Property Transfers March 21-27, 2017

Here's a link to a list, courtesy of the Morning Advocate, of the property transfers in St. Tammany Parish the week of March 21 through March 27, 2017. It shows who sold what to whom for how much. 

CLICK HERE to see the list. 

For previous weeks, CLICK HERE.

Mackie Pine Oil Plant Fire

In early October of 1935, fire broke out in the Mackie Pine Oil Plant on Jefferson Avenue in Covington. It was an event that brought out many volunteers to fight the blaze. Here is an article from the Times Picayune the day following the disaster.

Click on the images to make them larger.

A History of the Mackie Pine Oil Operation

 

The Mackie Pine Oil Payroll from 1935

In the same location as the Mackie Pine Oil Products plant in later years was the Delta Pine Products plant. Here is a picture of that facility in operation. 

Richard Warner, in comments made on Facebook, said that the old Mackie office was a two story building located on the southwest corner of the block where the rear of the current courthouse faces across Jefferson from the courthouse parking garage. 

 

"Behind the old Covington Grocery & Grain was the Rosin Yard, where hot liquid rosin was piped across Jefferson from the plant and large metal barrels that were made on site there were filled with Hot Rosin, usually just over 500 pounds each, and after hardening were moved out in the Rosin Yard to be loaded on boxcars for the train," Warner stated. 

 

North of the Rosin yard was the Canning building where workers canned turpentine.

Champagne Grocery

A long established business in Covington was Champagne's Grocery on Columbia Street, between Lockwood and Gibson. On June 6, 1974, the St. Tammany Farmer newspaper ran an article that detailed the history of the establishment. Click on the images to make them larger.

 

Text from the above article: 

Old-Time Store Still Going Strong

St. Tammany Farmer June 6, 1974

When you open the door to Champagne's Grocery, 427 Columbia Street, you're in a delightful world of yesteryear. The sights, the smells, the arrangements of stock are reminders of those days before supermarkets. Of days when everybody knew their grocer personally, trusted him, depended upon him, called him friend.

Champagne's may be the very last of the "Pa & Ma" grocery stores hereabouts---a pleasant reminder of what Lum & Abner's fictitious "Jot-Em-Down" emporium of that beloved radio serial might have been like.

Robert A. Champagne and his wife, Mrs. Mildred McLain Champagne, run the store together. They have no other help. And it may well be the only grocery in this area that still delivers. Champagne delivers once daily, the orders coming in by telephone. Many of those customers are elderly people or have no means of transportation.

The proprietor delivers himself, and frequently is called upon, like a good neighbor, to help with varied and assorted household chores, which he performs graciously. Not only that, but when a customer needs a non-grocery item, Champagne takes the time to go to another supplier to get it, merely as an accommodation.

It's all in the game--that wonderful game known as life---as played by a couple who know and love people. The little grocery was established in 1918,where Champagne's grandfather operated it briefly for five or six months before his death.

His father, Thomas J. Champagne Sr., at the time was in partnership with the late A. J. Plaunche in the 300 block of Columbia street, also in the grocery business.

When his father died, Thomas Champagne took over the present location after selling out to his partner. He operated the store until 1946. when his son became manager. Thomas Champagne Sr.. at 82, still lives in Covington and is in good health. As you enter Champagne's Grocery, you are impressed by the vast and varied stock, all of it neatly arranged. The store actually is spotless.

While they do not generally handle fresh meats, they do carry cold cuts, bacon, sausages, cheeses, hot dogs, etc. Brand names are everywhere and prices for the most part are in line with supermarkets. Champagne recalled the depression years of the 1930's, when he sold a 2-pound slab of salt meat for 25 cents; a pound of red beans for five cents; five pounds of rice for 19 cents---and on and on in those days when a dollar was worth a dollar, but everybody didn't have one.

Food stamps were a disappointment to him. He tried them and recently quit handling them. Some customers used cash to buy non-food stamp items from him, but took the stamps elsewhere.

Not all his clientele forgot the little store with the big heart. He has one family who has traded with Champagne's through three generations. Fifty-six years in the same spot and still going strong, in an era when many neighborhood groceries have gone out of business, is a monument to something more than running a store. It has to be attributed to the human side of the proprietors, who are not merely merchants, but friends.

 

An Advertisement from 1935

The grocery building today

The store opened in 1919, with Thomas Champagne as proprietor. It was being run by Robert Champagne when it closed in 1979, looking pretty much the same as it had for decades with its original counters still in place.  

Champagne used two tree truