah Military Campaign that began with the burning of Atlanta and continued as Union General Sherman marched to the sea. Among
the surviving records were letters documenting Mary Helen’s family before, during and after the Civil War, approximately a 5-to-6 year period. They are preserved today in historical collections at the University of Georgia and Tulane University. A family friend compiled the letters in The Children of Pride: A True Story of Georgia and the Civil War edited by Robert Manson Myers. It took him 10 years to complete the book, which received the National Book Award in History in 1973. Later, these documents became part of an epistolary novel published in the 1980s. Mary Helen’s recounting of details relating to her family history at the time illustrates her abilities as a true Southern storyteller, “My father’s mother was born on the plantation right after the war. Sherman was raiding and burning anything in his way. He spared the plantation at that time because he received a dispatch that a baby, who later became my grandmother, was being born. Later, he returned and burned the plantation down. That is when the family left for New Orleans.” Mary Helen’s interest in the arts apparently springs from strong roots. British painter and watercolorist, Edward Brian Seago (1910-1974), a cousin of Mary Helen’s father, was well known throughout Europe. His atmospheric landscapes and scenic water scenes were painted in the Late Impressionist Style and highly regarded by collectors. The Queen of England acquired one of his paintings for the Royal Collection. Mary Helen’s brother Robert Seago is a recognized painter and musician. Her brother John Seago “is a lawyer turned vintner. John loved science, and the challenge of growing grapes in Louisiana resulted in the founding of Pontchartrain Vinyards.” All three siblings now live on the northshore. Leaving the “way back” influences of ancestry behind, Mary Helen relates her journey to the arts. “I graduated from St. Martin’s before heading to Newcomb College. I worked hard, completed a full curriculum of classes carrying 21 hours each semester. When I saw an opportunity to study with Jules Strubeck, head of the fine arts sculpture program, I immediately enrolled in his class and became the first fine arts sculpture major in the department.” After graduation, Mary Helen moved to New York and landed a job in a large advertising agency. She met
and married her husband. “By the time we moved to Arizona in 1969, I had small children ages 4, 2, and a newborn. These were not easy years and included major changes in my family life. The responsibility of small children in an environment that was unlike New York, and even more unlike my home in New Orleans, left me with little time for myself. Nevertheless, I had pursued the arts at Newcomb, and I continued to practice my skills in unexpected ways. I was always a good observer, so I became particularly attentive to the desert landscape. I visited the Desert Botanical Gardens in Phoenix and absorbed as much as I could in the hope that these observations would inform my
art making. I considered the contrast between desert and tropical flowers to be much more interesting than the study of cactus alone. I learned that there is no gentleness about the desert. It is nothing like the luscious tropical atmosphere of New Orleans, so while living in the desert, I found myself creating gardens. In 1982, I had my first public art show.� Mary Helen traveled throughout her life. She returned to Savannah from time to time, visiting friends and painting gardens by the seashore. She also visited New York, where she lived in her early career, and added a twist to my question concerning artists whose work influenced her own. “While in >> May-June 2017 21
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nature. These earlier paintings are grounded, usually in contact with the edge of the canvas to achieve a feeling of being rooted to the earth. An example from this period is the centerpiece of the permanent collection on display in the Atrium Gallery at the Christwood Retirement Community in Covington. The process that Mary Helen prefers in her practice involves reference materials such as photographs as points of origin for developing her subjects. She makes preliminary studies of these images, usually drawing in black and white before going forward in her preferred medium of oil paint. “Oil requires more technical considerations for layering color but yields the kind of luminous surfaces I prefer. Over the years, I have continued to open myself to new ideas and experiences in the arts. I have taken classes and workshops with many notable artists, most recently with abstract painter, Nell Tilton. I discovered how difficult it is to release the composition from the edge of the canvas and retain only the essence of the subject without explicit representation. In this process of exploration, I find myself alluding to botanical subjects in a more subtle application of overall muted layers of paint with passages of intense color breaking through.” When Mary Helen returned to Louisiana about
photo: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
New York, I took a side trip to Newport with my friends who had family there. We were invited to lunch in a lovely home surrounded by paintings of flowers. Upon closer examination, I realized that I was surrounded by an amazing number of paintings by Georgia O’Keefe from the collection of her sister. It was like dining in a museum.” The subject of influences brings us to Mary Helen’s thoughts on spirituality. She is a devout Christian. Her spirituality seems to be non-denominational, with a strong connection to Christ. “There was a very stressful period of my life when I was riddled with fear about the future. It took about seven years for me to begin to feel at peace. At my age now, I see more clearly that life is a journey. One of the great sustaining influences on me has been the spiritual approach to life encouraging me to find peace within myself. We attach ourselves to certain things. The earth gives us energy, and we are connected to the earth because of it. Spirituality gives us peace, and we are connected to the spiritual life because of it. Each day, I am mindful of the gift of art and the making of it.” Mary Helen’s latest paintings may be described as lyrical abstractions. The compositions she brings to this style evolved after years of painting floral subjects, most often a single flower in a powerful reference to
five years ago, she had already had several exhibitions of her work. She found gallery representation quickly in the Three Rivers Art Gallery in Covington. Her work was often prominently displayed in the corner window on Boston and Vermont as the strong graphic presence of her botanicals appeared as peaceful presences in a high traffic area. About eight months ago, Mary Helen began to explore the New Orleans gallery scene and began showing at Guy Lyman Fine Arts on Magazine Street. Her work was finding an audience when she became reacquainted with an artist she greatly admires, Gretchen Armbruster. Gretchen was in the process of relocating her gallery in Covington to Columbia Street when she saw Mary Helen’s breakthrough works of abstract gardens and invited her to show. Armbruster describes the popular response to Seago’s paintings, “Clients are drawn to Mary Helen’s use of light, airy colors that go with any décor. I think I have a favorite until she brings her next painting in, and then that one is my favorite. I am delighted to have her paintings in my gallery.” Most recently, Mary Helen met with art consultant Susan Illing, founder of Susan Illing Fine Art or SIFA. Illing has successfully introduced Seago’s paintings to a wider audience in Louisiana, along the Gulf Coast and the southern region of the United States. As our interview concludes, Mary Helen shares a question that she often asks herself, “Why do we attach ourselves to certain things? As an artist, something inside draws me to my subject. It becomes a love affair—a journey of peace, beauty, and love. View additional works by Mary Helen at Armbruster Artworks on Columbia Street in Covington or online at seagoart.com. May-June 2017 23
INSIDE
MEMORIAL DAY is the perfect time to purchase a framed flag for your home or business—especially when all the proceeds will go to such a worthy cause. During the Just Cause Flag Campaign, the entire cost of all the framed flags sold goes directly to the local chapter of Heroes on the Water, so every penny helps our local veterans. Heroes on the Water helps our warriors and veterans from all branches 24
I n s i d e N o rt h s i d e
of the United States military unwind using the therapeutic qualities of fishing from kayaks. Founded in 2007, our unique kayak fishing program gives the participants a chance to decompress from the stresses associated with combat and the physical rigors of rehabilitation. Participants receive basic kayak fishing and paddling instruction, angling clinics and paddling classes for participants with skill sets ranging from beginners to the
most experienced paddlers. Warriors enjoy these benefits while on guided fishing trips held in local communities around Southeast Louisiana. “Our chapter is at the point where we do not have enough kayaks or ways to transport them for the numbers of veterans interested in attending events. With the money raised from the flag campaign, the local chapter plans to purchase more kayaks and a larger trailer,” says Jessie Saucier of HOW.
photo courtesy: HEROES ON THE WATER-SOUTHEAST LOUISIANA CHAPTER
the definitive guide to northshore events and entertainment
Memorial Day May 29 Just Cause Flag Campaign. Purchase a framed flag. Benefiting Heroes on the Water-Southeast Louisiana Chapter. Heroesonthewater.org; justcauseflagcampaign.com; FB: Heroes on the Water Louisiana Chapter; FB: Just Cause Flag Campaign.
May 1-14 Young Frankenstein. Slidell Little Theatre, 2024 Nellie Dr. 641-0324. slidelllittletheatre.org. 1-16 Art & Bloom on the Northshore. Presented by the Slidell Art League. Slidell Memorial Hospital Cancer Center, 1120 Robert Blvd. slidellartleague.org. 1-18 I Should Have Named Her Virga: Drawings by Inga Clough Falterman. St. Tammany Art Association Art House,>> May-June 2017 25
Inside Scoop 320 N Columbia St, Covington. 892-8650. 1-21 A Life of Seduction: Venice in the 1700s.
festivities, live music, specials, costume contest
C. Diboll Crl, City Park, New Orleans. (504) 658-
and prizes. Covington, Slidell, Metairie and
4100. noma.org.
Harahan locations. carretasgrill.com. 5-7 The Red Velvet Cake War. 30 by Ninety Theatre,
Gestures and Cecilia Vicuña: About to
800 Lafayette St, Mandeville. 844-THE-3090.
Happen. Contemporary Arts Center, 900 Camp
30byninety.com.
St, New Orleans. (504) 528-3805. cacno.org. 1-July 16 Waltzing the Muse: The Paintings of
5-26 Hammond Art Guild’s Spring Open Judged Exhibition. Hammond Regional Arts
James Michalopoulos. Ogden Museum of
Center, 217 E Thomas St. 5-8pm. 542-7113.
Southern Art, 925 Camp St, New Orleans. (504)
hammondarts.org.
539-9650. ogdenmuseum.org. 1-Dec 2 Storyville: Madams and Music. The Historic New Orleans Collection’s Williams
6 Art Market. Covington Trailhead. 9am-1pm. covla.com. 6 Crawfish Festival. Live music by Mississippi Flush
Research Center, 410 Chartres St, New Orleans.
Blues, mini horses, petting zoo, all-you-can-eat
Tues-Sat, 9:30am-4pm. Free. hnoc.org.
crawfish, sides and non-alcoholic drinks. Beer
2 Give NOLA Day Northshore. Covington Trailhead. givenola.org. 2 Neil Diamond. Smoothie King Center, New Orleans. (800) 745-3000. livenation.com. 3, 10, 17, 24, 31 Covington Farmers Market. Covington Trailhead. 10am-2pm. covla.com. 4-7 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Fair Grounds Race Course, 1751 Gentilly Blvd, New Orleans. nojazzfest.com. 5 40th Annual Zoo-To-Do. Awakening new wonder
sold separately. Alexander Milne Developmental Services, 1065 Milne Circle, Covington. 12-5pm. $25; 6 and under, free. 327-6550. milneds.org. 6, 13, 20, 27 Camellia City Market. East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce parking lot, 1808 Front St, Slidell. 8am-12pm. camelliacitymarket.org. 6, 13, 20, 27 Covington Farmers Market. 609 N Columbia St. 8am-12pm. covla.com. covingtonfarmersmarket.org.
in Audubon Zoo’s Jaguar Jungle! The Audubon
6, 13, 20, 27 Mandeville Trailhead Market.
Zoo, New Orleans. Gala, 8pm. (504) 861-6160.
9am-1pm. mandevilletrailheadmarket.com.
audubonnatureinstiture.org/ztd. 5 Carey Street Crawl. 2200 Block of Carey
7 Some Enchanted Evening. Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra. Slidell’s Heritage Park.
St, Slidell. 5-9:30pm. facebook.com/
In case of rain, Municipal Auditorium. 4-7:30pm.
careystreetcoalition.
646-4375. myslidell.com.
5 Leadercast Live. Presented by St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce. Streaming a live HD simulcast of scheduled speakers Daniel
7, 14, 21, 28 Abita Springs Farmers Market. 12-4pm. townofabitasprings.com. 10 Let’s Talk Art Series. Hammond Regional Arts
Pink, Andy Stanley, Molly Fletcher, Suzy Welch,
Center, 217 E Thomas St. 5-6pm. 542-7113.
Dr. Henry Cloud, Donald Miller, Tyler Perry, Jess
hammondarts.org.
Ekstrom and Jim McKelvey. Movie Tavern 201 N
11 Mike Super, Magic & Illusion. OnSTAGE
Hwy 190, Covington. Chamber member, $110;
at the Fuhrmann Greater Covington Center.
nonmember, $125. event.leadercast.com/
7pm. 892-1873.
location/sttammany. 5 Sheriff Randy Smith Golf Tournament
I n s i d e N o rt h s i d e
5-6 Cinco de Mayo at Carreta’s Grill. All-day
The New Orleans Museum of Art. One Collins
1-June 18 Senga Nengudi: Improvisational
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or 705-4200.
12 Anchor Classic Golf Tournament. A fundraiser for Madisonville’s Maritime Museum Wooden Boat
Benefitting Rainbow Child Care. Royal Golf
Festival. Beau Chêne Country Club Oak Course,
Club, 201 Royal Dr, Slidell. 12pm. $125 per
602 N Beau Chêne Blvd, Mandeville. 12pm. Team
golfer, $500 per 4-person team. (504) 296-9982
of four, $500. 845-3572.
12 Celebrate Graduation at 18 STEAK. 11am-11pm. Reservations recommended, (225) 224-4142. lbatonrouge.com/dining/18-steak. 12-13 Mother’s Day at Palm Village. Gift with purchase promotional event. Palm Village, A Lilly Pulitzer Signature Store, 2735 US-190 C, Mandeville. 778-2547. 12-28 The Practice. Playmakers Community Theater, 19106 Playmakers Rd, Covington. Adults, $20; students, $10. 893-1671. 12-June 23 Slidell Photo Club Exhibition. Slidell Cultural Center, 2055 Second St. Reception May 12, 7-9pm. Wed-Friday, 12-4pm. Free. 646-4375. myslidell.com. 13 Crawfish Mambo. Crawfish cook-off, live music, artists and more hosted by the UNO International Alumni Association. University of New Orleans Lakefront Campus. (504) 280-2586. crawfishmambo.com. 13 Louisiana Veterans Festival. Car and truck show, arts and crafts, games, food, drinks, live music by Amanda Shaw, Topcats, Eli Seals and 90 Degrees West. Special tribute show with guest speaker Matt Cole and music by Witness. 6390656. laveteransfestival.com. 13 NAMIWalks St. Tammany. NAMI walks for mental health. Mandeville Lakefront, across from Pontchartrain Yacht Club. 10am. 626-6538. namisttammany.org. 13 Red Stick Food Fest. Local restaurants, drinks, art vendors and live music to benefit the Louisiana Hospitality Foundation. Family friendly. The Lawn at L’Auberge Baton Rouge. 11am-7pm. redstickfoodfest.com. 13 Second Saturday Evening Stroll. Downtown Covington. 6-9pm. covla.com. 13 Swingin’ in the Pines. Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra. Bogue Falaya Park. Covinton. 6pm. covla.com. lpomusic.com.
>>
May-June 2017 27
Inside Scoop 13 The Roamin’ Jasmine and Phil DeGruy & Emily Robertson. Dew Drop Jazz and Social Hall, 430 Lamarque St, Mandeville. 6-9pm. $10. 624-9604. 13 Walgreens Greater New Orleans International
Symphony Youth Orchestra. Live Oak Plaza; Bellingrath Gardens and Home; Theodore, Ala. 5:30-7pm. bellingrath.org. 14 Mother’s Day Home Tour. The Old Mandeville
Dragon Boat Races & Festival. Tchefuncte
Historic Association presents the 8th annual OMHA
River, Madisonville. 8am-4pm. (855) 496-2628.
Mother’s Day Home Tour. Starts at Jean Baptiste
gwndragonboat.com.
Lang House, 605 Carroll St, Mandeville. 2-5pm.
13-14 Crescent City Auction Gallery. 1330 St. Charles Ave, New Orleans. (504) 529-5057. crescentcityauctiongallery.com. 13-14, 20-21 Northshore Parade of Homes. Over 30 homes. St. Tammany and Tangipahoa Parishes. 12-5pm. Free. northshoreparadeofhomes.org. 13-June 23 Transformations: paintings of Nell
Adults, $20; 12-18, $12; under 12, free. 626-4975. 17 Meet the Cover Artists of Inside Northside. Raising the Roof for Charity Home, Money Hill, 320 Steeplechase Dr, Abita Springs. 5:30-7pm. 6269684. 882-5002. 18 Linnzi Zaorski at Ogden After Hours. Ogden Museum of Southern Art, 925 Camp St,
Tilton. Reception May 13, 4:30-6:30pm. The Atrium
New Orleans. 6-8pm. (504) 539-9650.
Gallery, 100 Christwood Blvd, Covington. 898-0515.
ogdenmuseum.org.
christwoodrc.com. 14 Mother’s Day Brunch at 18 STEAK. Buffet-style
18-20, 21 Foreign to Myself. Performance presented by Goat in the Road Productions.
stations and carving stations. 11am-2pm. $49 per
Contemporary Arts Center, 900 Camp St, New
person excluding tax and gratuity. (225) 224-4142.
Orleans. May 18-20, 7:30pm; May 21, 2:30 and
lbatonrouge.com/dining/18-steak.
7:30pm. (504) 528-3805. cacno.org.
14 Mother’s Day Evening Garden Concert. Mobile
19 Beverage Academy at the Grand. Wine 101.
Grand Hotel Marriott, Fairhope, Ala. 5:30pm. $20.
767 Robert Blvd, Slidell. 8pm. 649-3727.
(251) 928-9201. marriottgrand.com.
cuttingedgetheater.com.
19 Pepe Romero and “The Three-Cornered Hat.
20 Abita Springs Opry. Last Chance Bluegrass
LPO concert. First Baptist Church of Covington.
Band, Kass and Friends, The Magnolia Sisters
7:30pm. lpomusic.com.
and The Zion Harmonizers. Abita Springs Town
19 Sunset at the Landing. Columbia Street Landing, Covington. 6pm. covla.com. 19 Sweet Olive String Band. Concerts in the
Hall, 22161 Level St. Doors open, 5:45pm; performances, 7-9pm. 892-0711. abitaopry.org. 20 Culinary Academy at the Grand. Grilling. Grand
Courtyard, The Historic New Orleans Collection,
Hotel Marriott, Fairhope, Ala. 10am. $25. (251)
533 Royal St, New Orleans. Doors open, 5:30pm;
928-9201. marriottgrand.com.
6-8pm. $10 includes three drinks. 21 or older. (504) 523-4662. hnoc.org. 19 The Chee-Weez. Event Center at L’Auberge Baton Rouge. Doors open, 8pm; show, 9pm. $10. Must be 21 to enter. lbatonrouge.com/ entertainment/shows-and-events/chee-weez/. 19-21 Mid-City Bayou Boogaloo. Free, family-
20 Great Strides. Walk-a-thon to benefit the Louisiana Chapter New Orleans Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Audubon Park, New Orleans. (504) 455-5194. louisiana.cff.org. 20 Helping Heroes 2017 Extravaganza. We Heart Veterans’ fundraising event to help fund programs and services provided to local aging wartime
friendly, multi-cultural festival featuring music, food
veterans and their widowed spouses. Mandeville
and art as the flagship program of Mothership
Trailhead, 675 Lafitte St. 5K check in, 7am; race,
Foundation. 500 N Jefferson Davis Pkwy, New
8am; car show, 11am-2pm; after party 3-9pm.
Orleans. mothershipfoundation.org.
5K Fun Run, $30; after party, $20; car show, free.
19-June 3 Belles. Cutting Edge Theater,
weheartveterans.org.
>>
Inside Scoop 20 Jumpin’ into Summer. Family fun sponsored by the
(Parts 1, 2, 3). By Suzan-
City of Covington. Covington
Lori Parks, directed by Valerie
Trailhead. Free. 10am-12pm.
Curtis-Newton. Marquette
covla.com.
Hall, Loyola University. (504)
20 Seersucker & Sazeracs at the Southern. Benefitting Arts Programming at the St. Tammany Art Association.
June 1-3 Belles. Cutting Edge Theater, 767 Robert Blvd,
Boston St, Covington.
Slidell. 8pm. 649-3727.
7-10pm. $75. 892-8650.
cuttingedgetheater.com.
21 Bruce Diagrepont Cajun
1-18 Father Comes Home From the Wars (Parts 1,
Band. Third Sunday Concert
2, 3). By Suzan-Lori Parks,
Series. Christ Episcopal
directed by Valerie Curtis-
Church, 120 S New
Newton. Marquette Hall,
Hampshire St, Covington.
Loyola University, New
5pm. Free. 892-3177.
Orleans. (504) 522-6545.
25-28 New Orleans Food & Wine Experience. 25th
southernrep.com. 1-18 Senga Nengudi:
anniversary. (504) 934-1474.
Improvisational Gestures
nowfe.com.
and Cecilia Vicuña: About
25-28 Splash Into Summer
to Happen. Contemporary
at Palm Village. Gift with
Arts Center, 900 Camp St,
purchase promotional event.
New Orleans. (504) 528-
Palm Village, A Lilly Pulitzer Signature Store, 2735
3805. cacno.org. 1-23 Slidell Photo Club
US-190 C, Mandeville.
Exhibition. Slidell Cultural
778-2547.
Center, 2055 Second St.
26 Columbia Street Block Party. Covington. 6:309:30pm. covla.com. 29 Memorial Day Just Cause
Wed-Friday, 12-4pm. Free. 646-4375. myslidell.com. 1-July 16 Waltzing the Muse: The Paintings of James
Flag Campaign. Purchase
Michalopoulos. Ogden
a framed flag. Benefiting
Museum of Southern
Heroes on the Water-
Art, 925 Camp St, New
Southeast Louisiana Chapter.
Orleans. (504) 539-9650.
Heroesonthewater.org; justcauseflagcampaign.com. 30 Train. Featuring O.A.R.
ogdenmuseum.org. 1-Dec 2 Storyville: Madams and Music. The Historic
and Natasha Bedingfield.
New Orleans Collection’s
Champions Square, New
Williams Research
Orleans. (800) 745-3000.
Center, 410 Chartres St,
livenation.com.
New Orleans. Tues-Sat,
31-June 18 Father Comes I n s i d e N o rt h s i d e
522-6545. southernrep.com.
Southern Hotel, 428 E
sttammanyartassociation.org.
30
Home From the Wars
9:30am-4pm. Free. hnoc.org.
3 Kokomo Stroll. The Covington Business Association presents specialty drinks, music, giveaways and more. 4-7pm; concert at 7pm. gocovington.org. 3, 10, 17, 24 Camellia City Market. East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce parking lot, 1808 Front St, Slidell. 8am-12pm. camelliacitymarket.org. 3, 10, 17, 24 Covington Farmers Market. 609 N Columbia St. 8am-12pm. covla. com. covingtonfarmersmarket.org. 3, 10, 17, 24 Mandeville Trailhead Market. 9am-1pm. mandevilletrailheadmarket.com. 4, 11, 18, 25 Abita Springs Farmers Market. 12-4pm. townofabitasprings.com. 7, 14, 21, 28 Covington Farmers Market. Covington Trailhead. 10am-2pm. covla.com. 9 Hornbeck Offshore Bobby Hebert Golf Classic. Lakewood Golf Club, 4801 General De Gaulle Dr, New Orleans. (504) 455-5194. louisiana.cff.org. 9 Jay Leno Live on Stage. Event Center at L’Auberge Baton Rouge. Doors open, 7pm; show, 8pm. $10. Must be 21 to enter. Starting at $65, reserved seating. lbatonrouge.com/ entertainment/shows-and-events/jayleno/. 9 Legacies for Leaders Estate Planning Day. Schedule to confirm your legacy/estate plan including a Will, Power of Attorney and Living Will. Christie Tournet & Associates, 1795 W. Causeway Blvd, Ste 103A, Mandeville. $500. 951-2177. tournetlaw.com. 9-11 NPAS presents Motown Favorites. Christ Episcopal School Theater, 80 Christwood Blvd, Covington. Friday, 7:30pm; Sunday, 3pm. 276-9335. npas.info. 10 Bogue Chitto Youth Fishing Rodeo. Bogue Chitto National Wildlife Refuge, 37358 Lock One Rd, 6, Pearl River. 7:30-11am. $15. 882-2000. fws.gov. >> May-June 2017 31
Inside Scoop 10 Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. 30 by Ninety Theatre, 800 Lafayette St, Mandeville. 844-THE-3090. 30byninety.com. 10 Holland Grill Demo. Outdoor Living Center, 1331 N Hwy 190, Covington. 10am-2pm. 893-8008. 10 Run to Remember. One-mile run and 5K race through Terra Bella Village to benefit the Wounded War Heroes. 100 Terra Bella Blvd, Covington. Registration, 6:30am; 1-mile, 7:30am; 5K, 8am. Adults, $30; 12 and under, $10. getwellatdynamic.com/run. 893-4700. 10 Second Saturday Evening Stroll. Downtown Covington. 6-9pm. covla.com. 11 Tour De Louisiane Bike Race. Covington Trailhead. 8am. neworleansbicycleclub.org. 16 Sunset at the Landing. Columbia St. Landing, Covington. 6pm. covla.com. 23-25, 30, July 1 Peter Pan The New Musical. Cutting Edge Theater, 767 Robert Blvd, Slidell. 8pm. 649-3727. cuttingedgetheater.com. 24 The Molly Ringwalds. Event Center at L’Auberge Baton Rouge. Doors open, 8pm; show, 9pm. $15. Must be 21 to enter. lbatonrouge.com/entertainment/ shows-and-events/the-molly-ringwalds/. 27 Hot Club of New Orleans. Dew Drop Jazz and Social Hall, 430 Lamarque St, Mandeville. 6-9pm. $10. 624-9604. 30 Columbia Street Block Party. Covington. 6:30-9:30pm. covla.com. 30 Sparks in the Park. Fourth of July fireworks. Bogue Falaya Park, Covington. 6pm. covla.com. 30-August 4 Olde Towne Arts Center 2nd Annual Summer Exhibition. 2055 Second St. Reception June 30, 7-9pm. Wed-Friday, 12-4pm. Free. 646-4375. myslidell.com.
Send your event information to scoop@insidepub.com to have it featured in an upcoming issue. 32
I n s i d e N o rt h s i d e
IN Other Words by Becky Slatten
HAVE I MENTIONED that I’ve become a grandmother? Those who know me would say, “Oh Lord, yes,” and then back away, claiming to be late to something, before I can whip out my phone and show the latest 50 photos. It’s hard to explain to those who aren’t in the “grandparents’ club.” I didn’t get it either until my child handed me a teeny tiny person who shares our DNA—it was love at first sight. Don’t ask me why, but over the years my kids have had ongoing discussions worrying and wondering what they would do if they had an ugly baby. My reply was always the same,
they don’t let us vote. Grandchildren are like having kids when you’re kinda too old, and there’s zero pressure about the outcome! Morrison Jean is only 9 months old, but I couldn’t care less if she wins The Nobel Peace Prize when she grows up. In fact, if she can’t get a job, she can just come live with me. The best part is that I get to give her anything she wants, and I’m not responsible for how she turns out. Ultimately, no matter how much I spoil her, everyone will blame her parents if she’s spoiled. It’s fantastic!! I’ve already bought her her first car;
The Grandparent Club “You’ll never know. You will think your baby is the most beautiful child ever born, even if the rest of the world is thinking, ‘yikes.’ Of course, there’s really no such thing as an ugly baby, though they sometimes need a few days for their head to look normal. When my eldest was born, she looked a little like Yoda—because she was breech, her head was wedged into my ribcage for three months. My own mother couldn’t even say she was cute; she just kept using the word ‘sweet.’ By the time we left the hospital, she looked somewhat more human, which was a relief, and I still enjoy teasing my mother: “What kind of grandmother are you?!” My granddaughter was born perfect and beautiful, as far as I know. As parents, we sometimes attempt to map our children’s’ futures from infancy, creating grand plans for them that include Harvard and The Presidency and The Nobel Peace Prize. We hound them to finish their homework and study and always try harder; we worry about everything and continually push them to do better. Sometimes it works out, but occasionally they go off-roading and make their own life plan, and
granted, it’s purple and plastic and powered à la Fred Flintstone, but a mere harbinger of things to come. Choosing a grandmother name is no small matter. At 54, I’m clearly a very young grandmother. In fact, I often hear that I look too young to have a grandchild. That’s a lie. No one ever says that, but the kid working at the tire store did think she was my baby, so I’ll take that as a compliment. Anyway, Granny, Grandma and MawMaw are understandably out of the question; I feel my new name should reflect what a hip grandmother I am, which, in my opinion, is very. So I decided to steal the name Mimsy from a couple of my cool grandmother friends—I think it adequately illustrates just how hip I really am. (I added that last part strictly to make my 17-year-old daughter cringe.) And that’s another thing. When Mosie turns into a sassy teenaged girl, I can just change the locks on my house; I’m forced to house and feed her aunt until she graduates from Harvard. And then she’s on her own until she moves into the White House. May-June 2017 33
Raising the Roof
The shutters on the front porch are painted a spa blue. A Bevolo Gas and Electric Light lantern hangs above the front door. 34
Inside Northside
THE 2017 NORTHSHORE Home Builders Association’s “Raising the Roof for Charity” Raffle House, located in the beautifully designed golf course community of Money Hill 15 minutes from downtown Covington, was built by Jules and Rhonda Guidry of Highland Homes. In a forestland setting, the house is a jewel-box, waiting for some lucky winner to acquire at the June 3 drawing. “Rhonda and I are honored to have Highland Homes chosen as a core builder in Money Hill Plantation and look forward to changing lives for our future clients in such a beautiful place,” says Jules. The finishes on the house are high-end, with an eye toward carefree living. The Baton Rouge office of the national architecture firm Looney Ricks Kiss designed the 3,200-square-foot, Southern Traditional-style home with
>>
photos: THOMAS B. GROWDEN
The 2017 NHBA Raffle House by Poki Hampton
A traditional sectional sofa and Europeanstyle, cane-back chairs define the living room in this open concept. May-June 2017 35
plenty of open areas and ample storage. The stucco exterior, energy-efficient windows and working shutters are perfect for those wanting easy maintenance. The focal point of the open-concept living area is a whitewashed brick fireplace with a traditional mantel. The walls are painted in Pale Oak by Benjamin Moore with White Dove trim. Oversized covecrown molding with simple window and door casings are used throughout the house. The flooring is a silver-gray, limed oak-look laminate that is very durable and waterproof. Great for dogs and kids! The classic, yet current, round chandelier, ceiling fan and pendant lights are from Pine Grove Electric. The kitchen boasts plenty of Shaker-style 36
Inside Northside
cabinets, painted in White Dove. The island is in a custom mid-tone gray. End-wrapped panels give a custom look to the side of the refrigerator and the ends of the island. Stainless appliances, the Moroccan-influenced tile and Silverstone countertops, along with the custom vent hood, complete the high-end look. The master bedroom is spacious and >>
The two-tone kitchen with its dark gray island seats four people comfortably on gold and silver-leaf barstools.
Left: The contemporary whitewashed French-style table is surrounded by modified wing chairs in natural Belgium linen
photos: THOMAS B. GROWDEN
with nail head trim. A tall sideboard of reclaimed pine sits perfectly under the dining room windows. Opposite page, clockwise from top: The European-style iron bed is topped with custom Italian bedding in cream and spa blue; Over the contemporary master bathtub is a painting by Brad Budge; A slim cabinet in soft gray is beside a leather chair and ottoman in parchment; The bathroom hardware in brushed nickel finish. May-June 2017 37
Clockwise from top left: A French-style bench is at the end of the guest bed. Round night stands are painted a matte white; The desk in the office holds two topiaries and an iron-and-Lucite lamp
is the perfect place to relax in the spring weather; A gold-leaf lined shell bowl filed with small succulent plants sits atop a cabinet in the hallway.
38
Inside Northside
photos: THOMAS B. GROWDEN
with a white linen shade; The small patio
Three brushed nickel cake stands are on the island countertop.
serene. Sunlight streams in from two large windows. The European-inspired bed and simple furnishings make for a peaceful retreat. The master bath is anchored by a contemporary style, free-standing tub and a large walk-in shower. The sinks are under-mounted in Silestone countertops, with faucets in a brushed-satin finish. Louisiana Custom Closets outfitted the closets for the ultimate luxury. Jeff McNeely of Niche Modern Home styled and provided the interior design and furnishings for the home. “We wanted the interiors to have a ‘collected over time’ look. And because of all the green spaces outdoors, we wanted to bring in tones of green throughout,” says Jeff. For over 22 years, the Northshore Home Builders Association has sponsored the “Raising the Roof for Charity” event benefitting our local community, raising over $4.9 million. This year’s recipients are St. Tammany Hospital Foundation, Giving Hope Retreat—New Orleans Mission and Northshore Miracle League. Tickets are $100, and the drawing for the lucky winner is June 3.
Note: The furnishings in the house are not included in the raffle, but are available to purchase if you fall in love with the look! May-June 2017 39
Covington’s “Dynamic Young Pioneers” by Ann Gilbert
40
Inside Northside
ADVENTUROUS MEN in search of a pleasant and productive place to live in the early 1800s chose the Three Rivers area north of Lake Pontchartrain. Hailing from Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Virginia and other points north, they found promise and prospect in the rivers and aromatic pine forests of St. Tammany. Many of these men fought in the Battle of New Orleans under General David Banister Morgan or in earlier War of 1812 engagements. John Wharton Collins purchased about 1,600 acres on the Bogue Falaya River from Jacques Dreux, an ancestor of former Covington mayor Keith Villere. Collins had come to New Orleans from Philadelphia with family members after the Louisiana Purchase. He married a French woman in St. Louis Cathedral and opened a mercantile store on Magazine Street. He came to the northshore after his brother William had already staked out 600 acres on the Tchefuncte River. John Collins appeared before Judge James Tate on July 4, 1813, to have his town dedicated. He named the village Wharton after his Scottish father. Although he didn’t sign the map, it is believed General Morgan prepared the one for Collins to present to Tate. Morgan was a civil engineer, surveyor and the first state senator from St. Tammany. When the state Legislature gave its stamp of approval to Collins’ town in 1816, it changed the name to Covington. Historian and former Judge Steve Ellis suggests Gov. Claiborne wanted to honor Congressman and Brigadier General Leonard Covington for joining him in defeating the Republic of West Florida in 1810 and for his service in the War of 1812, when he died a hero. A descendant of Collins, who was a resident of Christwood Retirement Center at the time of his interview with this writer, thought otherwise. He suggested that it was too soon to name a town after a member of the British gentry when Americans had just fought the English for a second time. Citizens of the town did indeed appeal to the Legislature to change the name from Wharton. Collins was upset, but he became ill and died in 1817. “It was probably pneumonia that killed him,” his great-great-great-grandson said. He believes Collins never recovered from the harsh, cold, wet conditions in the Battle of New Orleans. Collins was sent to New Orleans for treatment, but no medical records exist. His body was brought back and buried on property later donated by his widow, Marie Elizabeth Tabiteau, for the town cemetery. Collins left one heir, Thomas Wharton Collins, who changed his name to Collens for reasons unknown. A year later, John’s widow married her deceased >> May-June 2017 41
husband’s nephew John Gibson. That would raise eyebrows today, but Collins had been a ward of his uncle and was raised by him. It was all in the family. Gibson is sometimes referred to as the co-founder of Covington because after the marriage, he sold the rest of the lots in the Division of St. John, the original town, which John Collins never had the time to do. Local historian Don Sharp wrote, “The founder
42
Inside Northside
of Covington and his brother Will owned much of the land within the present-day city limits and controlled much of the rights to the Bogue Falaya and the Tchefuncte rivers.” John had been encouraged to invest here by Will, who much earlier had purchased 600 acres on the Tchefuncte River south of where Robert and Henry Badon had substantial property. The Badon brothers married sisters of Will and John.
Henry was also the first to establish a ferry at Old Landing, connecting the two rivers. When John W. Collins hired New Orleans surveyor Joseph Pilié to plan his village, the two of them creatively left open plots of land measuring 120’ x 120’ in the center of each block. “They were in the style of English villages,” former Mayor Keith Villere said. “Only later were they called
‘ox lots.’” Without these spaces, one can imagine the street congestion, with wagons stacked high with pine products, cotton bales or produce, and pulled by a team of up to 12 oxen. The wagons came into Covington to be unloaded at the Columbia Street Landing of the Bogue Falaya. Even cattle were herded through town to board ships and cross the lake. The ox lots, not the architecture, were instrumental in getting Covington recognized by The National Register of Historic Places, Villere said. Thanks to former City Councilwoman Pat Clanton, the Columbia Street Landing has been reclaimed as a public park decorated with art, benches and a small pavilion. It is a pleasant place to enjoy a picnic lunch or hear an evening concert sponsored by the city. Only 18 months after its founding, the town would play an interesting role in preparations for the Battle of New Orleans. Gov. Claiborne called for General Andrew Jackson’s aid this time, and the Tennessean entered the town on the Indian Trail now called Military Road. The entourage >>
May-June 2017 43
crossed the lake in Madisonville. Will Collins may have had the privilege of ferrying Jackson’s troops to New Orleans for the epic battle that saved the United States from becoming part of the British Empire again. Will was quite the sailor, traveling up and down the East Coast as a postal courier and sailing crossing the Atlantic several times, only to drown in a maritime accident in Lake Pontchartrain in 1816. Judge James Tate married Will’s widow, Ann Corran. But first he brought in Justice of the Peace Lyman Briggs to draw up an agreement, naming him in control of Ann’s assets, according to St. Tammany Clerk of Court Archivist Robin Perkins. As a young adult, Will and Ann’s son George Collins returned to Covington and sued Lyman Briggs but was unsuccessful at reclaiming any family land, Perkins said. The first Covington town “council” meeting was held June 2, 1817, at the home of William Bagley, a friend of Bernard de Marigny, who would establish the town of Mandeville. Thomas Tate was elected mayor, and Dudley Packwood, Jesse Rubel Jones, Collins and Bagley were elected trustees. John Gibson was appointed secretary. “Most of these men were 30 years old or younger,” said an amused Perkins. “Covington was founded by a group of dynamic young pioneers.” Obediah Kirkland and Elijah Hornsby were among other entrepreneurs who settled there before 1820. The town became the hub of the parish from its earliest days because of its prime location as the northernmost navigable point on the Bogue Falaya. Schooners and barges carried the numerous resources of the parish— sand, gravel, pine and its by-products, and bricks made from the clay. Bagley, the man who hosted that first town hall 44
Inside Northside
meeting, owned one of the first steamboats to dock in St. Tammany. “Steam engines became the new mover and shaker in the commercial world, as it was far superior to wind, water or animal power,” Perkins said. By 1830, Bagley and Elijah Terrell had a mercantile company. Bagley bought and moved the cargo on his five lake barges, and Terrell sold it. With the arrival of steam transportation, the two men purchased the steamship “The Corsair.” It had an unusual addition—a hurricane house to help withstand storms. Terrell and Bagley expanded into The Lake Pontchartrain Steamboat Navigation Company, and within three years, they had purchased two more ships, “The Planter” and “The Blackhawk.” Others involved in the company were Judge Jones, Hezekiah Thompson, Martin and Alexander Penn, Sylvanus Parsons and William Maloney. In 1834, the ambitious men started a new enterprise that would expand over the next 100 years—transporting passengers on Sunday outings to the northshore. In the same year, Bagley ferried passengers from New Orleans to Mandeville, where Marigny was selling lots in his new village. Politically active, Bagley became president of the St. Tammany Police Jury, and in 1860, he served on the commission to prepare Civil War resolutions for the parish. Perkins also discovered that Bagley apparently owned the original brick courthouse in Claiborne, selling it in 1858. That historic building can be seen when visiting The Chimes Restaurant on the Bogue Falaya River off Highway 190 south of
downtown Covington. Bagley had yet another interesting business on his 640-acre Abita Springs property—that of bottling and selling spring water in barrels, bottles and demijohns—with a New Orleans physician as his partner. The site was known as Bagley’s Abita Spring. Yet another chapter in the life of this amazing man was the 1862 capture of his ship, “The William Bagley,” which was apparently trying to run a blockade in the Gulf of Mexico. One wonders if Bagley was aboard. He died at the age of 82 in Pensacola, where he and his wife had retired near family, and is buried there. “He was so adventurous, and such a visionary; his life could be a movie,” Perkins said. Another interesting leader in early Covington was Judge Jesse Jones, who attended that first town meeting. In 1830, he bought the remaining 1,300 acres in Covington from the founder’s son Thomas. >>
May-June 2017 45
With John Collins’ early death, it had never been developed. Jones also owned a brickyard and saw mill, and he was a merchant, as well as a longtime judge (1835-46) and a state representative. Yet another early settler was
46
Inside Northside
Thomas Cargill Warner, who had 13 children, fought in the Battle of New Orleans and was the first parish judge. Two of his sons entered the law profession, as did his son-in-law Ezekiel Ellis. When the Ellis’ sons enrolled in Centenary College in Jackson, the whole family moved to Amite. He wanted to get out of “wicked Covington,” according to Judge Ellis, who is a descendant of Ezekial. Obediah Kirkland owned a restaurant, tavern and rooming house near the Columbia Street Landing. His wife, Mary Winn Kirkland, was active in her husband’s businesses, and she also bought and sold property. Obediah may have followed Bagley to Covington because they had served together in the War of 1812. Archivist Perkins suggests Obediah was a popular and influential man in town as he “appeared as a witness in many court proceedings,
depositions, and affidavits.” The population in 1820 was, oddly enough, 1,821. A need arose to educate the children. When the state set aside $600 for each parish in 1819 and authorized police juries to set up school boards, Covington opened a school in 1820. Tuition was charged, but the schools were also required to accept eight indigent students, according to Ellis. Additional support came from taxes levied on land and enslaved people. By 1850, almost 600 children were enrolled in public schools and another 170 in private academies in St. Tammany Parish, Ellis wrote. With thriving businesses, schools and churches, Covington was an impressive town by mid-century. Congestion was likely on the rivers as the schooners and barges competed with logs floated in huge “rafts.” Log drivers skipped across them, managing
any potential pile ups. “Pine forests offered the best and the only answer for some men to the question how to make a living,” wrote John Cross in the St. Tammany Gazette. For them, it was either “run turpentine, float logs, burn tar or burn charcoal,” the forester said. >>
“Burning” charcoal was quite dangerous and difficult. It meant tending a 30-foot-wide “kiln,” a carefully built towering stack of pine logs that burned slowly 24 hours a day for 20 to 30 days. (See sidebar.) Timber was considered an asset, and cutting another man’s tree could land you in court. “The earliest criminal cases in St. Tammany Court Records were boundary disputes which involved harvesting timber,” Perkins said. Saws needed to be kept in good repair. Highly skilled blacksmiths set, sanded and mended the saws. Family sawmills ended in the decades after the Civil War when railroads arrived, and logs were shipped off to be milled elsewhere. James Hosmer of Massachusetts, a friend of John Collins, purchased a large pine forest on the Bogue Falaya River in 1822. The property included one of the earliest mills in the area, and it became known as the Hosmer Mill. James’ daughter, Arsene, married William Kirkland, and they may have built the circa 1845 Hosmer House. Her brother William married Mary Jones, the granddaughter of Obediah Kirkland. William served as Clerk of Court from 1856 until his death in 1880. Perkins wonders if his father-in-law, Judge Jones, encouraged him to pursue that position. In 1901, Charles Hosmer, grandson of William and Mary, sold the property, then 1,100 acres, to the Benedictine Monks of St. Joseph Abbey. The sale came with the stipulation that the acreage could 48
Inside Northside
not be subdivided. The historic Hosmer House still stands on the property and is in use. Because it sits on a hill, the legend circulated that the house was built on an Indian mound. The late Benedictine priest, Dominic Braud, was an amateur archaeologist and invited an LSU professor to investigate. He determined the mound had formed from flood waters over thousands of years. The Hosmer family also built the two-story gingerbread house on Jahncke Street called the Swiss Chalet. These men who figured so prominently in the early development of the Covington area are honored with streets named after them—Briggs, Collins, Gibson, Hornsby, Hosmer, Jones, Kirkland and Tate. “There is no street named after Bagley,” the archivist noted. Covington and the entire parish were “destitute by the end of the War,” Ellis wrote in the book Stories of a River Town. “Trade had been virtually eliminated by the blockade in the lake.” The economy revived after Reconstruction and with the advent of the railroad. Three businesses which opened in the late 1870s and remain active today are H.G. Smith & Sons, Marsolan’s Feed and Seed, and The Farmer newspaper. There was also time then for beautification and recreation. In 1879, the first oil-burning street lamps were installed, and the first Mardi Gras parade was held in Covington. Citizens were looking forward with anticipation to brighter days.
A little-known-but-significant part of northshore history was the production of charcoal. Before gas and electricity, coal was the primary fuel, as it burns longer and more steadily than wood and is much lighter. Because of St. Tammany’s pine forests, it was one of the key producers of coal in South Louisiana. Schooners carrying local coal lined the wharves at the New Orleans port. Producing charcoal involved piling pine logs into a towering coneshaped mound—for example, with a 30-foot diameter and an 8-foot flat surface—and covering it with pine straw and then with clay 10 to 6 inches think. Air intake holes were placed around the bottom of the pile and a chimney port at the top. The wood was set afire and allowed to burn slowly in the lowoxygen atmosphere constantly for 20 to 30 days. As coal was produced, it was pulled out using an 8-foot fork and allowed to roll down the cone. The clay coating would be pulled back over the excavation site. After some 30 days of tending the kiln day and night, the structure became a mound of dried clay surrounded by the cooling coal. Charcoal “burning” was dangerous. In tending the mound, the men had to climb on it, and the mound might crash. The volatile gases that were emitted could explode. It was a job no one wanted.
May-June 2017 49
Trailblazing by Karen B. Gibbs
Women of God The Ursulines in New Orleans Ursuline Sisters boarding a streetcar on Dauphine Street in the Bywater for their trip to their new home in Uptown New Orleans, 1912.
50
Inside Northside
IF YOU WANT TO LEARN about the history of the Ursulines in New Orleans, you can look in a book; but if you want to really FEEL their story, you should ask an Ursuline sister—and we did. They offered us an insider’s look into their centuries-old story. “We’re trailblazers, that’s what we are!” says Sr. Carla Dolce, not even trying to disguise the love and pride in her voice. “Oh, yes!” echoes Sr. Donna Hyndman, as she lists some of the
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May-June 2017 51
the Dauphine Street steps. Below: The museum at Ursuline Academy. 52
Inside Northside
photo above: M. Marie de la St. Croix, O.S.U., 1884-1912, Ursuline Convent Archives and Museum of New Orleans
photo: THOMAS B. GROWDEN
Above: Students on
accomplishments of these remarkable sisters: first woman druggist in the United States, first nuns in Louisiana, first and oldest school for girls in the country, and more. Impressive by today’s standards, it’s even more so considering these women were living in a time when they had little control over their lives. So how did these particular women break free from this stereotype? Through their foundress, St. Angela Merici. “She must have experienced the unconditional love of God,” says Sr. Carla. “She knew she was valuable to God and saw herself as equal to men.” And she engrained that philosophy
in the women who joined her Company of St. Ursula (the Ursulines). In turn, they instilled it into the spirit of the girls that they taught. “Ursulines are strong, know who they are, have a sense of purpose and know no limits,” says Emilie Leumas, Ursuline alum. “They teach their students that through education they can do and be whatever they want. In a male-dominated world, the Ursulines ARE trailblazers,” she reiterates. Archivist for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Leumas is worldrenowned for her archival work after Katrina. The influence of the Ursulines in New Orleans began in France in 1727, when the sisters agreed to send missionaries to the Louisiana territory. Although their primary ministry was the education of young girls, the sisters agreed to staff the hospital in New Orleans. Leaving behind the love of family and the comforts of life in France, 12 religious pioneers braved a five-month journey to an untamed frontier. “They were grounded twice, faced pirates and endured terrible storms,” recounts Sr. Donna. This delayed their arrival by two months. When they did
disembark from the ship to begin a six-day pirogue ride up the Mississippi River, they entered into the annals of history as the first nuns to set foot in Louisiana. This was the beginning of many “firsts” they accomplished in New Orleans. As part of their contract with the Company of the Indies (the governing body of the new French colony), the Ursulines became the first sisters to administer a military hospital and care for its sick. Unfortunately, because the sisters were semicloistered and not allowed to leave their convent grounds, they couldn’t begin this ministry until a convent was built adjoining the hospital, something that took seven years to complete. In the meantime, they pursued their first love, education, opening a boarding school for young girls in their temporary quarters in 1727. Starting with 30 boarders, Ursuline Academy would become the oldest continuously operating girls school in what is now the United States, as well as the oldest Catholic school in the country. The sisters’ rationale was simple: since women were the
primary educators of their young, they should be well educated. This was essential to the growth of a spiritually-sound, civilized society. To afford this privilege to slave and Indian girls, the Ursulines also founded the first free school in America where they taught religion, reading and writing. The sisters also opened the country’s first orphanage in November 1729 to care for children whose parents were slaughtered by Natchez Indians at Fort Rosalie. Initially, the city paid the sisters five dollars per month per child, to clothe, feed, teach and tend to their medical needs. Later, the sisters made the orphanage a free facility, one >>
Above: Sr. Rosemary
photo: The Historic New Orleans Collection, acc. no. 1950.51
Meiman, Sr. Donna Hyndman and Sr. Carla Dolce. Below: Drawing by draftsman Henry Grabau of the principal building of the second Ursuline Convent on Dauphine Street. May-June 2017 53
that remained in operation for 183 years. During that time, the sisters taught the orphans French, English, history, geography, arithmetic, catechism, writing, sewing and housework.
The first Ursuline Convent
St. Ursula, Virgin and Martyr. Patron of the Order of Ursulines, one of two stained-glass windows from the Dauphine Street convent that are now at Ursuline Academy. Created by F.X. Zettler of Munich, Germany, they were purchased in 1892.
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In 1734, seven years after their arrival, the sisters moved into the first Ursuline convent on the corner of Conde (Chartres Street) and Rue de l’Arsenal (renamed Ursulines), next to the military hospital. Since they only had to walk across monastery grounds to reach the hospital, they could now undertake their hospital ministry and still remain cloistered. Because of humidity and insects, the wood and brick convent was already showing signs of decay when the sisters relocated there. The structure was dismantled and reconstructed on the same grounds in 1751. This building, which still stands today, is the oldest in the city, having survived the Great Fire of 1788. The Ursulines believe they were spared from the fire through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Sr. Rosemary Meiman, archivist for the museum
at Ursuline Academy, explains that, as the fire roared toward the convent, the sisters placed a small statue of Our Lady, which they affectionately call Sweetheart, in the window facing the blaze. Almost immediately the flames abated, and the building was left unscathed, only one of 244 buildings to survive the conflagration. Today, Sweetheart is kept in a small room next to the chapel in the Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor. During their years at the Chartres Street location, the sisters did their best to remain self-sufficient by raising their own chickens and livestock and growing many of their own fruits and vegetables. It was here that one of the sisters, the country’s first woman druggist, grew medicinal herbs for use in the hospital. While herbs were certainly beneficial, sometimes, the best balm the sisters could supply was of a spiritual nature. Such was the case when they comforted family members of five men sentenced to execution for leading a revolt against Spain at the time of the cession in 1789. Tragically, the executions took place on a street bordering the chapel. As gunshots shook the windows, the sisters >>
Sweetheart, a small statue brought to New Orleans in 1786 by Sister Felicite in gratitude for her being allowed to serve as a missionary in New Orleans. During World Wars I and II, returning soldiers brought their medals and awards to Sweetheart in thanksgiving for her interceding with God for their safety.
Above: This magnificent vestment, made with gold, silver and silk thread, was hand sewn by the Spanish Ursuline sisters in the 1700s during the period when Spain ruled New Orleans. Used by priests to celebrate Mass in the city for over 200 years, it is now on display in the Ursuline Academy museum. Right: Lining both sides of the private (or inside) chapel in the Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor are the individual prayer stalls used by the sisters during Mass and for community prayer. The stalls flank the pews where Ursuline Academy students sit. 56
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prayed with the grieving families inside. The Ursulines played a critical role in caring for the sick and injured, especially during the Acadian exile in 1755, the revolt against Spain in 1769, the yellow fever epidemic in 1822 and the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. During this conflict in particular, the sisters not only cared for the wounded; they also prayed without ceasing to defeat the enemy. Sr. Rosemary describes how the Davidand-Goliath match held little promise for an American victory against the well-disciplined, well-armed British. “But, the British were unfamiliar with the geography of the area. They thought they could easily cross the river to attack at Chalmette. They also didn’t know the land was swampy. So, they came in their spic and span red coat and white trousers. Our men knew what to do to defeat them.” Meanwhile, frightened women and children of New Orleans gathered in prayer at the Ursuline convent. Their future lay in the balance. If General Andrew Jackson and his rag-tag troops did not succeed, British General Packenham’s promise to his soldiers of “booty and beauty” would become a reality. Facing fear with courage, the Ursuline nuns prayed with the women throughout the night, beseeching God, through the intercession of Our Lady of Prompt Succor, for the British to be defeated. “Very early the next morning, as the Bishop was celebrating Mass, a courier came from Chalmette with the news, ‘Victory is ours!’” Sr. Rosemary continues. “At the end of Mass, they sang the Te Deum in thanksgiving for winning the battle. The Prioress vowed that each year we’d celebrate a Mass on January 8th and sing the Te Deum to thank God.” And for the last 202 years, the Ursulines have kept that promise. After the war, the sisters cared for wounded soldiers from both sides, setting up makeshift wards in classrooms to handle the hospital’s overflow. The sisters were
so compassionate, it’s reported that even the British soldiers wept like children when it came time to leave their care.
The second Ursuline Convent As the steady growth of the city encroached upon their peace and privacy, the Ursulines knew they could no longer stay on Chartres Street. As detailed in the welldocumented book, A Century of Pioneering: A History of the Ursuline Nuns in New Orleans 1727-1827, by Sister Jane Frances Heaney, in 1818, they purchased land for a new convent on Dauphine Street, two miles downriver from New Orleans. Three years later, the city, disputing the Ursulines’ title to the Chartres Street property,
announced plans to cut a street through the convent grounds. Although the Ursulines appealed to President James Monroe to halt the construction, by the time the U.S. Attorney General decided in favor of the nuns, the city had already laid the street. This was the first of several times the local government—either French, Spanish or American—usurped or tried to usurp what rightfully belonged to the Ursulines. Now, more than ever, it was important to relocate to new quarters. Because the sisters had lived frugally, worked hard, and invested wisely in several pieces of property, they were able to finance much of the new convent. It’s important to realize that the sisters had always managed their own finances—this at a time >>
In the Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor are two altars. The main altar (on the right) features the gilded statue at its center. The Sacred Heart altar (seen on the left) was used by visiting priests when celebrating Mass privately. The private (or inside) chapel is to the right of the main altar. The altar table, situated in front of the main altar, is constructed of wood from the grille that once separated the inside chapel from the public one. May-June 2017 57
when women were traditionally barred from doing so, explains Sr. Rosemary. In 1823, construction began, based on the sisters’ meticulously drawn plans for the new convent, chapel, school and priest’s residence. Eighteen months later, 72 boarders and the last group of sisters moved in. Most of the sisters had never left the convent grounds since entering, years before. Whatever dreams they had about the Dauphine Street complex could not have prepared them for what they saw. A magnificent example of plantation architecture, the two-story building measured 180 feet long and 50 feet wide, with covered porches across its entire length. The beauty of the structure and the gracious lifestyle of its residents were captured by Mother St. Croix, a talented French Ursuline photographer who resided here from 1873 until the convent was moved in 1912.
to the sisters by Louis XV and marked on the back with his coat of arms. Also on display are letters from U.S. presidents Monroe, Madison and Jefferson, and a marble bust of Andrew Jackson, as well as his letter of thanks to the Ursulines for their prayers during the Battle of New Orleans. Many of the items in the museum are from the Dauphine Street convent and are written in French. “All classes were taught in French,” explains Sr. Rosemary. “It was only after the school moved to State Street that they started teaching in English, too.” For a yearly tuition of $180, the girls learned academics and the finer things of life like needlework, china painting, music (instruments, vocals and orchestra for an extra fee), water color, porcelain, and wax figures. Some of the students’ work was exhibited at the Columbian Exposition. Well respected for its fine teaching, Ursuline Academy was where many wealthy Central and South American families sent their daughters to learn English and secretarial work.
The Ursuline Academy Museum Sr. Rosemary, curator of the museum in Ursuline Academy, knows firsthand the works of Mother St. Croix. Her photographs, along with some antique 14” X 17” glass negatives, are among the priceless treasures she displays. So also, is the massive camera Mother St. Croix brought from France to photograph the Ursuline Academy campus for an exhibit at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. Other Ursuline artifacts in the museum include the original handwritten document from Louis XV in 1726 allowing the nuns to come to Louisiana. In addition, there is an exquisite painting of St. Catherine, given 58
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The State Street Convent In 1912, the government purchased the Dauphine Street property to construct the Industrial Canal. For the third time in nearly 200 years, the sisters had to relocate and, as always, they built on the outskirts of the city. This time it was on an 11.5acre tract of land bordered by State Street, Willow Street, Nashville Avenue and S. Claiborne Avenue. “At the time,” says Sr. Rosemary, “Nashville Avenue was a canal, a dump, but it was available and not too far from Jesuit schools—Loyola and Holy Name. The Jesuits have helped our sisters from day one in 1727. >>
The Shrine The National Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor, built in 1924, enshrines the miraculous statue of Our Lady of Prompt Succor, Patroness of New Orleans and Louisiana. Declared a national historic landmark in 1976, it’s composed of two chapels built at right angles to each other and joined by a common altar. One chapel was for the cloistered sisters and their students, the other for the public. Above the main altar is the statue of Our Lady of Prompt Succor that was brought to New Orleans from France in 1810 by Mother St. Michel Gensoul. She promised to have a statue carved in honor of Our Lady if the then-exiled Pope would quickly give her permission to serve in New Orleans. When her prayers were answered, she fulfilled her promise, naming the statue “Our Lady of Prompt Succor” (meaning quick help). The stained-glass windows are by Emil Frei and Associates—the only commercial craftsmen in the country who use mouthblown colored crystal for their stained glass. This method, which produces deep, vibrant colors, requires eight to 10 men to blow a two-by-three-foot sheet of glass. May-June 2017 59
Even today, a Jesuit celebrates Mass for us three to four days a week.” The Nashville Avenue building originally housed the infirmary for the sisters and the students, including a room outfitted with a dental chair. There was a laundry building, too, for the sisters had to wash all the sheets, towels and clothing of the sisters and the students. Today, there are no boarders at Ursuline Academy, nor do the sisters teach there. They do, however, oversee the school, assuring that Ursuline values still guide its daily activities. Each girl is instilled with the school’s motto: Serviam, I will serve—not only in school but also throughout life. Currently, 750 girls attend Ursuline Academy—from the Early Childhood Learning Center through high school. Each receives an excellent academic education as well as diverse extracurricular opportunities like dance/yoga studio, weight room, cardio room, two athletic courts, indoor elevated track, on-campus softball field, upgraded science labs, two tennis courts and renovated art studio.
The future For the past 290 years, the Ursuline/New Orleans partnership has brought much good to the city, including educating over 30,000 girls. However, with only eight active Ursuline sisters remaining in New Orleans, who will take their place? “Maybe the United States can get missionary sisters to come again as they did in the 1700s,” responds Sr. Rosemary, adding that Poland, Indonesia and South Africa have a ready supply. If so, then perhaps it’s time to ask Our Lady of Prompt Succor to put in a good word for us with God. After all, we can really use some “quick help” once again. 60
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A Foundation for the Future
From top: Hannah Miller, Chase Jenkins and Patrick Connolly. 62
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DID YOU KNOW THAT ONE of the many wonderful opportunities and services the Northshore Community Foundation provides for our region is helping our students pursue their educational dreams? As its mission states, the NCF has been uniting both human and financial resources to enhance the quality of life in the northshore region since 2007. This is achieved by serving donors, supporting nonprofits and driving civic leadership. A shining example of the NCF mission in action is the scholarship program.
The NCF staff works with the donors of the scholarship funds to develop criteria and work through the selection process; handles the paperwork and applications; arranges selection committee meetings; and notifies scholarship recipients. The varied scholarships available through the NCF speak loudly to the hearts and passions of generous donors throughout our region. These funds are often created in memory of someone or used to support a specific educational institution, a group with a shared experience or a specified course of study. From cancer survivors, to swimmers in Slidell or standouts from Bogalusa, each scholarship’s criteria are developed around the priorities of the good people who establish the scholarship itself. The NCF has helped their dreams become a reality for 97 local students since opening its doors. In the following pages, learn what three of these deserving students are doing with their scholarships. For more information about available scholarships, visit northshorefoundation.org/scholarships.
photo: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
Local students. Local scholarships.
Hannah Miller Hometown: Slidell College: University of Louisiana at
Lafayette Scholarship: St. Tammany Cancer
Scholarship Fund Background
“While studying biology with a minor in chemistry, I’m a member of Sigma Alpha Pi Honor Society, National Society of Leadership and Success, Alpha Lambda Delta Honor Society chapter of ULL, Phi Mu Fraternity and Pre Professional Society. I’m also an Academic Honoree for Scholastically Distinguished Students.” What does this scholarship mean to you?
‘‘My mom was diagnosed with infiltrating ductile carcinoma (breast cancer) in September 2010. Due to the financial hardship of on-going medical bills, along with my mom >> May-June 2017 63
carrying the sole responsibility of care for my brother and me, the TOPS Scholarship reduction and my student loan debt, the St. Tammany Cancer Scholarship Fund is a blessing to me. The scholarship has lightened my financial burden and allows me to focus on learning. The program’s generosity has continued to motivate and inspire me to give back to the community. Without financial assistance through this scholarship, my goal of becoming a dentist would not be possible.” Academic goals
“My present goal is to obtain a degree in biology. I’m striving to maintain a 4.0 GPA by staying focused, motivated and involved in my studies. Upon receiving my undergraduate degree, I plan to take the Dental Admissions Test for admission into the Louisiana State University Dental School in New Orleans to become a Doctor of Dental Surgery. My long-term goal would be to operate my private practice in dentistry. I would take great care in offering my future patients the education they need to improve their oral health and provide them with self-confidence and a smile that they are proud to wear! Providing underprivileged children and adults with the tools and knowledge they need to establish good oral hygiene is a career dream of mine.” Personal goals
“Commitment to volunteering can get difficult at times with regard to my college studies, but I have a passion to help improve the lives of others in and around my community, hence my desire to become a dentist. Focusing my attention on someone 64
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else brings happiness to my life. Whether I work alone or with a team, my focus is to build camaraderie and to work toward a common goal that leaves positive influences and impacts within local communities and people. My promise to the Foundation is to continue to work diligently in all avenues and to give to others just as they have given to me!”
Chase Jenkins Hometown: Folsom College: Mississippi College Scholarship: St. Tammany Cancer
Fund Scholarship Background
“When I was 8 years old and in the third grade, I became incredibly sick. I was soon diagnosed with extremely high-risk leukemia. Although I had a life-threatening illness, my faith in Jesus never wavered. I was eventually healed after two and half years of cancer treatment. After sixth grade, I began attending Northlake Christian School. It was there that my healing truly began. I started playing football, and I found confidence in myself as I regained my strength and physical abilities that I had lost during my treatment. Throughout high school, I started on the varsity football team while maintaining a 4.0 GPA. During my senior year, God blessed me with several honors and scholarships, including Academic Allstate Team for football, the Allstate Sugar Bowl scholarship, a composite score of 33 on the ACT, Second Team AllDistrict Offensive Tackle, and the St. Tammany Cancer Fund Scholarship. I owe everything to Jesus Christ for His rich blessings on my life.” >> May-June 2017 65
What does this scholarship mean to you?
“When I received the scholarship, I was overjoyed. At the time, I was struggling to decide where I should go to college. However, once I received it, my path became clear. The scholarship meant that I could follow God’s plan for my life by attending Mississippi College. All the hard work I had put forth in school, especially during my cancer treatment, was paying off. I have been truly blessed with this scholarship.” Academic goals
“While attending Mississippi College, I hope to maintain a high GPA and graduate with my degree in electrical engineering. Professionally, I want to pursue a career in electrical engineering working for a company that partners with the military, or for the electric utility industry.” Personal goals
“During my time in college, I hope to make a difference in others by sharing the love of Jesus Christ with them. Following graduation, I want to earn a position that I can use my knowledge and skills to help others in my community—I also hope to get married and start a family.”
Patrick Connolly Hometown: Mandeville College: Tulane University Scholarship: Tulane Legislative
Scholarship by Senator Jack Donahue Background
“I graduated from St. Paul’s High School in 2016. I am currently a freshman at Tulane University majoring in cell and molecular biology with a 3.85 GPA. At Tulane, I’m 66
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involved with the Premedical Society, the Red Cross Club and the Running with Science Society, and I work at the Tulane Mail Services Center.” What does this scholarship mean to you?
“To say this scholarship changed the course of my life would be an understatement. Without it, I would have been unable to attend Tulane University. Accordingly, I strive to make the most of every day that I spend at Tulane in order to make not only the scholarship committee proud, but also all those that have had a hand in raising me, from my family to my teachers and coaches at St. Paul’s High School.” Academic goals
“Academically, I hope to graduate with my degree in cell and molecular biology with a dual major in economics. I’m aiming to graduate in the honors program, which entails completing a senior thesis and graduating with above a 3.8 GPA. My next step after my undergraduate studies will be medical school onto residency and then practice as a doctor.” Personal goals
“While on the northshore, I’ve had countless mentors in the form of relatives, teachers, coaches and friends that have taught me about the integrity necessary to be a good person. During my time at Tulane so far, I’ve learned about personal responsibility and competency through managing my studies and my job, among other things. When I am finished with school, I hope to be a positive member of my community by providing others the same opportunities that I’ve been given.”
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Flourishes
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1. Seasonal arrangements starting at $65. Florist of Covington, 892-7701. 2. Mother’s Day knob charm; other occasions available, 5
$30. mélange by KP, Mandeville, 807-7652. 3. Contemporary white marble and brass candlesticks; $162 large, $135 small. EMB Interiors, Mandeville, 626-1522. 4. St. Francis and Friends statue and bird feeder, 31” high, $150. Outdoor Living Center, Covington, 893-8008. 5. Primitive handcarved antique wooden dough
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bowls available in a variety of shapes and sizes. Rug Chic Home Décor, Mandeville, 674-1070. 6. Custom setee in 20 finishes and 100 fabric options. The French Mix by Jennifer Dicerbo Interiors, Covington, 809-3152. May-June 2017 69
Flourishes
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1. Natural cow hide in beige and silver metallic accents, available in 2
an array of colors, sizes, textures and patterns. Hestia Linens, Covington, 893-0490. 2. Aqua blue glass mini splash bowl, 20”w x 18”d x 6.5”h, $315. Beth Claybourn Interiors, New Orleans, 504-342-2630. 3. Credenza has sycamore wood grains under a lacquered turquoise finish; intricate pulls; vast storage space. American
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Factory Direct, Mandeville, 8710300. 4. HALO bassinest features 360° swivel, two levels of vibrations, three lullabies; $249. Baby & Me, Mandeville, 626-0267. 5. Book your Destin vacation using promo code: SPRG17 and save 10% on your stay. destinvacation.com. 6. Make L’auberge your home away from home. L’auberge Casino and Hotel, Baton Rouge, lbatonrouge. com or 800-724-1686. 7. The Spa at the Grand’s boutique offers fashion-forward clothing, designer jewelry and products for a healthy 5
lifestyle. Grand Hotel Marriott Resort, Golf Club & Spa. Visit grandhotelmarriott.com or call 251-928-9201.
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1. Antique gold leaf starburst pendant. Includes six 40w G9 halogen bulbs. Pine Grove Electric, Covington, 893-4003. 2. Monogrammed place settings;
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different colors available. History Antiques & Interiors, Covington, 892-0010. 3. Elia diffuser in aqua, $72.95; essential oils starting at
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$13.95. Earthsavers, Mandeville, 674-1133. 4. Rustic reclaimed wood frame, $39. Stone Creek Club and Spa, Covington, 801-7100. 5. 175th Anniversary Cookbook, $39.95. Antoine’s Restaurant, New Orleans, 504-581-4422, antoines.com. 6. Freeform scallop centerpiece bowl, $315. Niche Modern Home, Mandeville, 624-4045. May-June 2017 73
INside Look
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Citrus Summer 1. Gold statement necklace with orange stones with matching earrings, $18.95. Private Beach, Mandeville, 674-2326. 2. 100% silk, orange multi-colored, “Best of Class” construction 59” neckties. H.W. Rosenblum, Mandeville, 727-
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9955. 3. J-Maui beach cardigan in Mimosa over sunburst top with white Bermuda pants. Columbia Street Mercantile, Covington, 8091789, 809-1690. 4. Juicy Peach “Only You” bra and panty set by Prima Donna Twist. Smooth-cup balcony bra with great lift and convertible straps, and matching no-
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show panty. Bra Genie, Mandeville, 951-8638. 5. Shu Uemura Urban Moisture Collection for dry hair adds nourishment and hydration; protects against aggressors such as dust, pollution, and hard water. H2O Salon, Mandeville, 951-8166.
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INside Look 2 1
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Citrus Summer
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1. Morse Code prayer rope; the Lord’s Prayer encoded using aqua crystals as dots and topaz beads as dashes, $68.95. Deluca’s Fine Jewelry & Gifts, Covington, 892-2317. 2. Lime racerback dress, $39.50. Olive Patch, Covington, 327-5772. 3. Handwoven Thai silk cocktail dress with 23” crossover ruched neckline; DemiCouture-Marisa Baratelli exclusive, $755. Ballin’s LTD, Covington, 892-0025. 4. The perfect perfume travel kit from Tocca, $48. deCoeur Gifts & Home Accessories, Covington, 809-3244. 5. Yellow printed button-up shirt by Velvet by Graham & Spencer, $128; mother-ofpearl necklace by Nora James, $46. Vine, Mandeville, 951-0005. 6. Athletic crop top, $56; stripe athletic pant, $74. The Lifestyle
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Store at Franco’s, Mandeville, 792-0200.
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Citrus Summer 1. Radiant Fancy Yellow Diamond double-halo pendant set in 18K white gold; starting at $3,250. Boudreaux’s Jewelers, Mandeville, 626-1666. 2. Yellow crocheted romper, $92; necklace by Emily Grace Creations, $56. Posh Boutique, Covington, 8982639. 3. 2.07 ct vivid yellow cushioncut diamond with .75cttw white round 5
brilliant cut diamond accents. De Boscq Fine Jewelry, Mandeville, 674-
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0007. 4. Open-shoulder, lemon print top with banded bottom. Shown with yellow plaid palazzo pants. The Villa, Mandeville, 626-9797. 5. Rose gold and silver stacked heel sandal by Seychelles, $99. ShoefflĂŠ, Covington, 898-6465.
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INside Look 2 1
Citrus Summer 1. Full Body Plus Self-Tan Towelettes, 5-pack, $28; TanTowel® On The Glow®
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self-tanning daily body moisturizer, $21. The Oasis Day Spa, Mandeville, 6246772. 2. Fully lined wrap dress with surplice neckline, button closure and
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waist tie, $82. Paisley, Mandeville, 727-7880. 3. Laurana dress style in Coral Reef Island Seacret, $168. Palm Village, a Lily Pulitzer Signature Store, Mandeville, 778-2547. 4. Melon knit swing top. CDN Clothing, Covington, 327-7300. 5. Reserve Collection traditional fit, short-sleeve, pima cotton polo shirt under a Signature Collection traditional fit windowpane sport coat. Jos A. Bank Clothiers, Mandeville, 624-4067. 6. 18k yellow gold earrings feature faceted cushion-shaped citrine center stones totaling approximately 2.31 cts; surrounded by pavé diamonds totaling approximately 0.16 cts; and scrollwork mounting sides with post backs; $1,125. Lee Michael’s Fine Jewelry, Metairie, 504-832-0000.
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“You can only become truly
accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead, pursue the things you love doing, and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off you.” - Maya Angelou
2017
I work with dynamic women who inspire me every day. I hope I
inspire them. I believe women inspire other women to be their best in every capacity of their lives whether they are sitting with them around the boardroom table or reading about their successes in Inside Northside. Designer Tory Burch says, “I think you can have it all. You just have to know it’s going to work.” I agree with her—a woman has to believe in herself and her vision to be successful in both her business and her life. On the following pages, you will meet some successful women who dared to believe in themselves, their businesses and their personal dreams. I hope they will inspire you to pursue your dreams as well. I know they are an inspiration to us here at Inside Northside. --Lori Murphy, publisher Inside Northside
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4 Erin Moore Cowser Executive Director of Public and Governmental Affairs, Southeastern Louisiana University
6 Stacked with Confidence 30 IN the Bookcase
7 Billie Comeaux and Grace Comeaux-Piro
20 Kim Camet
Integra Mortgage
American Factory Direct Furniture
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8 The Weeks Team Mortgage Lending 10 Christie Tournet and Chrissy Williams
Rebecca Markway Lee, RDN, LDN, Katy Bridges and Sophie Lanciers, M.D.
True Body Nutrition
22 Amy Ybarzabal
Cypress Notary and Christie Tournet & Associates
Northshore Home Builders Association
11 Sandra DiPietro
23 The Women of Animal Medical Center
St. Tammany Parish Hospital
12 Laura Brown and Courtney LeBlanc
24 Cynthia Thompson,
Lacey Toledano and Rhonda Bagby
Latter & Blum Realtors
13 Ellen Bajon
St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce
EMB Interiors
14 Katie Peralta and Rachel Jones
25 Dawn Sharpe
East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce 26 Melissa Bordelon,
Carla Tate and Stacey Neal Partners for a Greater Tangipahoa 26 Dianne Morgan Baham STARC 27 Gretchen Armbruster Armbruster Artworks School
28 Dr. Molly Burns
Junior League of Greater Covington
29 Devin Tournillon
Avanti Senior Living of Covington
29 Jenny Mutter Hestia Linens
The Women of NOLA Lending, A Division of Fidelity Bank
16 Donna Bares and Susan Hooks Riverview Camp for Girls
17 Team Saint Anthony’s Gardens 18 Beth Assaf Rug Chic
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Leigh Thorpe, Cammie Proctor, Jamene Dahmer, Charlotte Champagne and Sonja R. Newman
United Way of Southeast Louisiana’s Blueprint for Prosperity
photos: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
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location: ARMBRUSTER ARTWORKS GALLERY
Triton Stone Group
Women IN Business 3
Erin Moore Cowser by Mimi Greenwood Knight
AS A FRESH-FACED ERIN MOORE high kicked her way into the hearts of Slidell’s Northshore High School fans on the Silverbelles dance team, she had ambitious plans for her future. Always a lover of the written word, Erin had her heart set on a mass communications degree from her beloved LSU. College did not disappoint as she dove into campus life, devoured her studies, established lifelong friendships and soaked up all she could learn from anyone who was willing to teach her. It was an exhilarating time for her. Four years later, she emerged with her degree, graduating magna cum laude and landed a journalism job. She was ready to change the world. “As my classmates headed off to top newspapers and magazines in New York, Chicago and other big cities, I’d accepted a position with The Daily News in Bogalusa,” says Erin. About the time she was second-guessing that decision, she overheard the dean tell her parents what a good experience this was going to be for her. She says, “He reasoned that in big cities the news happens. But in small-town journalism, you have to go out and find the news. He said I probably wouldn’t be assigned to ‘a beat’ like my classmates, but to several beats, and would learn every aspect of the newspaper business inside and out.” And he was right. Erin worked her way up to managing editor at The Daily News, then worked as an on-screen personality and editor at the local TV station, Channel 17. She speaks glowingly of her time in Washington Parish, and it’s clear she came to love the small-town rhythm. She appreciated it all the more through hindsight, when she accepted a new position that turned her into what she calls a “commute zombie.” “It was a great opportunity for me,” says Erin. “I was working as marketing coordinator for New Orleans Investment Conference, recruiting 4
Inside Northside
speakers from around the world, scheduling programming
whimsical Let’s Lion Up with Roomie, for which Eliza Kate takes
and coordinating advertising and event planning for a multi-
full credit. “She tells me she’s famous because there’s a picture
million-dollar conference. But hours of my day were taken up
on the internet of her holding the book. She’s very, very proud
with my commute.”
to have inspired her own book.”
Although Erin adjusted to the feverish pace of her new
The year after Eliza Kate’s birth, Erin moved up to
career and learned to love her big-city colleagues, she missed
executive director of public and government affairs at
the friendliness and slower pace of the northshore. So in
Southeastern. “I like to say I work with the three publics,” she
2003, she became the first-ever communications director for
says. “I work in public policy with legislators on legislation
St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce. It was a pivotal
that impacts Southeastern. I work in public relations as
time, with unprecedented growth in the parish and then the
an ambassador for the university, building networks and
wallop of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 to overcome. “I adore the
coalitions. And I work in public information, overseeing
northshore,” says Erin. “It has every aspect going for it. The
the office of communication, creating fliers, brochures, and
towns have preserved a wonderful nostalgia, yet also offer
websites and overseeing our social media presence.
the arts of every kind, exceptional dining, and lots of forwardthinking people.” It was at that time that she came to know Lori Murphy
“One thing I’ve learned throughout my working life is that
and others at Inside Northside, where she is still a frequent
communication is all about
contributor. “We became instant friends,” says Erin. “They allow
relationships,” says Erin.
me to stretch my creative muscle with writing and to stay in
“I don’t mean ‘who you
touch with my artsy side.”
know,’ but that it’s vital to
The next chapter of Erin’s life saw her moving to
build relationships based on
Hammond and taking on the title of executive assistant to the
trust and reliability. I need
president at Southeastern Louisiana University. She loved the
to present legislators with
work and used the opportunity to complete her masters in
real facts—and all the facts—so
organizational communication. But the biggest change in her
they know they can trust me.
life came in 2009, when she accepted the most important job
The media needs to know I
she’d ever undertake, that of Mama to Eliza Kate.
won’t withhold anything from
“She changed my life in every way,” laughs Erin. “She’s
them. If I’m remembered
seven now and a force to be reckoned with. She’s convinced
for anything, I hope people
she runs Southeastern, and I swear she knows more people in
remember that I cared. Whether
Hammond than I do. The northshore is the perfect place to be
it’s in my personal life with
raising a child. Eliza Kate and I can walk to the library, the park,
friends, with Eliza Kate or in a professional capacity, I’ve always
or the farmer’s market. She stays busy with ballet and piano
been known as a ‘fixer person,’ and I’d like to think it’s because
lessons. And her new campaign is to convince the president of
I care that I’m motivated to fix what needs fixing and leave
the university that she can compete in the Miss Southeastern
each situation better than I found it.”
pageant because she’s a student at Southeastern’s lab school.” Eliza Kate was Erin’s inspiration as she tried on yet
When she’s not on the job, Erin loves nothing more than reconnecting with friends. “I’ve been so blessed to meet so many
another hat, this time that of published author. She says,
wonderful people,” she says. “I’m still in touch with friends from
“At my baby showers, friends gave me LSU books for kids. I
high school and college and from each of my jobs. There’s always
realized there were none for Southeastern.” So she wrote the
someone to visit with and someone to catch up with.” Women IN Business 5
Stacked with Confidence With a little lipstick, coffee and
a smile, the businesswomen in our
K. Jahnke’s The Well-Spoken Woman is a
their friends, clients, customers, coworkers,
guide to looking and sounding your best.
employees and families. While every
The hilarious Mindy Kaling’s book, Why Not
remarkable businesswoman puts her best face
Me?, shares humorous yet insightful and deeply
forward, she often keeps a bag of tricks to make
intimate essays about being a woman in business.
This stack of reads includes powerful women’s advice, stories and rules for becoming—or continuing—as an influential woman in business. New Rules of the Game
Inside Northside
women in the workplace and Christine
community make a positive impact on
it through each day.
6
by Susan Packard includes strategies for
So grab a read, feel empowered and continue to lead with the grace that only a woman can have. And take it from the women of Inside Publications— these all pair well with a glass of wine!
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Billie Comeaux and Grace Comeaux-Piro As you walk through American Factory Direct Furniture, you will be amazed at the breathtaking showroom design and delighted by the friendly staff. Bob and Billie’s journey began when her mother introduced them. It was a marriage of ideas and talent! Their honeymoon was spent at the furniture market in North Carolina. “It has been furniture ever since. Our passion for the business and our love for God have been the root of our success in business,” says Billie. “He has always protected and guided us in the way He knows best”. Blessings have come in the form of expansion of the Mandeville location, with additional stores in Mississippi and Baton Rouge and Clearance Centers in Mandeville and Baton Rouge. Billie says, “Our stateof-the-art Distribution Center enables us to compete with larger national companies in our area. It gives us efficiency and buying power to offer the lowest prices.” AFD’s mission statement is: “For generations, our family serving yours with honesty, integrity, fairness and loyalty.” Billie says, “Our employees are an extension of our family and have been such a blessing to have helped make our business what it is.” American Factory Direct Furniture offers a complimentary in-home design consultation and a 60-day price guarantee. “We have three
designers available for appointments. One of our greatest blessings is having two of our three children join the business. Our daughter, Grace Comeaux-Piro, CFO, plays a vital role,” says Billie, “not only administratively and with human resources, but in helping set goals and clarifying our vision for the future. Working together has drawn us closer together as mother and daughter. “Our son, David Comeaux, COO, is another integral part of the business, handling operation and inventory management. My husband, Robert, is a wonderful merchandiser who insures our prices stay very competitive and is always very involved in the day-to-day business. Our eldest son, Robert III, is a minister in Arizona.” Billie smiles. “He is our prayer warrior.” Billie is the creative force as the corporate designer. From showroom design to meticulously creating the ambiance of the business, it is her creative touch that guides the process. She says, “Whether advertising layout, floor design or buying, it’s been such a blessing to see how the Lord has used each of our different talents, passions and expertise in different areas of the business to accomplish His perfect plan.
“Business is about relationships and the way we treat people; about giving without expecting anything in return,” says Billie. “Our business is God’s, and we give Him all the glory for what He has done. Supporting local charities, such as Habitat for Humanity, the Samaritan Center and sponsoring local schools, churches and organizations are ways we give back. We always try to respond when a need is presented.” American Factory Direct Furniture is very excited to announce it will be opening its newest location on I-12 in Covington in November 2017. “Commit your works unto the Lord and your thoughts will be established.” Proverbs 16:3. “For I know the plans I have for you, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11.
American Factory Direct Furniture has locations in Mandeville, Baton Rouge, Covington and Long Beach, MS. 985-871-0300. afd-furniture.com. Women IN Business 7
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B U S I N E S S Left to right: Missy Brackley, Danielle Tonagel Thiel, Stephanie Weeks and Keri Jackson
The Weeks Team Mortgage Lending
8
It’s Wednesday at lunchtime, and your loan closing is less than
one from the nice lender. Apples to apples, the closing and title company
a week away. The kids are excited about making new friends and
fees are actually higher with the new lender. And your monthly payment
swimming in the pool at the new house. But if you’re totally honest,
is going to be the same as it was before. Your intuition is telling you this
you’re feeling just a smidge guilty. The first mortgage lender you
might not be the last bit of bad news you receive from the new lender.
talked to was very nice, totally transparent and professional. They
gave you a pre-approval with a nice rate and fair fees.
haven’t cancelled your application yet and you can still close with them.
The receptionist answers the phone, and it’s like a warm hug from a
But then, your brother-in-law mentioned that a friend of his,
That’s when you sheepishly call back The Weeks Team, hoping they
who is also a lender, had an amazing offer—$5,000 off closing costs
friend you haven’t seen in awhile. Your file is still right there, and yes,
along with a special rate. When you met with the new lender and
they’re happy to take care of your loan. No more surprises and no more
did the math, it was going to save you $2,000 upfront, plus $200
chasing fool’s gold. The closing went great. They’re happy, and the kids
a month. That would be about $12,000 in the first five years just
love the new pool. The lesson here is that if a deal seems too good to be
in payment savings. So, while you liked your first lender, money is
true, it probably is. And the other lesson is that no one is going to treat
money, so no hard feelings, right?
your friends or borrowers with the same care, professional courtesy and
personal attention that The Weeks Team will—and with a great rate and
Just as you’re about to finish lunch, karma sends you a text
message. Except this one is from your new lender. “Hey, just a
competitive closing costs.
quick heads up, we just got the numbers in for the insurance and
taxes, and your payment is going to be a little higher than we
Team Residential Mortgage Loan Originator, NMLS# 97116. “We have our
anticipated,” he says. You take a closer look at the closing estimate
clients’ best interest in mind when finding loan options for them. And we
the new lender gave you and compare it side by side to the first
don’t just give one solution because it’s easiest for us. We give multiple
Inside Northside
“We do things differently here,” says Stephanie Weeks, The Weeks
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options so that our clients can choose what works best for them.”
after ten plus years, I’m still thrilled when we make it work for borrowers.
No two loans are ever the same, which keeps it exciting.” Missy and her
With a wealth of experience and knowledge in mortgage lending,
the office is filled with constant conversations. “There are always ideas
husband of 17 years spend their weekends on the soccer fields with their
and solutions bouncing between the offices,” says Keri. “Everyone bans
two children.
together to help balance each other’s strengths to give the best options
for our clients.”
and Realtors are well taken care of. Keri has worked with Stephanie
Keri Jackson serves as Office Manager, working to make sure clients
The team of four strive
personally and
diligently to “make it
professionally since
work” for their clients. “We
2005. She schedules
aren’t the people who say
appointments for
‘oh, we can’t do that, call
Stephanie, who
someone else,’” Stephanie
often speaks about
explains. “We are here for
mortgage lending
our clients to consult them
and her book,
and help them. If there
Mortgage Peace,
is something we can’t
in seminars and
actually do, we’ll
loan classes. Keri
find someone for
enjoys spending her
them who can.”
weekends with her daughter and their
The Weeks Team
two dogs.
Stephanie began
When the
in mortgage lending
team is not “making
following her bachelor’s
it work” for their
degree from the University
clients or spending
of New Orleans. She started
time with their
building her team in 2004 when the mortgage lending industry began to
families, they’re “making it work” for our community, giving back through
grow. As regulations and workload grew, Stephanie knew she needed to
Habitat for Humanity Women’s Build, Hope House, Relay for Life, 24 in 24
continue building her team so that she could process the same amount
for breast cancer and more.
of loans at the same quality. “That’s where my full team came in. Keri
Jackson has been with me for almost 12 years, Danielle Tonagel Thiel for
came from humble beginnings and are now educated women helping to
six years and Missy Brackley just celebrated her one year anniversary with
make a difference in someone else’s life. We genuinely care about our
us.” Stephanie, her daughter and her husband of 19 years enjoy anything
clients. Otherwise, we would just be pushing paper, and that’s not what
outdoors, including spending time on the river and four-wheeler riding.
we’re here to do.”
“We take pride in what we do every day,” says Stephanie. “We all
Yoga and meditation keep Stephanie focused to change the world one loan at a time.
Another team member who is a water and outdoor lover and loves to
travel with her husband is Danielle Tonagel Thiel, NMLS# 327345. She is a Residential Mortgage Loan Originator. Danielle landed in the mortgage industry while at SLU. Six years later, she has continued to “complete the puzzle” for homebuyers. She says, “My determination offers great rewards when a borrower is satisfied with their financing at the closing table.” She and Stephanie are both licensed throughout the Gulf States.
Missy Brackley, NMLS# 197065, is new to The Weeks Team, but is in
no way new to the mortgage industry. Missy has been in the mortgage industry since 2006. As a Residential Mortgage Loan Originator, she assists clients in purchasing and refinancing their homes. She says, “Even
The Weeks Team is located at 125 N. Theard St, Ste. B, in Covington. 985-300-5626. WeeksTeam.com. Sponsor MFS, NMLS ID 43021. Women IN Business 9
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Christie Tournet and Chrissy Williams For Christie Tournet and Chrissy Williams,
as a statewide Notary Public. In 2010, Christie
Provisional Custody by Mandate.
providing thorough legal and notarial
became an attorney and obtained a Louisiana
resolutions for the northshore is their utmost
real estate license. While working at a defense
says Christie. “We pride ourselves on efficient
goal. Combined, the two boast 40 years of
firm, she continued to practice estate planning,
and helpful services with affordable rates.
experience in the law and real estate industries.
successions and real estate law.
We are excited to be a part of the northshore
Operating Cypress Notary and Christie Tournet
Since 1986, Chrissy, a certified Paralegal,
& Associates has allowed them to put their
has worked in the legal field. She obtained
valuable blend of knowledge and unique skills
her Notary commission in 2003. A licensed
to work to achieve professional and personal
Louisiana realtor, she began working in real
satisfaction.
estate transfers, sales and management in
“Our work ethic and extensive experience enable us to provide clarity at a stage when our
“Most of our business is referral based,”
business community!”
2005. Christie Tournet & Associates provides
clients often do not understand the significance
estate planning, probate, real estate and
of a legal document or what their next step
commercial legal services. Cypress Notary
should be,” says Christie.
prepares and notarizes numerous legal
Cypress Notary and Christie Tournet & Associates are
documents, including Acts of Sale/Donation,
located at 1795 W. Causeway Approach, Ste. 103A,
Christie worked in real estate development and construction for over a decade. In 2007, she offered notarial and estate planning services 10
Inside Northside
General and Healthcare Powers of Attorney, business contracts, Pre-Nuptial Agreements, and
in Mandeville. 951-2177. Cypressnotaryla.com. Tournetlaw.com.
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institute as a stand-alone community hospital
through Ochsner at a significant savings. The
maybe one of the best examples of collaborative
electronic records have increased efficiency,
success with Ochsner so far. Ochsner brought
quality, safety, and in turn, patient satisfaction.
two neurosurgeons and five neurologists into St.
On slate for mid-2017 to 2020 are more
Tammany. The number of neurosurgeries performed
expansions at the main hospital including
at STPH grew from 228 in 2014 to 355 in 2016.
pharmacy, lab, support services, operating rooms,
STPH completed a Neuro Operating Suite in 2016
cath lab, infusion suite, more private rooms and a
and is about to open a four-bed Neuro-ICU this
four-bed pediatric ICU. “All of these improvements
spring. “With the issuance of $34 million in hospital
will allow for increased quality and reduced
revenue bonds, we have been able to plan for all
healthcare cost,” says Sandra. “We’re here to keep
has been on the forefront of Sandra DiPietro’s
this growth,” says Sandra. “We recently committed
these promises and continue to deliver results.”
mind. As St. Tammany Parish Hospital Chief
to a new MRI unit, an additional surgical robot and
Financial Officer, she has seen the hospital grow
plans that will expand parking capacity.”
Sandra DiPietro Keeping promises and delivering results
Sandra joined STPH in 1994 before taking over as controller in 1995 and then senior vice
The recently completed $21 million
president/chief financial officer in 2014. She
this hospital when it was a single-story, flat-top
Emergency Department includes infrastructure
holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from
building,” Sandra recalls. “I began working
specifically to address pediatric, geriatric, bariatric
Southeastern Louisiana University and a master’s
here in 1994 as a senior accountant. Since
and mental health emergencies. The growth
degree in business administration from the
then, I have watched the hospital expand into a
of services at STPH has also sparked growth of
University of New Orleans. She is a Certified
remarkably beautiful, high-quality facility.”
personnel. “Since partnering with Ochsner, we
Public Accountant and member of the Healthcare
exponentially in recent years. “I was born in
have 32 additional Ochsner employees and 151
Financial Management Association. She teaches
expansion supports the goals of STPH and
Since 2014, much of the hospital’s
additional St. Tammany employees,” says Sandra.
undergraduate- and graduate-level healthcare
Ochsner’s partnership. Leaders of both
“The economic impact has been greatly positive.
financial management at the University of Phoenix
organizations promised patients, employees,
It has also created efficiency, with $1 million in
and serves as treasurer on the New Heights
physicians and the community high quality and
negotiated savings and three percent supply chain
Therapy board.
safety, growing services in west St. Tammany,
savings.”
collaborating to build on collective strengths
In 2016, the partnership reduced costs,
and adding expertise where gaps existed. An
improved technology and served more patients,
initial promise was to increase subspecialty
including 690 patients transferred to STPH
care for patients. Pediatrics, neurology and
through the OHS referral system, and 3,000
neurosurgery are examples of that success.
patients accessing their health information
For more information on STPH, its expansion
through MyChart, a component of EPIC, purchased
and partnership with Ochsner, visit stph.org.
The difficulty in building a neurosciences
Women IN Business 11
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15 Samantha Dr. Covington, LA 70433
Laura Brown and Courtney LeBlanc Real estate expertise with vision—that is what Laura Brown and Courtney LeBlanc want to give clients. “We want to help enrich the lives of others by providing a positive experience in all things real estate,” Courtney says. “ Our clients experience innovative and personally tailored real estate services that go above and beyond the industry standard. We also look at each property with an artistic perspective and provide an artistic rendering of each home by local artist, Artist Andrew Starns.” Courtney and Laura joined together in real estate to provide clients with an impressive numbers- and marketing-minded package. Laura’s career before entering the real estate industry was in math. “Because of my strong background with numbers, I’m able to help clients estimate the best possible offer or listing price for properties. This helps the real estate process run smoothly, further providing a positive experience for our clients.” After the price is set for clients selling their homes, Courtney’s marketing skills and keen eye for details steps in. She says, “With over ten years experience in sales and marketing, I believe in an honest approach based on concise, professional guidance, while also exercising the utmost in discretion for our clients.” Whether representing first-time homebuyers or listing the most exquisite estates, Courtney and Laura provide the highest level of expertise and 21005 Sims Vallon Rd. Covington, LA 70435
service. “We are committed to making a difference in the lives of our clients and the communities we serve,” says Courtney. Whatever your real estate vision may be, they hope to surpass it.
Laura and Courtney are both licensed by the Louisiana Real Estate Commission. Their office is located at 1151 N. Causeway Blvd. in Mandeville. 985-626-5695. 12
Inside Northside
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Ellen Bajon For more than 25 years, Ellen Bajon and her dedicated team have guided clients to make the best choices for their distinct home. “We want your home to speak for your personality,” says Ellen. “It’s our goal to design rooms that are a reflection of your family, but also comfortable and timeless.” Ellen’s experienced staff works closely with clients and retail customers to understand their individual wants, needs and style, whether for one room or an entire home. The team can also assist in the design and implementation of new construction and home renovations. The 5,000-square-foot showroom features carefully selected furniture, artwork and accessories. In EMB’s Design Studio, the team will work with you to customize a plan to fit your needs. “We often have clients come in for a particular look,” says Ellen. “While we love prior inspiration, we truly love to make the room work beautifully for your family and your existing home.” Ellen and her team gather for daily meetings to discuss their client projects, using the talents and strengths of each woman to guarantee a well-rounded, personal design experience.
EMB Interiors is located at 4510 Hwy. 22 in Mandeville. 626-1522. embinteriors.com. Women IN Business 13
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Katie Peralta and Rachel Jones
Triton Stone Group is a family business in every sense of the word, with
siblings, spouses, cousins, aunts and in-laws all finding a niche within the
and tile and assists customers with commercial or residential projects. In January, the family bought out the Triton franchise brand, acquiring
business. “My dad is an entrepreneur and has run his own trucking company
five additional stores throughout the Southeast. “Now when our kids do
for years,” says Katie Peralta. “As he watched his seven kids grow up, he
projects for school about what they want to be when they grow up, they say
started looking for a way to keep us in this area.” He bought a Triton Stone
they want to work for Triton,” says Jones.
franchise and set Katie up to run it. Before long, younger sister Rachel Jones
“I guess we’ve learned to separate work and family,” says Peralta.
graduated and joined her in time to help with the city’s rebuild after Katrina.
“Everyone understands their role and does their job. It helps that we love and
As more siblings were ready to come onboard, the family opened other locations, nine in ten years. Soon, some of their spouses were working in the
respect each other and that we’ve been blessed with amazing employees who’ve become like family, too. It really doesn’t feel like work at all.”
company as well. “We’ve been blessed to be able to find jobs that fit each of our personalities,” says Jones. “Our mom laid down the law early on. She said if the business created problems within the family, she’d come in and pull the plug on the whole operation,” she laughs. Firm believers in promoting from within, the family rewarded employees who showed initiative by sending them to run new locations as they opened in other states. Triton Stone today is one of the largest importers
Triton’s head office is located at 6131 River Rd. in Harahan.
of natural stone and other building products in the country, with 14 locations
(504) 738-2228. 2090 Woodrow St. Suite A, Mandeville. (985) 951-2360
and a distribution yard. It also carries a large line of kitchen and bath fixtures
Mandeville location by appointment only. TritonStone.com.
14
Inside Northside
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Left to right: Suzy Ortiz, Randi Barrett, Courtlin Donner-Noggerath, Heather Braiwick, Courtney Jenkins, Betsy Merrick, Tiffany Bruno and Jamie Lynn Seals
The Women of NOLA Lending, A Division of Fidelity Bank “With almost 300 local women employed by NOLA Lending and Fidelity Bank combined, it is not lost on anybody that much of our success is due to the experienced and exceptional women on our team,” says Richard LaNasa, President of NOLA Lending, a division of Fidelity Bank. “That saying ‘If you want something done, ask a busy woman’ rings true in our line of business.” NOLA Lending opened its doors 15 years ago in Mandeville. Co-founded by Richard LaNasa, the original founding team of three included Anne Stirratt Elston, now Vice President of Operations. The mission was clear: make the loan process simple, easy and fast, and deliver world-class client service. Today, the women of NOLA Lending understand the real estate business and take pride in what they do each and every day. Senior Loan Officer Randi Selby Barrett adds, “I understand this is not a 9-to-5 career. I appreciate the flexibility to work with my clients and make the loan process as simple as possible. Sometimes that means meeting my clients at the office in the early morning, or late night or even going to their home or place of business. I take the time to get to know my clients and their needs so I can ensure every step of the process is as smooth as possible, from applying for the loan to the closing table.” When asked why working at NOLA Lending is so special, Vice President of Operations Anne
Elston says, “I know that what we all do here matters and that we are helping build the community, one loan and one home at a time. Our mission is HERE FOR GOOD. In my career, I’ve seen mortgage companies come and go, but NOLA Lending and Fidelity Bank are here for the long haul. When your goals are long term you act and behave differently, and I appreciate that ‘Here For Good’ also means we do good in the community and give so much back.” With 26 mortgage offices spread across Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, Texas and Alabama and 18 Bank branches, you do not have to go far to find a NOLA Lending office. As a local leader in the mortgage finance industry, its lenders closed almost $1 billion in loans last year. Alton McRee, CEO of Fidelity Bank explains, “Women play a critical role in all levels of our organization. I’m proud that we have entry level positions, lenders, senior management and even the highest level of our organization—Chairman of the Board—filled by strong, capable women. Our Chairman, Katie Crosby, makes sure opportunities abound for advancement in our Fidelity Family.” NOLA Lending operates as the mortgage division of Fidelity Bank, a local bank with a rich heritage of over 100 years of service to the community. This means that unlike many of its competitors, NOLA Lending can offer a full array of financial service products designed to meet the needs of clients. While its lenders still work
with mortgages all day long, the synergy between Fidelity Bank and NOLA Lending has allowed NOLA Lending to serve even more people and give more back to the community. Community is extremely important to the people at NOLA Lending and Fidelity Bank—it is one of their core values. You will find NOLA Lending and Fidelity Bank representatives at numerous nonprofit events serving up delicious food with their well-known and often-requested grilling rig. Not only will they bring delicious food and drinks, but they will be sporting their special #NOLAHATITUDE. Their branded hat has become so popular in local circles that team members are often asked if they will sell their hat!
On the northshore, find the Women of NOLA Lending Group here: 830 W. Causeway App., Mandeville; 2550 Florida St., Mandeville; 2201 Hwy. 190 North, Covington; 70457 Hwy. 21, Suite 105, Covington; 1901 Gause Blvd.., Slidell; 500 C.M. Fagan Dr., Hammond For mortgage information, call (985) 951-8479, or visit nolalending.com. Women IN Business 15
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from a wide variety of activities!
goodness that is within each child; to the simple
attending for years, and the good news is that a
joys of playing, laughing and sharing good times
Riverview Chaperoned Chartered bus comes to
with friends in a safe, carefree and wholesome
Covington for camper pick-up and return every two-
environment year, after year, after year.
week session! Most summer campers attend for two
Donna Bares and Susan Hooks “In 1983, when we first became camp directors, we realized quickly the seriousness of the privilege of providing quality camping for young girls,” says Susan Hooks. At Riverview Camp for Girls we have carefully planned everything you are looking for in a perfect camp setting. Just off DeSoto Parkway on top of Lookout Mountain in Mentone, Alabama—and nestled in a bend of beautiful Little River, as well. “This is what I’ve always imagined a camp should be like,” parents and campers tell us, and you will agree! Adventure, inspiration, character and confidence-building are just a few of the benefits that are in abundance as campers choose 16
Inside Northside
celebrating childhood, and the kindness and
Girls from the Northshore area have been
We invite you and your girl(s) to visit
or more weeks, though there are some one-week
our website, riverviewcamp.com. Enjoy the
options available. Once campers—and their parents—
information and watch the videos (Riverview has
experience Riverview and the peace of mind that
it’s own YouTube Channel too!) to get a sense of
comes with a girl’s first visit, they want to return.
what makes Riverview “my camp” for so many
The girls know that “the camp I know and
girls. If you’d like to experience the fun with your
love is going to be there for me” with traditions,
daughter(s), consider joining us in May or August
friends and familiar places. They know that each
for a Mother-Daughter weekend. The memories
summer they are welcomed back to “my camp,” a
you’ll share will last a lifetime. Instagram,
place where fun and caring go hand-in-hand, and
Facebook, YouTube are among the Social Media
where girls feel free to express themselves and
pleasures you will want to follow as our friends!
extend their limits without pressure to perform or fear of ridicule. Because girls grow up meeting other girls from across the Southeast and the nation, camp offers lifetime friendships and longterm goals since many of the campers return as Counselor once they age out of camp! In the last 20 years we have given out over 225 “Ten-year
Susan and Larry Hooks, Owners and Directors. For
blanket awards” at our banquets at the end of
more information, call (800) 882-0722. Riverview
each session.
Camp for Girls, P.O. Box 299, Mentone, AL 35984.
Riverview is a community committed to
riverviewcamp.com
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Left to right: Iris Blundell, Julie Portmann, Kit Friedrichs-Baumann, Brenda Jacobi, Kathy LoCicero and Lisa Ray.
Team Saint Anthony’s Gardens “We have a ‘yes’ mentality,” says Kit Friedrichs-Baumann, Director of Marketing and Sales for St. Anthony’s Gardens in Covington. “If a
Trinity Catholic Church is right next door.” St. Anthony’s residents stay busy with group activities and outings. “We
resident wants something to make their life more comfortable or for St.
bring in musical groups and performances for our new Trinity Theater and the
Anthony’s to feel more like home, our motto is ‘Yes is the answer. What is
residents have formed a gardening club and a book club,” says Baumann.
the question?’”
“There’s happy hour in our Vineyard Lounge and our wellness center includes a
A new ministry of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, St. Anthony’s
senior adapted gym and fitness centers with outpatient rehabilitation services
Gardens is a vibrant, active community consisting of 213 independent,
that includes physical and occupational therapy. We even have a massage
assisted living and memory care apartments. Baumann notes that moving
therapy studio.”
into a senior living community like St. Anthony’s offers seniors a new lease
Residents enjoy outings to concerts, museums, and local restaurants.
on life; a second retirement where they’re freed from the worries of home
Transportation is provided to doctor’s appointments and other churches, if
maintenance and domestic chores such as cooking, cleaning, and laundry;
they wish. Gourmet cuisine with restaurant-style service is available for three
and where they’re free to socialize and enjoy a lively, fully engaged life
meals a day, or residents may opt to cook in their own fully-equipped kitchens.
with like-minded peers.
“We have on-site nursing care available 24/7,” says Baumann. “All housework,
Joining Baumann in this dynamic ministry are Residency Counselor Julie Portmann; Move-in Coordinator Brenda Jacobi; Director of Life
maintenance, and laundry is included in one monthly fee. But beyond all of that is our commitment to ‘YES!’”
Enrichment Lisa Ray; Director of Health Services Kathy LoCicero, RN, BSN, eMBA; and Business Office Manager Iris Blundell. “We offer independent living, assisted living, and memory care,” says Baumann. “A resident may enter at any level. We offer a choice of floor plans and amenities such as an on-site prayer and meditation chapel, a library, art studio, a full-service upscale salon and beautiful grounds with a pond and walking trails. Although we are open to all faiths, Most Holy
St. Anthony’s Gardens is located next to Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church at 601 Holy Trinity Drive in Covington. 605-5950. StAnthonysGardens.org. Women IN Business 17
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B U S I N E S S “Like our relationships with our rug weavers, we have a wonderful relationship with our upholstery and rug manufacturers. We specialize in custom rugs of any style and color that we can design for you, or you can choose from our current inventory.” Rug Chic offers custom furniture for any room in your home, including sofas, chairs, beds and accent pieces. In addition to upholstery and slipcovered furniture, Beth curates a selection of fine wood furniture made in Italy. With nearly 20 years of procurement at Rug Chic, antique furniture and rugs are also found throughout the store. And if you don’t see what you’re looking for, Beth can have your piece specially made. “Everything is customizable—our upholstery, furniture and rugs. For instance, we recently sent a photo of a sideboard that our client wanted a headboard to look like. It arrived from Italy perfect—exactly what they envisioned.” Once you have made your selections at Rug Chic, Beth’s team delivers and installs your rugs, furniture and more. “We are happy to deliver and install everything we have in the store. We enjoy working with designers who allow us to go into a home to install our rugs and furniture. We see ourselves as a great support for designers in New
Beth Assaf Floor Art. That’s how Beth Assaf, owner of Rug Chic Home Décor, best describes rugs. “Hand-knotted rugs and their natural-dyed colors are so specific that they can never be duplicated. It really is art.” Like any form of art, it can be an investment that will easily be passed on through generations. “A
Orleans and on the north shore.” Beth has been immersed in the rug industry since childhood. As an expert in rugs, Beth offers rug appraisals for antique and heirloom rugs, as well as, cleaning and preservation
hand-knotted, 100-percent wool rug is durable enough to outlive you and your children. The material
recommendations. Beth can be seen giving talks
dates back to 4 B.C.—it’s made to last!” says Beth.
on rugs from the New York Design Center to local
“With any investment, you want to make sure you’ll be happy with it for a very long time. I always
garden clubs.
say to choose a color that makes you happy. If aquamarine makes you happy, have that color in it,” says Beth. “Vegetable-dyed rugs always have variation, which allows them to blend with other colors in the room. The rug should be the last thing to change when updating. Wall color and fabric are much easier to change and are less expensive. Your rug should be the anchor of the room.” Beth sources her rugs in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey, Nepal and other regions that are home to master weavers. “We work closely with weavers in the world’s best rug-making regions to find fine-quality, one-of-a-kind, hand-knotted rugs. We are able to source rugs that translate well in our local marketplace and only choose items that are made with 100-percent child-free labor. For me, the origination of the rug and the conditions it was made in are important. You’re bringing that energy into your home. 18
Inside Northside
Rug Chic serves New Orleans, South Louisiana and the Gulf Coast. The flagship store is located at 4240 Highway 22, Ste. 6, in Mandeville. 985-674-1070. rugchic.com.
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Leigh Thorpe, Cammie Proctor, Jamene Dahmer, Charlotte Champagne and Sonja R. Newman On the front line of United Way of Southeast Louisiana’s Blueprint for Prosperity plan to fight poverty, Jamene Dahmer, Leigh Thorpe, Cammie Proctor, Charlotte Champagne and Sonja R. Newman are actively working on the North Shore. The Blueprint for Prosperity addresses the growing problem of poverty in
a value of $1.4 million dollars in the first month following the August flood. Leigh Thorpe, Vice President of the Resource Development and Marketing Departments, oversees a team of fundraisers and marketing professionals with a goal of raising more than $16.1 million to eradicate poverty. Leigh also works directly with
Southeast Louisiana, where 42 percent of households are either living in poverty or
United Way’s Campaign Cabinet, made up of volunteers throughout the community
are teetering right on the edge. In conversations with community members, residents
who are dedicated to recruiting new individuals and organizations to be engaged with
discussed their aspirations and the challenges they faced. From there, United Way’s
the organization through volunteerism, advocacy or philanthropic support.
Blueprint for Prosperity was developed to support our neighbors as they struggle to
Within Resource Development are Director for Tangipahoa Parish Cammie
pull themselves out of poverty and create more vibrant communities. The Blueprint
Proctor and Manager for St. Tammany Parish Sonja R. Newman. Cammie’s career at
envisions all families having the skills, resources and opportunities to access basic
United Way began in 2014 and Sonja’s in 2015. Both have extensive backgrounds
needs and have the social, educational and financial assets needed to create a better
in creating a better tomorrow for the North Shore. Further north is Resource
future. The plan takes a holistic approach in which businesses, nonprofits, foundations,
Development Director for Washington Parish Charlotte Champagne. Charlotte has
government, churches, schools, and everyday citizens come together to break down
been an integral part of the North Shore for eight years. Charlotte, Cammie and
silos, align programs and resources and set shared goals. Investments focus on the
Sonja manage all operations of their respective parishes, conducting workplace and
root causes of poverty, such as financial literacy classes and tax preparation assistance,
individual engagement campaigns to further long-lasting community change.
access to healthcare and prescription drugs, and early-grade reading initiatives, along with standards for high quality early education. Each of the five women pictured plays an important role in the Blueprint for Prosperity. As Senior Vice President, Jamene Dahmer is leading the long term recovery
These United Way women work diligently so that the Blueprint for Prosperity can succeed and inspire others to adopt their vision, inform others with data and innovative practices so they can accelerate their own impact and initiate new collaborations where they are needed most.
efforts on behalf of survivors of the 2016 March and August floods. Jamene’s mission is to provide opportunities to help rebuild families’ lives for those affected by the disaster. She also coordinates disaster response and planning with parish, local and state officials. In just three days following the August flood, Jamene opened a United Way warehouse to collect and distribute goods. Leading the collaboration of 90+ community organizations she oversaw the distribution of 1.2 million recovery items at
For more information on the Blueprint for Prosperity call the St. Tammany regional office at 985-778-0815 or visit unitedwaysela.org. Women IN Business 19
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Kim Camet “I have the innate need to be part of someone else’s better,” Kim Camet says. “Whether I’m pushing someone to their healthier self or helping a family reach their real estate goals, I love to help.” Kim’s day-to-day involves both working at Integra Mortgage INC and personal training. At Integra, Kim assists clients in buying and refinancing. Integra Mortgage was founded by Lance Scott and Guy Jones in May 2002. Their philosophy is “smaller is better,” and service is the number one priority. “Buying or refinancing a home is very personal, so we believe in personally investing in each client,” says Kim. “From the first-time homebuyer to the empty-nester looking to downsize, each of us at Integra takes our files from conception to closing so that the customer knows who to call throughout the process. “What sets us apart at Integra is our ability to fit a real estate mortgage with the customer and not the other way around. Each borrower is a unique individual with unique needs. We are not a ‘one-size-fits-all,’ institution-type of lender.” Walk through the front doors of their Madisonville office—just south of I-12 on Highway 21—and you won’t find yourself in a sterile bank or mortgage company environment. However, don’t let the informality fool you. Managing partners and owners Guy Jones and Lance Scott know what they’re doing when it comes to residential mortgage lending. In a short time, their unwavering commitment to area homeowners has made them the ones to call when you’re ready to obtain a home mortgage loan. If you look for the word integrity in the dictionary, you’ll find this definition—“depth of principles; steadfastly adhering to high moral principles or professional standards.” At Integra, they take their name seriously, with a commitment to keeping the individual homeowner and his needs at the forefront of the home loan process. Not only does Integra hold no obligation to real estate and title companies, they are not beholden to any bank to obtain the money they will lend you. They are a direct lender, which means that Integra actually funds the loan, which in turn allows them to expedite the entire process with less hassle than ever 20
Inside Northside
before. Eliminating the need for a middleman allows the homeowner to have a personal relationship with the person they’re borrowing from. Instead of dealing with a huge, impersonal banking conglomerate, when you obtain your home mortgage from Integra, you’re partnering with St. Tammany residents. Kim moved to St. Tammany in 2002 when she married her husband, Christian. The two enjoy life on the northshore with their three girls, Brennan, Meghan and Mackenzie. Kim began her career in the real estate world in 2013 working in title services before joining Integra in August 2015. She holds her MBA from the University of New Orleans. When not helping soon-to-be homeowners, Kim is a fitness instructor and personal trainer on the northshore.
You can find Kim at Integra Mortgage located at 385 Hwy. 21, Suite 515, in Madisonville. 985-206-0011. kim@integra.mortgage.
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Rebecca Markway Lee, RDN, LDN, Katy Bridges and Sophie Lanciers, M.D. Rebecca Lee remembers sitting atop the kitchen counter as a girl, chitchatting with her mom as she prepared family meals using organic vegetables grown in their urban garden and artisanal ingredients that are all the rage today but that, at the time, Rebecca’s friends considered weird. “Now I realize what a healthy relationship my sister and I have with food because of the way our parents raised us,” says Lee. Thanks to her forward-thinking parents, the “new” wellness model to which we all aspire has always been her norm. Now she looks around her, at a time when one-third of America’s adults is considered obese, nearly $200 billion is spent each year on obesity-related medical care and for the first time in recorded history, children have a shorter life expectancy than their parents, in part due to obesity-related illness. Changing those stats will be monumental. Undaunted by the challenge, Rebecca
armed herself with a nutrition degree and launched a David and Goliath-type battle against the obesity epidemic in her home state. She began as a dietetic intern at North Oaks Health System, then as a dietitian at East Jefferson General Hospital and St. Tammany Parish Hospital, spending the last three and a half years working in bariatrics. Last March, she opened True Body Nutrition, where she provides one-on-one weight loss and nutritional counseling and healthycooking classes, empowering clients to take wellness into their own hands. Rebecca is both a “crunchy momma” and a licensed and registered dietitian with a vision for dramatic change in the way we Louisianans shop for, prepare, and eat food. “Someone can reach their weight-loss goal, but if they don’t have the support and knowledge to make the right lifestyle changes, they’ll regain the weight—and usually additional pounds. We’ve got to fix this problem together. So, anything I do has a large support component.”
Before long, Rebecca had partnered with chefs at Abita Fresh to provide ready-made healthy meals for individuals and families through an arm of the business she calls True Body Meals. Next on board were fitness and movement guru Katy Bridges; pediatrician Josh LeBlanc, MD; and pediatrician, pediatric gastroenterologist and board-certified childhood obesity specialist, Sophie Lanciers, MD, who joined Rebecca to launch True Body Kids, a program to bring nutrition and movement education into preschools and daycares. The program provides role-modeling skills for staff and parents, introduces kids to gardening and offers them movement competence education, a form of physical literacy teaching. The program also includes a menu overhaul that will aim to source 80 percent of ingredients locally and organically, introducing healthy habits to the children before they have a chance to develop bad ones. Rebecca is a huge advocate for the farmto-table movement, and helps those who attend her workshops and cooking classes at Simplee Gourmet in Covington learn how to cook healthy, tasty meals from local ingredients. “I’m working to help local farmers get produce directly to families,” she says. “And I’m looking forward to working with the state’s farm-to-school program, whereby a majority of the fruits and vegetables school children eat will be grown locally. I also want to work with local chefs to change the way they prepare traditional Louisiana dishes, to make them healthier without sacrificing taste.” It all sounds overwhelming, but Rebecca thrives on the challenge. “Almost daily someone else reaches out wanting to join the cause, and I welcome more. We can’t have enough people on board with this vision,” she says. “Together, we can change the unhealthy Louisiana food culture into a supportive culture of health and wellness.”
True Body Nutrition and True Body Kids are located at Ain’t Life Grand’s Corporate Headquarters: 1950 N. Hwy. 190 in Covington. 590-7043. betrue.today. Women IN Business 21
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Amy Ybarzabal Spring is a busy, exciting time of the year for Amy Ybarzabal. As Executive Officer of the Northshore Home Builders Association, she is deeply involved in two of the association’s main undertakings, the Northshore Parade of Homes and the Raising the Roof for Charity Home. During the Northshore Parade of Homes, premier builders on the northshore showcase their talents, offering visitors the opportunity to see a range of architectural styles, innovative and exciting technologies and the latest in decorating and design. A free, public event, the Parade of Homes is held this year on May 13-14 and 20-21. Through the raffle of the Raising the Roof for Charity Home, the NHBA stands as one of the largest contributors to local charities in the area. 22
Inside Northside
With the support of the public and its members, the NHBA has donated over $4.9 million to deserving charities since 1994. For the Raising the Roof for Charity event, NHBA members offer their time, talents and energy to design and build a home of exceptional quality. This year’s beautiful home built by NHBA Past President Jules Guidry of Highland Homes on a lot donated by Money Hill Plantation will be raffled off to one lucky winner on June 3. Since her appointment to her position by the association in 2016, Amy has overseen the 850-member organization, which serves St. Tammany, Tangipahoa and Washington parishes. She says, “I am honored to be part of an organization with such a positive impact
on the quality of life on the northshore. The NHBA members take pride in being trustworthy professionals in the home building industry.” Amy came to NHBA with an extensive background in non-profit associations, her experience with promoting the Southeast Louisiana business community spans 20 years. Her career began with the New Orleans Metropolitan Convention and Visitor’s Bureau. She later served as Executive Director for the St. Bernard Parish Chamber of Commerce. After moving to the northshore with her husband, James; their now-college-age triplets Adam, Gabrielle and Kyle; and Camille, age fourteen, she continued as Communications and Advocacy Coordinator for the St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce. “Amy brings leadership and creativity to the association, along with a strong sense of commitment to advocacy and our members,” says NHBA President S. Blake Mendheim, of 110 Builders. The NHBA was created in 2015 by the merging of the St. Tammany and Tangipahoa Home Builders Associations, forming the thirdlargest HBA in Louisiana. NHBA builders are licensed and insured. The NHBA mission is to support legislative, economic and educational initiatives that promote and protect the American dream of homeownership. Members of the local HBA are automatically members of the state association (LHBA) and the national association (NAHB). Legislative priorities and proposed regulations which may affect the home building industry are closely monitored at each level. NAHB works to ensure that housing is a national priority. In fact, the NAHB says that “home builders in 2017 will see significant value as a result of key NAHB advocacy victories from 2016.” On a local level, continuous communication and positive relationships with parish officials allow members to be educated on new standards and in some cases, participate in the creation of ordinances. Amy says: “The NHBA builds better homes and better communities.”
The NHBA is located at 29021 Builders Dr. in Lacombe. 882-5002. northshorehba.org.
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Left to right: Dr. Alissa Whitney, Dr. Lori Daniel, Kristen James, Dr. Katie Bannerman and Dr. Paige Massey.
The Women of Animal Medical Center When Dr. Dan Daniel and his wife, Lori, graduated
at Animal Medical Center as an intern when she was
five more taking the RVT test now, so we’ll soon have
from LSU vet school in the early ’80s, over half of the
still at Mandeville High, went off to veterinary school
nine extremely capable and dedicated RVTs.”
students were male. This year, the school’s freshman
and returned to join the practice. Since then, she’s
class consists of eight men and 91 women. Quite a shift.
married and is proud mama to 6-year-old twins and a
Center to take that team approach. “I’m not kidding
But as a self-professed “thorn among roses” at Animal
4-year-old. “She’s one of our superstars,” says Dr. Dan.
myself,” Dr. Dan laughs. “I’m strictly Plan B around
Medical Center in Covington, Dr. Dan thinks this is a
“Her kids are very active in sports and other activities.
here. Drs. Katie Bannerman, Paige Massey, Alissa
change for the better. “When I look at numbers like that,
Our team approach means she gets to be right there
Whitney, and our RVTs are the best of the best, and
I know that statistically, the best doctors coming out of
cheering them on. Dr. Paige Massey is also a mom,
our clients have figured that out. I’m just glad they still
the school will be women,” he says. “But it’s when I look
and we want her to be able to be as big a part of her
allow me to hang around. When we began bringing
at my own experience, surrounded by extraordinary,
kids’ lives as she wants to be. Dr. Allison Whitney is an
RVTs in, that’s when our practice exploded. You know
caring veterinarians who just happen to be women, that
outstanding mom to her fur babies. Because of our
how St. Tammany Parish Hospital is known for their
I realize what excellent veterinarians women make.
superstar team, when a client comes to Animal Medical
great nursing staff. We’ve gotten the same reputation
Center, they don’t just get a super vet—they get a
with our RVTs. And I couldn’t be prouder of them.”
“They come out of school with their DVM,” says Dr. Dan. “Then, they get their MRS. Then they get their MOM. Now they face a monumental task: trying to be
These paraprofessionals allow Animal Medical
professionally trained and caring team.” The way the Daniels went about building that
a good veterinarian, a good wife and a good mother all
team is a bit innovative, in veterinary circles. “We’ve
at the same time. Anyone has to be super to juggle all
hired four registered veterinary technicians, who are
those titles and do each of them well. But they do! Lori
state-credentialed animal healthcare professionals,
and I want to do everything we can to empower them to
trained to perform clinical and laboratory procedures
Animal Medical Center is located at 904 S
be the best they can be, in all their life roles.”
under the supervision of a licensed veterinarian, much
Tyler Street in Covington. 985-893-1616.
like an RN does under a doctor,” says Dr. Dan. “We have
MyCovingtonVet.com.
Dr. Katie Bannerman, for instance, came to work
Women IN Business 23
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B U S I N E S S with a changing landscape of a community that is growing approximately 20 percent per year can be a daunting task. Lacey is excellent at helping the board see the short-term needs but develop plans for a business community that will be different five, even ten years from now.” This Chamber is dynamic: as needs of businesses change, committees or task forces come and go. “Managing change is a challenge in any workplace. Lacey not only manages change, she often initiates it,” Rhonda adds. One example is the long-term conversations that led to the formation of St. Tammany’s first business political action committee, or PAC, St. Tammany CHAMBERPAC. Lacey is quick to counter that kudo by crediting the strength and vision of her volunteer leadership with the successes the Chamber has tallied. She stays in tune with trends and issues by active participation with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, including serving on its Committee of 100 and Accrediting Board. Of course, the Chamber has achieved U.S. Chamber Accreditation three times, including its latest highest ranking of 5 stars. She has served on the American Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE) Board of Directors, currently serving as chairman of ACCE’s Fringe Benefits, Inc. (FBI) board. She is a past president of the Louisiana Association of Chamber of Commerce Executives (LACCE).
Cynthia Thompson, Lacey Toledano and Rhonda Bagby According to Lacey Toledano, “One of the
chairmen are both strong business women, and
many privileges and rewards in the chamber
she is proud to be featured here with the 2017
profession is working with business leaders and
Chamber Board Chairman, Cynthia Thompson
getting to know them while learning about their
with Impera Wealth Management, LLC, and
various areas of expertise. My career has spanned
Rhonda Bagby of Humana Health Benefit Plan of
27 years, so I have worked with a different
Louisiana, Chair-Elect for 2018.
chairman of the board each year over that time.
“A good Chamber CEO has to be able
My list of colleagues and friends has grown as
to interact and work effectively with an ever-
a result. In the end, it’s all about relationships
changing cast of diverse volunteers as well as
and the ability to get things done for a better
manage staff. Lacey not only is successful in that
community by working collectively with others.”
endeavor, she does so without losing her capacity
Historically, there has been a male majority
to voice her opinions or share her own vision,”
in the Chamber’s board chairman seat. It’s a
Cynthia states. “Helping develop programs of
coincidence that Lacey’s current and future
work that address immediate concerns along
24
Inside Northside
Cynthia and Rhonda both bring with them experience not only from their professions, but in community service and leadership. All three of these Women in Business leaders are strong supporters of the newly established Northshore Regional Partnership and look forward to what the future holds for the various business organizations in the parish and toward more collaboration and cooperation between entities for a stronger future for our community.
The St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce is located at 610 Hollycrest Blvd. in Covington. 892-3216. sttammanychamber.org.
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B U S I N E S S “People like doing business with people they know. As a chamber, it’s our job to provide business owners with opportunities to meet and expand relationships across the parish. There are limitless opportunities for our entire region to grow as we all work together.” One of Dawn’s proudest accomplishments is the restoration of a building the chamber now calls home. The circa 1916 masonry building enjoys a long and storied—even notorious—past. Originally a hotel, it has served for two centuries as a liquor store, restaurant, mini-brewery, nightclub, office building—and even reportedly as a brothel. It now offers space for over thirty local artists on the bottom floor and chamber offices on the top. The building restoration is just one example of the commitment Dawn has made—and kept—to keep Slidell’s picturesque Olde Towne a unique, viable, thriving business district. She says, “The chamber is the managing arm of Olde Towne Slidell Main Street. Working with Main Street Manager Sharon DeLong and the board of directors, we are actively involved in bringing in new vendors and supporting economic development in this historic area anyway we can.” Charles Klepfer, the 2017 chamber board chairman and owner of CiCi’s Pizza Slidell, enjoys being involved in the community and providing support to local businesses. He says, “Dawn is very goal oriented and focused on economic stimulation. As she, the staff and board members work together,
Dawn Sharpe
Ten years ago, when Dawn Sharpe took
we are able to utilize each other’s ideas to enhance our community partners, the membership.” area, attracted by the entrepreneurial spirit that’s
“It’s an honor to be able to serve the parish
the helm of the East St. Tammany Chamber of
still rejuvenating the parish. The East St. Tammany
where I grew up,” says Dawn. “This job is all about
Commerce, the area was reeling from Hurricane
Chamber has doubled its membership under Dawn’s
relationships. When the chamber works with
Katrina, with many of the area businesses still
leadership. And one of the best results of the parish-
the school board, government, non-profits, local
clawing their way back. “Our biggest challenge
wide “do-over” has been a coordination of resources
artists and businesses, together we can make our
was finding ways to be relevant to the community,”
on both sides of the parish.
community better. It’s humbling every day for me to
she says. “Businesses were focused on using any
“It’s been a goal of Parish President Pat
funds they had to get their business alive again,
Brister to bring together the resources of the East
not paying chamber dues. So we operated as a
and West Chambers and eliminate duplication of
chamber on demand and didn’t exclude anyone
efforts in order to make us all more effective,” says
who wanted to be involved. We were on the radio
Dawn. This spirit of collaboration has united the
letting residents know who was open and looking
local tourist commission, economic development
for any way we could help.”
departments, the Northshore Community
Much has changed during Dawn’s decade as chief executive officer. Old businesses have regained solid footing, while new ones have flocked to the
Foundation and the Northshore Business Council, as well as the East and West Chambers. “It’s been an exciting process,” says Dawn.
have a hand in such a worthwhile task.”
The East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce is located at 1808 Front St. in Slidell, 643-5678. ESTChamber.com. Women IN Business 25
Melissa Bordelon, Carla Tate and Stacey Neal
Dianne Morgan Baham
Tangipahoa Parish is a place where people are really moving. One of the
director asked her what she wanted to do with her life. She told him she wanted to
fastest-growing parishes in Louisiana, it is home to Southeastern Louisiana University,
have one hand reaching up to God and one hand reaching out to people. Shortly
Northshore Technical Community College and other amazing education choices.
after that, she began working for the non-profit agency STARC, providing Services,
Ideally located at the intersection of I-12 and I-55, the Hammond Northshore
Training, Advocacy, Resources and Community connections to individuals with
Regional Airport is the centerpiece of its unparalleled infrastructure. Three women
disABILITIES. That was in 1973. She’s never left.
of Tangipahoa work every day to further their missions concerning commerce,
When STARC Executive Director Dianne Baham was a teen, her church youth
“My husband started working at First Baptist Church of Slidell on Sunday. I
economic development and tourism. They realize the importance of partnerships and
started at STARC on Monday, and we’re both still here,” she laughs. If everyone felt as
demonstrate that working together is moving their community forward.
passionately about their career as Dianne Baham, the world would be a different place.
Greater Hammond Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Melissa Bordelon
“We believe strongly that people are more alike than they are different.We focus on
is a native of Hammond and a graduate of Southeastern. She leads the 623-member
ABILITIES, rather than disABILITIES. The services are for a lifetime, many of the 3-year-
Chamber, which represents over 20,000 employees in Tangipahoa Parish. As the leader
olds I began working with are now in their late 40s”. Not only do the individuals helped
of and catalyst for strategies and services, which promote economic vitality in the Greater
by STARC enjoy more meaningful lives filled with jobs and socialization, dances, church
Hammond community, the Chamber is making a real impact in Tangipahoa Parish.
activities, art therapy and music therapy, their lives are longer and healthier because of
Since 2012, Stacey Neal has worked for Tangipahoa Parish Government as
the intervention of Dianne and the entire staff at STARC. STARC provides employment
the Executive Director of Economic Development. TEDF’s mission is “to identify
for 350 individuals in St. Tammany Parish and serves 1,000 individuals with disABILITIES
opportunities and lead efforts to attract new jobs and investment, enhance the climate
and their families. “I give all the credit to God and to the people surrounding me. We
for retention and expansion of existing business, address education and workforce
have a tremendous Board of Directors and the support of clubs and organizations and
development needs, and provide advocacy for economic development public policy
caring compassionate citizens in our parish. One thing we like to say is, ‘I’m only one,
on behalf of all Tangipahoa Parish citizens.” Stacey grew up in Tangipahoa Parish and
but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. What I can do, I ought
graduated from Southeastern in 1991.
to do. And what I ought to do, by the grace of God I will do to the best of my ability.’ No
As the parish continues to blossom, Tangipahoa Parish Convention & Visitors Bureau Executive Director Carla Tate ensures that the Tangipahoa Parish CVB is the first stop for visitors and locals alike. The CVB’s mission is to promote Tangipahoa Parish as a
matter how limited a person may be, God’s Holy Spirit is not limited. We see miracles every day.” One of the greatest blessings in Dianne’s life has been seeing her son join her
destination by attracting meetings, sporting events and tourism as well as contributing
work at STARC. “You can’t really teach compassion,” she says. “But Mark has it, and it’s a
to the identity and economic wellbeing of Tangipahoa Parish. Carla is a Tangipahoa
blessing to know he’ll take over when I’m gone.”
Parish native, attended Southeastern and is a Notary Public.
STARC has several facilities throughout the northshore, including hammondchamber.org. tedf.org. tangi-cvb.org. 26
Inside Northside
in Slidell and Mandeville. STARCla.org.
W O M E N
I N
B U S I N E S S
Gretchen Armbruster Gretchen Armbruster opened her fine art school and studio in Covington more than five years ago. Her workshop classes are popular, attracting students from Metairie, New Orleans and the entire region. She teaches classes in all mediums, with a special focus on oils. She says, “I couldn’t have imagined loving a job so much. Teaching such talented and wonderful people is truly a great thing to wake up and do every day!” With the success of her school, Gretchen outgrew her first building in 2016. She relocated to 502 Columbia Street in downtown Covington. “I’ve been so happy in this larger space. There’s room for classes and a gallery with plenty of
natural light shining in,” she says. Gretchen and her students are right in the middle of every downtown activity. “The location is ideal for the many arts festivals that take place in Covington. We love the traffic the festivals bring as well as being able to participate in so many great events.” Gretchen’s paintings have graced the walls of countless galleries over the years, including Southern Breeze in Jackson, Mississippi; Taylor Clark Gallery in Baton Rouge; Pineapple Gallery and Arabella Fine Gifts and Home Décor in Mandeville; and Gallery 526 in New Orleans. Her commissioned portraits don the walls of some
of the finer homes in Louisiana. No matter the subject, an Armbruster is always identifiable. “It’s my use of light and contrast of values in a painting,” Gretchen explains. “It’s very dramatic.” Her notable works include the 200406 Crescent City Classic posters, 12 years of elaborate Bacchus designs and extensive murals in the historic French Quarter Old Absinthe House. Her paintings can also be seen in St. Tammany Parish Hospital, West Jefferson Hospital, Ochsner hospitals and many restaurants and homes in the area. She was featured in the Art of the Horse issue of the national American Art Collector magazine. Her work was even on the big screen in the movie He Said, She Said. Gretchen’s original 24-by-36 painting The Dictator, which appeared on the cover of the February 2015 issue of Inside New Orleans, portrayed a very colorful Carnival scene. She says, “I moved to the northshore about 19 years ago. As a New Orleans girl, born and raised, I have to say I was surprised at how quickly my family and I embraced life over here. Although I consider myself a South Louisiana artist, my favorite subject is New Orleans. I just love the energy that New Orleans provides in a painting.” As a young artist, Gretchen studied with local artists such as David Robert Rossbach, Alan Flattmann and David Jinks. She studied at LSU, the John McCrady School of Fine and Applied Arts and the New Orleans Art Institute. As an instructor now, Gretchen loves fostering the talents of students of all age levels and experience. “I tell my students they need to try every medium and learn all the different techniques because you don’t know your style until you try,” says Gretchen. “I love working with a student who has never received instruction and helping them discover, little by little, that they have great ability.”
Armbruster Artworks School is at 502 Columbia St. in Covington. 985-630-6295. armbrusterartworks.com. Women IN Business 27
W O M E N
I N
B U S I N E S S and the community can look back at the many contributions the League has made since its beginning as the Greater Covington Junior Service League in 1977. In addition to volunteering at local hospitals and many other organizations, the original league was instrumental in the formation of the Western St. Tammany YMCA, Meals on Wheels, Northlake Nature Center, Kris Kringle (now Toys for Tots) and the Youth Service Bureau. In 1999, the Service League affiliated with The Association of Junior Leagues International, Inc. and changed its name to the Junior League of Greater Covington. Today, JLGC continues to fulfill its Mission Statement by training members to be civic leaders and promoting volunteerism. As the needs of the members and community have changed, the League has stepped up to meet new challenges. Many current projects impact northshore youth, such as Project Prom/Project Homecoming, Girl’s Health, and JLGC’s Signature Project, the Children’s Museum of St. Tammany. In addition to its programs, the League provides financial support to local non-profit organizations through Community Assistance Grants. As she wraps up her year as president, Molly continues to look to the future. “I hope to see JLGC continue to impact the northshore community over the next 40 years, and I am excited to see what is in store next for the Junior League of Greater Covington!” Mission Statement: The Junior League of Greater
Dr. Molly Burns
Covington is an organization of women committed to promoting volunteerism, developing the potential of
Dr. Molly Burns, president of the Junior League
set forth by the nine founding members forty years
of Greater Covington, has a deep-rooted history in St.
ago on April 11, 1977, Molly has served on various
Tammany Parish. Born and raised in Covington, Molly
committees and as a member of the JLGC board of
knew that she would return to her hometown after she
directors for the past five years. Although she joined
completed her studies at The Louisiana State University
the League to volunteer, Molly has found that she
School of Dentistry. Not long after settling into the
has gained a great deal from her membership. “I
practice of dentistry with her childhood dentist,
never thought that being a part of the League would
Dr. Mary A. Beilman, Molly looked for a way to get
impact my business, but my involvement has greatly
involved and give back to the community that helped
improved my problem-solving, communication and
shape her to be the person she is today.
team-building skills.”
Molly’s father, Roy K. Burns Jr., suggested that
women and improving the community through the effective action and leadership of trained volunteers. Its purpose is exclusively educational and charitable.
Under Molly’s leadership, the League is
she consider joining the Junior League. Ten years
celebrating its 40th Anniversary this year, boasting
New member classes are offered each spring and
after taking her father’s advice, Molly has not looked
a membership of over 225 women, a diverse group
fall. More information about JLGC projects and
back. Knowing that she wanted to continue the legacy
of women of all ages and backgrounds. Its members
membership can be found at jlgc.net.
28
Inside Northside
Devin Tournillon Seniors living at Avanti have choices. Surrounded by an endless array of
Jenny Mutter For 13 years, Jenny Mutter of Hestia Linens has made linen choices
amenities and programs, residents are able to continue living their lives doing
easy and approachable. Jenny provides a hands-on experience for
what they enjoy. And in Louisiana, everyone knows how to enjoy life! That is
customers to help them design and build perfect linen combinations.
why Avanti Senior Living brought the community to Covington.
Hestia offers an array of quality bedding options from sheets to throw
“We invite anyone interested in redefined senior living to stop by to see what Avanti offers,” says Devin Tournillon, Family and Resident Advocate. Avanti Senior Living of Covington has everything a Louisiana senior could need—formal and casual restaurant-style dining, a theater area, state-of-
pillows to complete a room. “Many people think luxury linens will be out of their price range,” Jenny says. “I’ve worked hard to carry designer lines that can fit any budget.” Various designer collections, including Bella Notte, Peacock Alley,
the-art wellness center, full-service salon and spa, Mind.Body.Strength area,
Sferra, Lili Alessandra, Matouk and Pine Cone Hill, grace the Hestia retail
and a fully functioning art studio. Within the 77,000-square-foot, $15 million
space, allowing customers to visualize their final product. In addition
community, there are 50 assisted living suites and 40 memory care suites.
to all of the gorgeous bed linens, Jenny also provides local in-home
For ageless seniors, Avanti redefines senior housing through forward-
consultations for window treatments. “I want clients to also be able
thinking design, an inspiring and innovative culture and state-of-the-art
to come to us for window treatments just like they have come to us
technology, emphasizing care, safety and engagement to create great personal
for bedding for so many years,” says Jenny. “We have everything from
experiences for our residents. There are even charging stations for residents to
custom and ready-made draperies to shades, blinds and plantation
keep their devices fully charged for the next FaceTime with their grandchild!
shutters.”
“We know families have many questions, and we want them to see for
Jenny is passionate about sharing her design aesthetic to create
themselves what is available at Avanti. Moving a loved one into assisted living
warm rooms you want to linger in. And if you don’t want to leave your
or memory care can be daunting, but once people see our chic, luxurious
Hestia robe or bed that Jenny helped design, you can now shop at home
design and learn about our personalized wellness program, I know families
on hestialinens.com. “I’m thrilled to open online sales for my customers.
will be put at ease,” says Tournillon.
It’s another way to gather ideas, shop and get inspired in addition to
Avanti Senior Living owns, develops and operates senior living communities in Texas, Louisiana and soon in Arizona. Avanti’s vision
seeing the products in the store. There is also a weekly blog where we share design tips and more.”
emphasizes personal choice and control to preserve resident dignity, while delivering world-class care and support and inspirational experiences.
Avanti Senior Living of Covington is located at 2234 Watercross Parkway.
Hestia Linens is located at 61 Park Place Drive in Covington.
(off Ochsner Blvd.) 985-222-9747. AvantiCovington.com
893-0490. hestialinens.com Women IN Business 29
IN The Bookcase by Terri Schlichenmeyer
don’t know they’re bugging someone with their behavior, so Foster advocates compassion when dealing with conflicts. Consider the other person’s story and way of thinking. It helps to step into their shoes. Then, and though Foster very strongly stresses that this book is not a psychiatry manual and that you shouldn’t make armchair diagnoses, understand that there are several basic kinds of office schmucks you might encounter in your worklife. Narcissists—up to seventy-five percent of which are men—thrive on compliments and hate being ignored. The Venus Flytrap loves chaotic and unstable relationships (think: Fatal Attraction). The Swindler only cares about the deal, and only if it benefits himself. The Bean Counter is obsessive and has difficulty letting things go, while Distracted people let go too easily. And then there are those with serious substance abuse problems, undiagnosed illnesses, true cultural differences or just plain eccentricities. Finally, says Foster, when you’re angry and digging for any possible reason to lend a shred of compassion, don’t forget to look inside. “Go get the mirror,” she says. “Hurry.” YOUR CO-WORKER is an idiot.
And then go back and read the chapter entitled
All day long, he’s blah-blah-blah, telling you how
“Important Disclaimers.” As you’re reading The Schmuck
great he is, the coolest guy ever. If you’ve done something,
in My Office, you can’t keep them in mind enough. That’s
The Schmuck in My Office:
he’s done it better. Twice. You’d love it if the boss fired the
because using real psychiatric diagnoses to battle an office
How to Deal Effectively with
jerk, but then you’d be short-handed and that’s no good,
pest can be fraught with danger, and author Jody J. Foster
Difficult People at Work
either. So read The Schmuck in My Office by Jody J. Foster,
(with Michelle Joy) is careful to repeatedly warn readers of
by Jody J. Foster, MD MBA,
MD MBA (with Michelle Joy, MD) and find out a better way
this. Yes, the possibilities are undeniably interesting and
of dealing with him.
can explain so much, and it’s the rare person who hasn’t
with Michelle Joy, MD
When she was in business school, Foster, a psychiatrist, was often amused and pleased to be a go-to
but remembering that “There is an important distinction
person when conflicts arose. Classmates constantly asked
between personality traits… and personality disorders” is
for help in dealing with others who rankled them, and she
the key to using this book. It helps that the authors also
was usually successful in smoothing ruffled feathers and
offer end-of-chapter hints for both workers and bosses, too.
feelings. So what are her secrets? First of all, she says, don’t assume that people are
30
Inside Northside
smugly rattled off a layman’s diagnosis for an office bother,
Though it’s not a handbook, this is fascinating. It may even teach you some compassion, so it’s
being jerks on purpose. Most folks act one way or other
recommended for anyone who works with others, shares
when they think they’re doing the right thing, or because
an office or is a supervisor. The Schmuck in My Office may
they haven’t been told any differently. Oftentimes, they
get you fired… up.
O Danube So Blue...
Cruise with St. Tammany West Chamber by Michelle Biggs
Above: Budapest, Hungary. Inset: A young man dressed in folk costume plays fujara at Festival of shepherd’s pipes in Slovakia. 116
IF YOU HAVE TRAVEL DREAMS, the St. Tammany West Chamber is offering The Majestic Danube River Cruise October 20-28. The adventure will start in Budapest and explore exciting destinations across Hungary, Slovakia, Austria and Germany. The fivestar river cruise experience includes sightseeing excursions to Budapest, Bratislava, Vienna, Regensbur and Passau. Coupled with the stylish comfort, boutique hotel ambiance, delicious cuisine and ultimate convenience offered by sailing on this upscale river vessel, the Danube awaits its travelers
Inside Northside
with a spectacular travel experience! Even thinking of flying across an ocean begs the question: how much? The Danube River cruise is a great value, starting at $4,199 per person, based on cabin choice and double occupancy. It includes round-trip airfare from New Orleans, firstclass accommodations, deluxe motor coach ground transportation and meals with wine. Chamber membership is not required, and everyone from around the northshore and New Orleans regions is encouraged to check out the value. Because it is a
cruise, space on the ship is limited, so talk to your travel mate and friends who may want to join you on this trip of a lifetime. In this ever-expanding global economy, Chambers of Commerce across the United States continue to offer first-hand learning opportunities about international cultures. These trips are a great way to learn about cultural differences and in some cases, open doors for potential trade opportunities or business relationships. And since they are open to non-Chamber members, they offer a chance for people to see the world with neighbors, co-workers and friends. This past March, the Chamber offered its twelfth >> May-June 2017 117
“I learned how to spell well at Huntington. I learned ur, er, ir, ar, sh, th and ch at Huntington. I can now read Diary of a Wimpy Kid. I learned how to add numbers together. These were the things I learned at Huntington.” - Gabe M. 1st grade “My first grade son has had a great experience with Huntington. When he entered the program, his reading skills were on a low Kindergarten level, but after a few months at Huntington, he started reading more fluently. His reading skills are now on par with a typical first grader. He is much happier and more confident, and he now enjoys reading! The amount of time he needs to complete his homework has also drastically decreased. We would highly recommend Huntington to other parents.” Amanda M. – Parent "After being at Huntington, I feel more confident. My ACT score went up 6 points, and my grades in school are better than ever. I have grown so much in school because of them." - Mary R. 11th grade “My daughter has always struggled academically. After tutoring, Mary is doing great in school. Her ACT score went from a 17 to a 23, and she’s not even finished with the program!” - Karen R. – Parent “My Huntington experience has been a good one. The teachers here helped me with study skills, math skills, and reading skills. Those skills improved all of my grades. Without Huntington, I don’t know where I’d be in school.” - Jacob S. “Huntington Learning Center has benefited my family by reinforcing Jacob’s education. HLC’s program gave him the tools to study and understand various subjects. He now continues to attend HLC for daily studies with well-qualified teachers there to assist. We highly recommend HLC.” - Carol S. - Parent
Church St. Paul in Passau, Germany.
international trip to a “bucket list” destination—a nine-day tour of Peru. Our guests discovered dazzling highlights, including Lima, Machu Picchu, the Incan wonders of Cusco, the Urubamba River to the Sacred Valley, foothills of the Andes and more. It was an amazing opportunity to explore this fascinating and ancient site, and the participants have a lifetime of memories to share. Many previous Chamber travelers have taken advantage of incredible savings to travel with loved ones—mother/son duos, father/daughter duos, sisters, friends, singles and retired couples. Several repeat travelers have established close friendships. Having traveled on two or more previous trips, they now look forward to traveling together each year. And of course, they are always interested in where the Chamber will go next! Michelle Gonzales, a six-time traveler, says it best: “The Chamber’s International Travel Program has offered some incredible destinations, all reasonably priced. Besides seeing the world, I’ve been able to meet like-minded people here from our community. It amazes me that with each trip, I meet new people who have been attending the same local events as me for years, but we were completely unaware of each other until traveling together. The Chamber program makes bucket-list destinations an attainable reality, while at the same time, broadening your circle of friends.” Visit sttammanyChamber.org/travel or the St. Tammany West Facebook page for regular updates on the sites you will see—or call 892-3216. Bon Voyage!
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Inside Northside
Spirits for the Southern Palate
Distilled in the Delta by Mimi Greenwood Knight
JOEL BRANNAN LEARNED A LOT as he worked toward his geology degree at LSU. But the lessons he learned behind the bar in Baton Rouge’s popular Tigerland were equally as valuable. “I got to see and understand people’s palate and how it changes as they get older,” he says. “I saw how easy it was to introduce a drink recipe and have people come back asking for it. I saw people at their best and at their worst—I learned a lot about human nature.”
DELTA LEMON COCKTAIL 3 muddled mint leaves 2 oz. lemonade 3 oz. Magnolia Vodka 1/2 oz. Sprite 1 orange slice dropped in
Muddle the mint leaves in a martini shaker. Add vodka, lemonade, and Sprite. Shake and serve in a glass on the rocks. Add orange as a garnish.
And with his easy-going disposition, the Covington native made connections in the spirits industry that would come in handy. After graduation, Brannan did the sensible thing and took a job with an oil company, a job which saw him traveling the country and spending nights in hotel rooms alone. “That gave me a lot of time to think,” he says. What he thought about was hunting in Tensas Parish in the Louisiana Delta when he was young. Brannan knew that the qualities of that nutrient-rich soil, fed with centuries of river silt, made for some of the sweetest, most nutritious corn imaginable. He’d eaten that corn. He’s seen it growing for miles around. “That’s when geology met spirits,” he says. He sat in those hotel rooms imagining the vodka he could make from that Louisiana Delta corn. Business trips also afforded him the opportunity to visit a lot of bars in a lot of towns, chew the fat with a lot of bartenders and continue his study of customers, observing their likes and dislikes and drinking habits. Many of us have million-dollar ideas that never get further than some scribblings on the back of a >>
A Magnolia Mule at the Barley Oak.
May-June 2017 121
photo: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
Joel Brannan and Thomas Brennan. 122
bar napkin. But this is when fate gave Brannan a nudge. He traveled to South Florida to purchase a boat and found himself in a local watering hole where he met an artisanal distiller. The two struck up a conversation. One thing led to another, and Brannan found himself touring the distillery. It didn’t take long before the two men made a gentlemen’s bargain. Brannan would ship his Louisiana Delta corn to Florida, where it would be distilled into vodka. He took a deep breath and pushed forward. His next obstacle was one of the toughest. Brannan had to convince his parents, Wayne and Angelle, that it was a good idea to leave his secure oil company job and roll the dice on a vodka label. “My first problem was my mom,” he says. “She’s very religious and grew up anti-alcohol. I knew she wouldn’t like the idea of me making my living in the spirits industry. I literally had to sit down with her and go over Bible verses and explain that what I wanted to do was okay. My dad was more worried about me giving up the security of the oil company for a very
Inside Northside
uncertain thing.” But once the older Brannans were onboard, they threw themselves behind their son 100 percent. “Dad’s helping me with store displays now,” says Brannan, “and Mom is wood burning our logo into wooden pallets.” The name was a no-brainer. Brannan wanted something that would offer a sense of place, that would conjure up South Louisiana and all it represents. “Magnolia” was the obvious choice. So, what’s the next step to take, when you’re considering a food- or spirit-related enterprise in the New Orleans area? You need to get the Brennan family onboard. Lucky for Brannan, Thomas Brennan, fourth generation in the Brennan’s Restaurant dynasty, is a close college friend. Brennan, who’d grown up in Covington and attended St. Paul’s, had graduated from the University of Alabama and was putting a marine biology degree to work at the Aquarium of the Americas. “I called Thomas and told him what I was considering,” says Brannan. “He told me to give him a call when I started a tequila company.” But it wasn’t long before Brannan had convinced his old friend to sign on. “I knew I couldn’t do this by myself,” he says. “Thomas is a go-getter. I really I needed his help.” And so, this time, it was Brennan convincing his parents that the gamble was worth taking. Tommy and Connie Brennan were—in their son’s words—terrified. “But I told them I’m young enough to take a chance,” he says. “If it doesn’t work out, I still have plenty time to go back to a safe job. I really wanted to join Joel, and see where this can take us. They didn’t take too much convincing. Ten minutes later, I called Joel and said, ‘I’m in!’” The two sat down and came up with a business plan. Then the cold calling began. “We wanted to make personal contacts with local grocery stores, to keep things small and personal,” says Brannan. “Once we convinced the stores’ buyers to put Magnolia Vodka in inventory, we needed to follow through and make sure they were actually putting it on the shelves at each location. It was important >>
The Moscow Mule.
Did You Know? The drinking of vodka has been documented as far back as the fourth century in Eastern and Northern Europe. And while the Russians and the Poles both claim to be the first to distill the colorless, odorless spirit, most historical references credit Russia. Vodka’s popularity in the United States began just after World War II during a short-lived, post-war glow of friendship between Russia and the United States. American John G. Martin of Heublein Co. (known at the time for his A-1 Steak Sauce) bought the Smirnoff brand from Russian Vladimir Smirnov and marketed it with a cocktail recipe he called the Moscow Mule—vodka and Cock ‘N Bull ginger beer. It was an instant hit. But popularity came to a screeching halt when relations between the United States and the Soviet Union soured. Scrambling to reclaim his market, Martin enlisted celebs like Groucho Marx, Woody Allen and Zsa Zsa Gabor to promote the idea that vodka—unlike bourbon—could not be detected on the breath. All the better for a little day drinking. Then in 1962, in perhaps the greatest product placement success story in the history of Hollywood, Sean Connery as James Bond uttered his iconic line, “Shaken, not stirred.” And vodka took its place in the American liquor cabinet. May-June 2017 123
that they see our faces and get to know us. That’s where Thomas is invaluable. People can’t help but like A dry vodka martini. him. Then we needed local bars to put us on their specialty cocktail menus. The best way to do that was to sit down with them and have them taste our vodka alongside other labels. The flavor is so clean, so smooth and so sweet. If we can get them to taste it, we’re in the door. It’s also gluten-free.” “I asked Joel, ‘How do I do this?’ Then I scheduled the hardest meeting of all,” says Brennan. “I made an appointment to go see my Aunt Ti and my Aunt Lally at Commander’s Palace. They didn’t go easy on me. They made me earn it. But then they gave me lots of great advice. They helped me come up with some cocktail recipes, and they put us behind the bar.” “I told Thomas that’s the scariest thing you’ll have to do,” laughs Brannan. “If you can do that, the rest should be easy.” The guys are distilling 900 bottles a month now. They just purchased $85,000 worth of distilling equipment and five acres in Tensas Parish to build their own distillery. “We’re designing it to look like a rustic barn and including a tasting room,” says Brannan. “That area is full of North Louisiana hunters all winter, doctors and lawyers from Monroe, and there’s really nothing else for them to do up there. We’re two miles from Lake Bruin, so during the summer the area is popular for fishing and water skiing. We’ll schedule tastings and other events and make the distillery a real destination for people.” “We’ve worked to get Magnolia Vodka into dozens of bars, restaurants and grocery stores from here to Shreveport, and we just signed with Republic National Distributors,” says Brennan. “But we still want to keep things small and personal. It means a lot to a store owner or restaurant owner when we walk through the door. We don’t want to lose that. We always want it to feel like a small, local company—to keep it personal, to keep the charm.” “This is vodka blended for the Southern palate,” says Brannan. “Louisiana has always been known for bringing flavor to the table with a variety of foods. That’s what we want to do with vodka, distilling it six times through an elite fermentation process with some of the most nutrient-rich corn grown. We’ll soon be distilling it here in Louisiana, and we want to keep it here, as an exclusive Louisiana vodka for a while. Then we’ll think about spreading east. Our market is basically anywhere a magnolia tree grows.” 124
Inside Northside
IN Great Taste
Fresh Herbs Brighten Spring Dessert
Thyme is on your side. 126
Inside Northside
WHETHER YOU’RE GROWING HERBS in a backyard garden or an indoor windowsill, fresh herbs can add vibrant flavor to your spring recipes. They are often used to complement savory dishes, but herbs’ bright flavors pair beautifully with baked goods. Herbs will add a distinctive twist to classic desserts, as in Lemon-Thyme Bundt Cake. Thyme’s aromatic quality complements the tart notes in the lemon cake, adding a sophisticated touch to each bite of this indulgent treat. Interestingly, the herb isn’t the only thing that enhances the Lemon-Thyme Bundt cake—a touch of the hand intensifies the lemon essence. The recipe instructs you to rub lemon zest and sugar together until well blended and fragrant. It’s a little step that creates big flavor. Your hands truly are your best kitchen tool. As we head into a new season, enjoy practicing the art of using herbs and your hands in this splendid springtime recipe. For more recipes go to Ydelicacies.com and @y_delicacies on Instagram.
photo: YVETTE JEMISON
by Yvette Jemison
Lemon-Thyme Bundt Cake Lemon-Thyme Bundt cake tastes every bit as bright as it looks. The moist interior is flecked with thyme for a fragrant cake that is immensely satisfying and perfect for serving with a cup of tea—or any special occasion. Servings: 12-16 Cake 3 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for coating pan 1 Tablespoon baking powder
scraping down sides as needed. Increase speed to high and mix until light and creamy, 2-3 minutes. 7. With the mixer on low speed, add half of the dry ingredients, alternating with half of the milk mixture in two additions just until all ingredients are well combined. Pour into prepared pan and bake until cake is golden brown, springs back to the touch, and a tester comes out clean, 50-60 minutes. Let cool for 15 minutes and invert onto a wire rack and cool completely, 3 hours.
1 teaspoon kosher salt 1 Tablespoon fresh minced thyme
Glaze
1 cup whole milk
1. In a medium bowl, whisk powdered sugar, lemon juice and water until well combined. Glaze should be pourable but stiff enough to hold its shape. 2. Pour glaze onto completely cooled cake. Pour along the center top of the cake, working around the cake as the glaze drips down the sides.
1/4 cup lemon juice 3 cups sugar 3 Tablespoons lemon zest 1 cup unsalted butter, softened 1/2 cup shortening 5 large eggs Glaze 1 3/4 cup powdered sugar 2 Tablespoon lemon juice 1 teaspoon water Special equipment: 12-cup Bundt pan
Do Ahead: Cake can be baked, cooled, wrapped in plastic wrap or stored in a cake dome at room temperature up to 3 days. Glaze can be made and stored in an airtight container at room temperature up to 3 days. Glazed cake can be stored at room temperature in a cake dome up to 3 days.
Cake
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and generously flour Bundt pan. 2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and thyme; set aside. 3. In a small bowl, stir together milk and lemon juice; set aside. 4. In a large bowl, using your hands, rub sugar and lemon zest together until well blended and fragrant, about 3 minutes. 5. Add butter and shortening to the sugar mixture and using a mixer on high speed beat until combined, about 2 minutes. 6. With the mixer on medium speed, add eggs one at a time until well blended, May-June 2017 127
At the Table by Tom Fitzmorris
FIFTY YEARS AGO on this May 13, I became a man. I wasn’t expecting such a thing to happen on that evening when I left my parents’ house for a night on the town. I wore a tuxedo for the first time in my life, and struggled with the bow tie. I had a bouquet for my date, as well as a small gold pin for her and another for myself in blue and white enamel. Two tickets in my pocket read, “Jesuit High School JuniorSenior Prom, hosted by the Senior Class of 1967, At Loyola University’s Danna Center. Semi-Formal. Strictly Personal. Live Music By The Basement Wall.” Halfway into that evening, without expectation, I knew that I had crossed one of life’s great borderlines. From that moment on, I recognized 128
Inside Northside
Life Before Prom Night and Life After Prom Night. Within a few days, I had calculated that the fiftieth anniversary of Prom Night would fall on a Saturday. What a thing to know when one is sixteen! To this day, I need no yearbook or personal relics to recall the details of Prom Night. I remember exactly where I was at any moment of the evening. Over the years, those memories ebbed away. But I have a continued fascination with the institution of the prom and each new young adult who has to deal with it. This time, my wife and I were having dinner with friends at Rip’s on the Lakefront in Mandeville. We weren’t there long when a young couple took a table not far from ours. She wore a lacy black dress that appeared to reveal more skin than it actually did. The reading from the women at my table was that the dress was stunning. Her date wore a tuxedo of the right size, with polished shoes and a well-tied bowtie. Both were slender and fit. They smiled the entire time they were there, and seemed to feel easy in each other’s >>
illustration: GRETCHEN ARMBRUSTER
Prom Night
May-June 2017 129
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company. In short, they could have been models doing a stylemagazine shoot. I wasn’t at first convinced that these two were prom bound. They looked thoroughly poised and comfortable. That and the perfect attire made them look older than high school kids. But then more couples arrived. They too looked terrific and happy. I was told by the waiter that these were indeed prom nighters from Fontainebleau High School. They were taking advantage of a $30 complete prom night dinner Rip’s established. The tip and tax were included. Alcoholic beverages were not available. Some of the young men had made their own reservations. That special menu, says Rip’s owner Roslyn Prieto, solves a lot of problems for both the restaurant and the young couples. Exactly the same package deal is available at restaurants throughout the metro. It is a great idea, and every year I compile a list of restaurants on nomenu.com that would lend themselves to young people looking for memorable prom-night dinners. If my Prom Night had been like the one I saw at Rip’s, my memories of it would be much different. Certain aspects of formal dances like the prom are not accessible to everybody. The dinner before the prom, for example. My parents never went out to restaurants, and so my siblings and I entered the adult world with no knowledge of how to play the restaurant game. I had some advantages. I had a steady income from working at the Time Saver. I could walk into a restaurant and know I had the money to cover dinner. I also had my own car. My best friend was classmate Bill McCarthy, who in exchange for my acting as his chauffeur, allowed some of his coolness to rub off on me. He showed me how to dress, where to walk and how to talk when you were with a girl, and elements of ediquette and style. But Bill didn’t know more about restaurants than I did. Unfortunately, what little I knew about dining out involved hamburgers and French fries. None of these matters would add up to much. In midafternoon on Prom Day, while taking a break from the bow-tie puzzle, I called my date, Cathy, to tell her that I would show up at her house in Harahan to pick her up at six p.m. There was a long pause on her end. “Hello?” I asked. “Hello,” she said. I felt chill in the center of what passed for my chest. “I can’t go,” she went on. “I forgot to tell you.” Then, a devastating coup de grace. “I have to wash my hair tonight.” I don’t recall what I said after that. But it was one of the only moments I don’t remember from that day. It was something about the flowers and the prom favors. She just said, “I’m sorry, but I really do have to wash my hair.” Not “shampoo,” but 130 130 Inside InsideNN orthside orthside
“wash my hair.” Then her phone disconnected. I never ran into or talked with Cathy again. Maybe we should have gone on a regular date before the prom. For awhile, I harbored the idea that she had gone to another prom with someone else. Maybe even my own prom, with a fellow Blue Jay! I dismissed all those ideas and moved on. The evening began at my favorite hangout, on the corner of Claiborne and Carrollton. Bradley’s was an old pharmacy with a soda fountain. My Prom Night feast would be cheeseburger, fries (which even then I recognized as unusually excellent), cherry Coke, a slice of apple pie, and the latest edition of Captain America. I sat at the counter in my tux, reading an Avengers comic book and wondering where I might find a date for the prom at this late hour. After a half hour, with the sun declining, I gave up on that. I changed out of the tux into white jeans and a yellow buttondown shirt. I drove away with no goal in mind. In the next four hours, I criss-crossed the city, from downtown to the CBD, to the Lakefront and Little Woods, to Gentilly and City Park. I passed in front of Jesuit, the Danna Center, the Time Saver from which I was taking the night off. I turned into River Ridge and went to the Krystal on Airline Highway. That brought me up to four hamburgers for the night. Driving west on West Metairie, the traffic signal just ahead went blank. After a beat, it began flashing red and yellow signals. I took this as a cue to end this episode and go home. A few weeks later, with nothing to do one evening, I went for another drive. I found myself following the same route I had on Prom Night. Already a few things had changed—the new Seabrook Bridge was open, instead of the puny old bascule bridge with the railroad through it. But a bigger change was in me. I wasn’t a comic-reading boy anymore. Five years after the Prom Night cheeseburger at Bradley’s, I was writing weekly restaurant reviews. Every few years since, I drove the route again and find that the same revelation occurs. When the twenty-fifth anniversary came up, I had compiled all the music that was on the radio on May 13, 1967, complete with the jingles from WNOE and WTIX, the two top-40 stations back then. I bought white jeans and a yellow button-down shirt. It was like being in a time machine. So thank you, Cathy, for standing me up on Prom Night, the night I found out who I am. I know a lot of people who never did find out who they are. And good luck to those sophisticated prom-nighters of 2017. Keep on looking fantastic. May-June 2017 131
INside Dining
Lunch, dinner. MCC.
7:30am-6pm. englishtearoom.com.
pizzas, calzones. 20 craft beers on
MCC, RR.
tap. Open 7 days a week. Lunch and
Carreta’s Grill, 70380 Hwy. 21,
dinner. MCC. mellowmushroom.com.
MCC: Major credit cards accepted
871-6674. Great Mexican cuisine and
Fat Spoon Café, 2807 N Highway
ME: Menu Express delivery
margaritas served in a family-friendly
190., 893-5111. Breakfast, Lunch,
Mugshots Grill & Bar, 300
RR: Reservations recommended
atmosphere for lunch and dinner. Kids
Tues-Sun. 7am-2pm. Breakfast
River Highlands Blvd., 893-2422.
eat free every Wednesday! Private
severed until 10:30 on weekdays and
mugshotsgrillandbar.com.
events and catering also provided.
all day Saturday and Sunday. Reserve
carretasgrill.com. MCC.
Fat Spoon Café for your next party.
New Orleans Food and Spirits, 208
fatspooncafe.com. MCC.
Lee Ln., 875-0432. Family owned
ABITA SPRINGS Abita Barbecue, 69399 Hwy. 59, 400-5025. Ribs, brisket, chicken, pulled pork and boudin. MCC.
The Chimes, 19130 W. Front St.,
and operated. neworleansfoodspirits.
892-5396. Catering, Sunday brunch,
Gallagher’s Grill, 509 S. Tyler
Abita Brew Pub, 72011 Holly St.,
daily lunch specials, 72 beers on tap.
St., 892-9992. Lunch, Tues-Sat
892-5837. Good fun and great
Lunch and dinner. chimesbeeru.com.
11:30am-2:30pm. Dinner, 5-9:30pm.
Nonna Randazzo’s Italian Bakery
beer. On the Trace. Lunch, dinner.
MCC.
gallaghersgrill.com. MCC.
and Cafè, 2033 N. Hwy. 190, Ste.
Coffee Rani, 234-A Lee Ln., 893-
Garcia’s Famous Mexican Food,
bakery. Luncheon salads, panini,
Abita Springs Café, 22132 Level St.,
6158. Soup and salad specialists.
200 River Highlands Blvd., 327-7420.
catering, donuts, kingcakes, cupcakes
867-9950. Tues-Sun. MCC.
coffeerani.com. MCC.
com. MCC.
5, 893-1488. Full service, year-round
abitabrewpub.com. MCC.
and wedding cakes. Tues-Sun, open Glory Bound Gyro Company, 500
at 7am. nonnarandazzo.com. MCC.
Camellia Café, 69455 Hwy. 59,
Columbia St. Tap Room & Grill,
River Highlands Blvd., Ste. A, 871-
809-6313. Traditional seafood and
434 N. Columbia St., 898-0899.
0711. Open 7 days a week, lunch and
Osaka West, 804 N. US 190, 985-
New Orleans cuisine. thecamelliacafe.
Lunch, dinner. covingtontaproom.com.
dinner. A new age American restaurant
871-8199. Japanese. MCC.
com. MCC.
MCC, ME.
concept with Mediterranean influences.
Mama D’s Pizza & More, 22054
Copeland’s. 680 N. US 190, 985-
Hwy. 59, 809-0308. Lunch, dinner.
809-9659. Creole. MCC. RR.
gloryboundgyroco.com. MCC.
mamadspizza.com. Dakota Restaurant, 629 N. Hwy. COVINGTON
Osaka 21, 70340 Hwy. 21, 985-8092640. Japanese. MCC.
Italian Pie, 70488 Hwy. 21, 8715252. Dine in or carry out. italianpie.
Ox Lot 9, 428 E Boston St., 400-
com. MCC, checks.
5663. Hotel. Dinner, Sunday brunch.
190, 892-3712. Contemporary
oxlot9.com. MCC.
Abita Roasting Company,
Louisiana cuisine using local
La Carreta Authentic Mexican
1011 Village Walk, 246-3345.
and seasonal ingredients.
Cuisine, 812 Hwy. 190, 624-
Papi’s Fajita Factory of Covington,
abitaroasting.com.
thedakotarestaurant.com. MCC, RR.
2990. Festive Mexican atmosphere,
1331 N. Hwy. 190 Ste. 100, 893-
fresh food from traditional recipes,
1382. Kids eat free on Tuesday nights.
Acme Oyster House, 1202 Hwy.
Del Porto Restaurant, 501 E. Boston
outstanding service and value. Live
Open 7 days a week for lunch and
190, 246-6155. Lunch, dinner.
St., 875-1006. Northern Italian cuisine.
music. Lunch and dinner seven days a
dinner. MCC.
mamdspizza.com. MCC.
delportoristorante.com. MCC, RR.
week. carretasrestaurant.com. MCC.
Albasha, 1958 Hwy. 190,
Dickey’s Barbecue Pit, 69292 Hwy.
Lola, 517 N. New Hampshire St., 892-
Lunch, Tues-Fri; Dinner, Tues-Sun;
867-8292. Mediterranean cuisine.
21, 871-2225. Locally-owned and
4992. Lunch, Mon-Fri; Dinner, Fri-Sat.
Happy hour, Tues-Fri, 4-7pm. Private
albashabr.com. MCC.
-operated franchise. Kids eat free on
Closed Sundays. lolacovington.com.
parties and catering. pardosbistro.
Pardos, 69305 Hwy. 21, 893-3603.
Sundays. MCC.
com. MCC. Mac’s On Boston, 324 E. Boston St.,
Annadele’s Plantation, 71518 Chestnut St., 809-7669. Yellow fin
DiCristina’s Restaurant, 810 N.
985-892-6550. Contemporary Creole.
Pat’s Seafood Market and Cajun
tuna, domestic lamb & much more.
Columbia St., Ste. C, 875-0160. Italian
MCC.
Deli, 1248 N. Collins Blvd., 892-7287.
annadeles.com. MCC, checks.
and seafood. dicristinas.com. MCC.
Jambalaya, gumbo, stuffed artichokes. Mattina Bella, 421 E. Gibson St.,
Bear’s Restaurant, 128 W. 21st St.,
DiMartino’s, 700 S. Tyler St., 276-
892-0708. Breakfast, lunch, dinner.
892-2373. Best po-boys in the world.
6460. Great food and reasonable
MCC, checks.
MCC.
prices. Lunch, dinner. dimartinos.com. MCC.
Beck ‘n’ Call Cafe, 534 N. New
21, 875-7894. Catch your morning buzz at this convenient drive-thru!
15, 898-2800. Great sandwiches,
Catering. MCC.
Hampshire, 985-875-9390. Lunch
salads, overstuffed potatoes.
Cafe, Breakfast. MCC.
Dr., 327-7111. Lunch and dinner.
mcalistersdeli.com. MCC, checks.
donsseafoodonline.com. MCC.
803-8368. Hamburgers. MCC. Buster’s Place, 519 E. Boston St., 809-3880. Seafood, po-boys, steaks.
132
Inside Northside
PJ’s Coffee & Tea Co., 70456 Hwy.
McAlister’s Deli, 206 Lake Dr., Ste.
Don’s Seafood Hut, 126 Lake
Bud’s Broiler, 1250 N. US 190, 985-
MCC, checks, ME.
Pizza Man of Covington, 1248 N. Collins Blvd., 892-9874. Checks, ME.
Megumi of Covington, The English Tea Room, 734 Rutland
1211 Village Walk, 893-0406.
Raising Canes, 1270 N. Hwy. 190,
St., 898-3988. Authentic English
megumirestaurant.net.
809-0250. Chicken fingers, crinkle-cut
cream teas. Special event teas,
fries, coleslaw, texas toast, signature
English scones, crumpets and cakes.
Mellow Mushroom Pizza Bakers,
secret dipping sauce. Dine-in, to-go
Serving breakfast and lunch. Mon-Sat,
1645 Hwy. 190, 327-5407. Salads,
and catering. MCC.
i Sala Thai, 315 N. Vermont St., 249-
Tope là, 104 N. Cate St., 542-7600.
6990. Special salads, spring rolls,
Contemporary delights. topela.com.
soups, noodle and curry dishes.
MCC.
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Sun-Thurs, 11am-9pm; Fri-Sat, 11am-10pm.Lunch buffet weekdays,
Trey Yuen Cuisine of China, 2100
11am-3pm. salathaibysu.com. MCC.
N. Morrison Blvd., 345-6789. treyyuen. com. MCC, checks.
Sugarbear’s Sweet Shop, 100 Tyler Square, 276-2377. Creative
Yellow Bird Café, 222 E. Charles St.,
cakes and assorted sweets. Tues-Sat.
345-1112. A great place to start your
sugarbearsweetshop.com.
day. Breakfast, lunch. MCC, checks.
Sweet Daddy’s, 420 S. Tyler St.,
LACOMBE
898-2166. Pulled pork, brisket and ribs.
La Provence Restaurant, 25020
sweetdaddysbarbq.com. MCC, ME.
Hwy. 190, 626-7662. Dinner, Sunday brunch. laprovencerestaurant.com.
Tchoupstix, 69305 LA Hwy. 21, 985-
MCC, checks. RR.
892-0852. Japanese. MCC. Sal & Judy’s, 27491 Hwy. 190, 882Vasquez Seafood & Po-Boys, 515
9443. Veal is the house specialty.
E. Boston St., 893-9336. Cuban
salandjudys.com. MCC, RR.
sandwiches and more. vazquezpoboy. MADISONVILLE
com. MCC, checks, ME.
Abita Roasting Company, 504 Water Yujin Japanese Restaurant and
St., 246-3340. abitaroasting.com.
Sushi Bar, 323 N. New Hampshire St., 809-3840. MCC.
Keith Young’s Steakhouse, 165 Hwy. 21, 845-9940. Lunch, dinner,
Zea Rotisserie & Grill, 110 Lake Dr.,
Tues-Fri. keithyoungs.net. MCC.
327-0520. Inspired American food. zearestaurants.com. MCC.
Morton’s Boiled Seafood & Bar, 702 Water St., 845-4970. Lunch,
HAMMOND
dinner. MCC, checks.
Brady’s, 110 SW Railroad Ave., 5426333. bradysdowntown.com.
Orlando’s, 304 Hwy. 22 West, 985845-4446. Seafood. MCC.
Don’s Seafood & Steak House, 1915 S. Morrison Blvd., 345-8550.
Water Street Bistro, 804 Water St.,
donsseafoodonline.com. MCC.
985-845-3855. Contemporary Creole. MCC.
Jacmel Inn, 903 E. Morris St., MANDEVILLE
542-0043. Catering, special events, weddings. jacmelinn.com. MCC,
Another Broken Egg Cafe, 1901 US
checks.
190, #7, 985-951-2246. Breakfast. MCC.
Kirin Sushi, 223 S. Cate St., 5428888. kirinjapanesecuisine.com. MCC.
The Barley Oak, 2101 Lakeshore Dr., 727-7420. Serving 130 styles of beer,
La Carreta Authentic Mexican
call and premium liquors. Lunch and
Cuisine, 108 N.W Railroad Ave., 419-
dinner. thebarleyoak.com. MCC.
9990. Festive Mexican atmosphere, fresh food from traditional recipes,
Beach House, 124 Girod, 985-
outstanding service and value. Live
624-9331. Neighborhood Cafe.
music. Lunch and dinner seven days a
beachhousemandeville.com. MCC.
week. carretarestaurant.com. MCC. Bistro Byronz, 1901 Highway 190, Tommy’s on Thomas, 216 W.
985-951-7595. American. MCC.
Thomas St., 350-6100. Pizza, pastas. Lunch, dinner. tommysonthomas.com.
Bosco’s Italian Café, 2040 Hwy. 59,
MCC, checks.
624-5066. boscositalian.com.
>>
May-June 2017 133
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985-626-8118. Japanese. locu.com.
Opal Basil, 690 Lafitte St., 985-778-
China cuisine with Louisiana flair. Lunch,
MCC.
2529. Eclectic. MCC.
dinner. treyyuen.com. MCC, checks.
9007. Casual fine dining for lunch,
La Carreta Authentic Mexican
Pat Gallagher’s 527 Restaurant and
Usual Suspects. 1680 LA 59.
dinner and Sunday brunch by
Cuisine, 1200 W. Causeway
Bar, 527 N. Causeway Blvd, 778-2820.
985-674-3333. Chicken Fingers.
Chef Joey Najolia. Tues-Fri, lunch:
App., 624-2990. Festive Mexican
Lunch, Tues-Fri 11:30am-2:30pm.
usualsuspectschicken.com. MCC.
11am-3pm. Dinner, 5pm. Catering
atmosphere, fresh food from
Dinner, Tues-Sat 5-9:30pm.
provided. cafelynn.com. MCC.
traditional recipes, outstanding
gallaghers527restaurant.com.
Café Lynn Restaurant and Catering, 2600 Florida St., 624-
service and value. Live music. Lunch
Vianne’s Tea House, 544 Girod St., 624-5683. A full café menu with over
Coffee Rani, 3517 Hwy. 190, 674-
and dinner seven days a week.
Pinkberry, 3460 Hwy. 190, 612-
120 loose leaf and speciality teas.
0560. Soup and salad specialists.
carretasrestaurant.com. MCC.
7306. Pinkberry is the original tart
Breakfast, lunch. viannes.com. MCC.
frozen yogurt that is the perfect Coscino’s Pizza, 1809 N. Causeway
La Madeleine, 3434 US 190, 985-
balance of sweet and tangy paired
VooDoo BBQ & Grill, 2999 Hwy.
Blvd., 727-4984. Italian. MCC.
626-7004. French. MCC.
with high quality, fresh cut fruit and
190 E., 629-2021. “Taste our Magic.”
premium dry toppings. pinkberry.com.
voodoobbq.com. MCC.
Fat Spoon Café, 68480 Hwy. 59.,
The Lakehouse, 2025 Lakeshore
809-2929. Breakfast, lunch, Tues-
Dr., 626-3006, events 778-2045.
PJ’s Coffee & Tea Co., 2963 Hwy.
PONCHATOULA
Sun. 7am-2pm. Breakfast served
Restaurant open. Call for reservations.
190, 674-1565. Catering. pjscoffee.
Middendorf’s Seafood Restaurant,
until 10:30am on weekdays and all
lakehousecuisine.com. MCC.
com. MCC.
30160 Hwy. 51, 386-6666.
Fat Spoon Cafe for your next party.
LaLou, 200 Girod St., 985-231-7125.
Pontchartrain Po-Boys, 318 Dalwill
fatspooncafe.com. MCC.
Breakfast. doyoulalou.com. MCC.
Dr., 985-626-8188. Sandwiches.
La Carreta Authentic Mexican
MCC.
Cuisine, 147 N.W. Railroad
day Saturday and Sunday. Reserve
middendorfsrestaurant.com.
Fazzio’s Seafood & Steakhouse,
Little Tokyo, 590 Asbury Dr., 504-
1841 N. Causeway Blvd., 624-
727-1532. Japanese. littletokyosushi.
Raising Canes, 3801 Hwy. 22, 674-
atmosphere, fresh food from
9704. Fresh fish daily, aged beef,
com. MCC.
2042. Chicken fingers, crinkle-cut
traditional recipes, outstanding
fries, coleslaw, texas toast, signature
service and value. Live music. Lunch
Liz’s Where Y’At Diner, 2500
secret dipping sauce. Dine-in, to-go
and dinner seven days a week.
Florida, 985-626-8477. Breakfast,
and catering. MCC.
carretarestaurant.com. MCC.
traditional Italian. Lunch, dinner. fazziosrestaurant.com. MCC, ME, RR. Franco’s Grill,100 Bon Temps
Ave., 370-0930. Festive Mexican
Diner. MCC. Rip’s on the Lake, 1917 Lakeshore
Roule, 792-0200. Fresh organic foods for breakfast, lunch and takeout.
Macaroni Grill, 3410 Hwy. 190, 727-
myfrancos.com/dining. MCC.
1998. Lunch, dinner. macaronigrill. com. MCC, ME.
George’s Mexican Restaurant, 1461 N. Causeway Blvd., 626-4342.
Mande’s, 340 N. Causeway App.,
Family owned. Fajitas, George’s
626-9047. Serving breakfast and
nachos, Carne al la Parrilla. Best
lunch, daily specials.
top-shelf margaritas in town.
Dr., 727-2829.
SLIDELL A Touch of Italy Café, 134 Pennsylvania Ave., 639-0600. Lunch,
Rusty Pelican, 500 Girod
dinner. kathrynandcompany.com.
St., 778-0364. Lunch, dinner.
MCC, checks.
rustypelicanbythelake.com. MCC. Assunta’s, 2631 Covington Hwy., Sake Garden, 1705 US 190, 985-
985-649-9768. Italian. assuntas.com.
624-8955. Japanese. MCC.
MCC.
georgesmexicanrestaurant.com.
Mandina’s, 4240 Hwy. 22 in
MCC, ME.
Azalea Square Shopping Center,
Sesame Inn, 408 N Causeway Blvd.,
Bear’s Grill & Spirits, 550 Gause
674-9883. Seafood, Creole and
985-951-8888. Chinese. MCC.
Blvd., 201-8905. Po-boys and more.
Gio’s Villa Vancheri, 2890 E.
Italian. Lunch and dinner, Mon-Sat.
Causeway App., 624-2597. Sicilian
mandinasrestaurant.com.
bearsgrillandspirits.com. MCC. SWEGS Kitchen, 4350 Hwy 22, Ste H, Mandeville, 951-2064. Healthy pre-
Blue Bayou Cafe, 1101 East Howze
Vancheri. Lunch and dinner, Mon-Sat.
New Orleans Hamburger &
made comfort food. SwegsKitchen.
Beach Rd., 985-649-3264. American.
giosvillavancheri.com. MCC. RR.
Seafood Co., 3900 LA 22, 985-624-
com, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook.
MCC.
8035. Sandwiches. MCC.
MCC.
778-2183. Contemporary Creole.
Nuvolari’s, 246 Girod St., 626-5619.
Taqueria Corona. 1901 US 190.
W., 985-288-5544. Sandwiches.
MCC.
In Old Mandeville. Italian cuisine for
985-778-2135. Mexican. MCC.
MCC.
Taqueria La Noria. 1931 LA 59.
Bonnie C’s, 1768 Front St., 985-288-
985-727-7917. Mexican. MCC.
5061. Creole Homestyle. MCC.
specialties by 5-star chef Gio
Iron Pelican, 2625 Florida St., 985-
Blue House Grill, 2170 Gause Blvd
fine dining daily for dinner or special K. Gee’s, 2534 Florida St., 626-0530.
events. MCC. nuvolaris.com.
Featuring Louisiana seafood with raw oysters 1/2 price on Tuesdays.
The Old Rail Brewing Company,
Express lunch and daily lunch specials
639 Girod St., 612-1828. Homemade
Times Bar & Grill, 1896 N.
Camellia Cafe, 525 Hwy. 190, 649-
under $10. Mon-Thurs, 11am-9pm;
American cuisine with fresh,
Causeway Blvd., 626-1161. Lunch,
6211. thecamelliacafe.com. MCC.
Fri-Sat, 11am-10pm. kgeesrestaurant.
local ingredients. Family-friendly
dinner. timesgrill.com. ME, MCC.
com. MCC.
atmosphere. Lunch and dinner. Closed Mondays.
Kazoku Sushi, 1680 LA Hwy. 59,
134
Inside Northside
Carreta’s Grill, 137 Taos St., 847Trey Yuen Cuisine of China, 600 N.
0020. Great Mexican cuisine and
Causeway Blvd., 626-4476. Quality
margaritas served in a family-friendly
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atmosphere for lunch and dinner.
Criollo Resturant and Lounge at
carretasgrill.com. MCC.
Hotel Monteleone, 214 Royal St., 504523-3340. Creole dining for breakfast,
Copeland’s, 1337 Gause Blvd., 985-
lunch and dinner. hotelmonteleone.com/
643-0001. Creole. MCC.
criollo/. MCC, RR.
Felipe’s Taqueria, 176 Town Center
Deanie’s Seafood Restaurant, 1713
Pkwy., 985-288-1210. Mexican.
Lake Ave., 504-831-4141; 841 Iberville
felipestaqueria.com. MCC.
St., 504-581-1316. Louisiana seafood prepared in Creole seasonings, available in
Michael’s, 4820 Pontchartrain
Bucktown or the French Quarter for lunch
Dr., 985-649-8055. Creole French.
and dinner. deanies.com. MCC.
michaelsrestaurantslidell.com. MCC. Gautreau’s, 1728 Soniat St., 504-899Nathan’s, 36440 Old Bayou Liberty
7397. Open Monday through Saturday.
Rd., 985-643-0443. Contemporary
Dinner. gautreausrestaurant.com.
Creole. MCC.
MCC, RR.
Osaka, 792 I-10 Service Rd., 985-
Gumbo Shop, 630 Saint Peter St.,
643-9276. Japanese. MCC.
504-525-1486. Award winning gumbo and soups, ship nationwide. Lunch
Palmettos on the Bayou,
and dinner. gumboshop.com. MCC.
1901 Bayou Ln., 643-0050. palmettosrestaurantslidell.com.
Louisiana Pizza Kitchen French Quarter, 95 French Market Place,
Peck’s Seafood Restaurant, 2315
504-522-9500. Casual dining in a fine
Gause Blvd. E., 781-7272. Po-boys,
dining atmosphere with experienced
seafood, burgers and lunch specials.
waitstaff, fresh dishes and made-
MCC.
from-scratch menu items. Lunch and dinner. lpkfrenchquarter.com. MCC.
Speckled T’s, 158 S Military Rd., 985-646-1728. Seafood. MCC.
Mellow Mushroom, 3131 Veterans Memorial Blvd., 504-644-4155. Pizza,
Vera’s, 2020 Gause Blvd W., 985-
30 craft beers on tap, lunch and
690-9814. Seafood. MCC.
dinner. mellowmushroom.com. MCC.
Young’s, 850 Robert Blvd., 985-643-
Messina’s Runway Cafe, 6001
9331. Steak. MCC.
Stars and Stripes Blvd., 504-2415300. Tues-Sun, 8am-3pm.
NEW ORLEANS/SOUTHSHORE
messinasterminal.com. MCC.
Andrea’s, 3100 19th St, 504-8348583. Northern Italian and local
Nola Beans, 762 Harrison Ave.,
seafood. Lunch, dinner, Sunday
504-267-0783. nolabeans.com. MCC.
brunch. andreasrestaurant.com. MCC Restaurant R’evolution, 777 Bayona, 430 Rue Dauphine, 504-
Bienville St., 504-553-2277. Located
525-4455. Fresh local ingredients,
at the Royal Sonesta Hotel. Triptych
balanced yet complex dishes. Lunch
of Quail and Oysterman’s spaghettini.
and dinner. bayona.com. MCC.
Revolutionnola.com. MCC. RR.
Brennan’s, 417 Royal St., 504-
Riccobono’s Peppermill, 3524
525-9711. Creole traditions
Severn Ave., 504-455-2266. Seafood,
and contemporary influences.
filets and Italian. Breakfast and
Breakfast, lunch and dinner.
lunch. Dinner, Wednesday-Sunday.
brennansneworleans.com. MCC. RR.
riccobonos.com. MCC.
Carreta’s Grill, 2320 Veterans Blvd.,
Warehouse Grille, 869 Magazine
504-837-6696; 1821 Hickory Ave.,
St, 504-322-2188. Lunch and dinner
Harahan, 504-305-4833. Mexican, lunch
specials, Monday-Friday. Brunch,
and dinner.carretasgrillrestaurant.com.
Saturday-Sunday, 9am-3pm.
MCC.
warehousegrille.com. MCC.
May-June 2017 135
M A R R I A G E A N D L O V E I N
Mary Elizabeth (Mary Beth) Crifasi and Henry Elder Brown III exchanged their vows at sunset underneath an oak grove on family property in Bush—the same place that the groom proposed 9 months before. Mary Beth wore a Martina Liana champagne Dupioni silk gown with a sweetheart neckline, pleated bodice, low back and traditional chapel train from Town & Country in Lake Charles. Her bridesmaid wore an elegant navy strapless gown. The ceremony was officiated by family pastor, Alfred Young Jr., and music performed by the Harry Hardin Quartet for the close 150 family and friends. Following the ceremony, additional guests arrived to celebrate the couple. Kenny LaCour of Grand Events arranged the warm, French Chateau-inspired evening complete with food provided by The Dakota’s and a 5-tier cake by Maple Street Bakery. The reception featured farmhouse tables, a white wash wooden dance floor and three elegant white wash chandeliers overhead. Wedding artist Tracy Plaisance painted the full, super moonlit reception before the bride changed into her late grandmother’s embroidered lace going-away suit from her wedding in 1955. The couple honeymooned in Turks & Caicos and Highlands, North Carolina, before retuning to Edler’s childhood home in Bush. 136
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photos: DARK ROUX
Crifasi-Brown
photos: STEPHEN LEGENDRE, OCHSNER
Celebration The 10th annual Children’s Museum of St. Tammany Celebration, themed “Soaring Beyond Imagination,” was held at the Castine Center in Mandeville. Doug Mouton and Shelley Brown emceed; special guests included “Chopped Junior” champions Emily Roche and Ella Petitto. The Bucktown All-Stars and the Slidell High School Jazz Band performed while a revolving silver solar system floated above a spectacular edible dessert display by Zoë’s Bakery. Libation stations surrounded the patron tables, and the celestial theme carried through the dishes from over 30 local restaurants. Celebration is the main fundraiser for the Children’s Museum. The museum’s first exhibits will be at Kids Town, a mini-town located at the Koop Drive Trailhead. The final project for the Children’s Museum will be within the proposed Cultural Arts District, an initiative of St. Tammany Parish Government that is currently in the design phase. For more information about the Children’s Museum of St. Tammany, visit cmstkids.org. May-June 2017 137
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The 28th annual Woofstock Festival, Low-Cost Veterinary Clinic and Mega Adoption Event hosted by St. Tammany Humane Society at the Castine Center was a howling success for the society and the many other animal organizations that participated. Over 600 dogs received necessary annual vaccinations, and 52 homeless dogs found a second chance with a forever family! Local WGNO anchor and supporter of the humane society Curt Sprang kicked off the day as emcee, followed by Mayor Donald Villere and Ashley Rodrigue, WWLTV northshore bureau chief and humane society board director. The day was jam-packed with fun and exciting activities for furry companions including pet sketches, shopping, on-site grooming and even a hippie-themed costume contest! “Woofstock is such an important day,” says Scott Bernier, the society’s CEO. “It not only helps the homeless animals of our facility, it also helps other animal agencies who attend and our community. Not to mention, it’s just a fun day for the entire family!” 138
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photo courtesy: ST. TAMMANY HUMANE SOCIETY
Woofstock Festival
INside Peek Northshore Heart Walk The American Heart Association welcomed members of the community to Fontainebleau State Park for the annual Northshore Heart Walk. The 2017 event was chaired by Tom Walmsely, senior vice president and general manager of Textron Systemss—Marine & Land Systems, which sponsored the walk. The Northshore Heart Walk, a noncompetitive, three-mile walk inspires people to take that first step in improving cardiovascular health or to celebrate successes in improving their health. The annual event is a community celebration in which funds raised stay in the Greater New Orleans area for research, education and community trainings. 1. Queen Bobbie Case and King Lou Tucker at the Windsor Mardi Gras Ball. 2. Captain of the Windsor Krewe Ruth Hohn. 3. Dr. Joseph Landers and Dr. David Toups receiving the fourth quarter Medical Director’s Awards at St. Tammany Parish Hospital. 4. (back) Kim Ellis, Kathy LeBlanc, Cindy Breaux; (front) Wesley George, 3
Henry Hanlon, Robert Taylor and Maddox Baumann at Cedarwood School’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade. 5. Carol Gonzalez, Maddox Baumann, Tara Lee, Kelli Baumann and Wendy Montecino. 6. Henley, Megan, Brent, Harper, and pup Owen Combs at Mardi Paws.
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photo: PHILLIP COLWART PHOTOGRAPHY
photo: PHILLIP COLWART PHOTOGRAPHY
INside Peek
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1 1. St. Paul’s senior Alexander Oliveri and Principal Trevor Watkins after Alexander was named a National Merit FInalist. 2. Melissa Bordelon with Sonia Perez and Mark Dispenza at the Greater Hammond Chamber of Commerce Annie Awards. 3. Melissa Bordelon, Judge Blair Edwards, Shelly Gaydos, Mary Zatarain, Myrna Jordan, Karen Pfeifer, Mark Dispenza and Elizabeth Reno. 4. Bernice and Charley Hoffman with Johnny and Mary Lou Pacquette celebrating St. Patrick’s Day at St.
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Anthony’s Gardens. 5. Helen and Rollin Camp with Paul and Diane Boudreaux. 6. Dawn Sharpe, Al Hamauei and Sharon Lo Drucker at the East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce awards night. 7. The Northshore Home Builders Association celebrating the 2017 “Raising the Roof for Charity” Raffle House event with a ribbon cutting. 8. Rose Anne McDow, Dr. George Barnes, Dr. Gary Agena, Tamie Kraft and Courtney Threeton after the Lakeview Regional Medical Staff donated $10,000 to the Crawfish & Roses Event supporting The UP 21
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Foundation and The Miracle League. 9. Mike Saucier, Mandi Magill and Rhonda Bagby at the St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce Northshore Young Professionals kick-off Pop UP Happy Hour series at bäcobar. 10. Tyler Ammerman, Kiley Bishop and Kyle Beerbohm. 11. Howard Weisten, Pio Lyons and Michey Weisten at the opening of Lyons’ Watercolor through an Architect’s Eye exhibit in the Atrium Gallery at Christwood. 12. Mark Johnson, David Bottner, Covington Police Chief Tim Lentz, Leslie Martin and Dr. Michael Sprague at the Leadership St. Tammany Alumni Foundation Breakfast.
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STEM Campus Ribbon Cutting
photos courtesy: NTCC
Northshore Technical Community College opened the STEM campus in Lacombe with a celebratory ribbon cutting. The over-30,000-square-foot building focuses on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). The St. Tammany Economic Development Foundation was recognized by NTCC for their partnering. Brenda Bertus, CEO of the STEDF said, “Moving forward, workforce development will remain a focus of economic development strategy, and we anticipate continual, steady growth of local and regional businesses as the workforce strengthens and expands.” The STEDF played a critical role in developing the property, advancing current partnerships and identifying future opportunities.
photos: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
St. Patrick’s Parade and Celebration Covington Celtic Club founding members Cody and Nick Ludwig both have Irish blood in their veins, but it was Nick’s great-grandfather John J. Sheahan who inspired them to bring such a wonderful celebration to Covington— he was the New York St. Patrick’s Day Parade Chairman from 1939-1958. “Each year, in mid-March, millions of the Irish—and the not-so-Irish—come together in celebration of Ireland’s patron saint, Patrick. We were thrilled to bring that time-honored tradition to historic downtown Covington,” says Nick. The inaugural parade brought a festive crowd to the streets of downtown Covington where Tom Fitzmorris served as Grand Marshall. A block party with more fun, food, drinks and live music ensued after the parade. May-June 2017 143
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Chef Soirée The annual Chef Soirée, presented by Chevron, brought quite the crowd to the Covington Trailhead for the best of food, drinks and entertainment. Patrons enjoyed small bites from the tastiest of northshore restaurants and drinks provided by local breweries, distilleries and distributors. The Dominos, Groovy 7, The Wagners and Jojjo Wight’s New Orleans Family Band provided entertainment throughout the evening. Proceeds from the event help the Youth Service Bureau provide advocacy, counseling, education and intervention for at-risk youth and families in St. Tammany and Washington parishes.
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Port Orleans Brewery
WHAT DO TOMMY DISCON, Ricky Thomas, Charlie Barnett, Dean Lacy, Mike Tilly and former Saints lineman Zach Streif have in common? Beer. They are the force behind the Port Orleans Brewery on Tchopitoulas Street in New Orleans. Slated to open in early May, this new brewery will feature clean, crisp ales and lagers, including a Germanstyle helles, a pilsner, Czech-style schwarzbier, a brown ale and session IPA. Brewmaster Brian Allen will brew on a custom Metalcraft 30-barrel brewhouse with eight 60-barrel fermenters and six 60-barrel horizontal tanks for lagering. He says, “The brewery will have space to enlarge with up to ten more 60-barrel and two 90-barrel fermenters.” As the craft beer industry expands in New Orleans, Streif feels Port Orleans Brewery can meet the increased 146
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demand: “As we grow, we will develop seasonal beers and specialty beers.” The brewery taproom will feature a covered front patio and plenty of seating. There is a large garage door entrance, creating an open and welcoming entry into the taproom. The brick-lined interior walls and grand arched windows offer views of the brewing equipment. The taproom has a coppertop bar built of reclaimed barge wood and 16 taps for the brewery’s flagship and experimental beers. Port Orleans Brewery is located at 4124 Tchopitoulas Street in New Orleans. Open seven days a week. Tours available. portorleansbrewingco.com.
photos: CANDRA GEORGE mycreativereality.com
Last Word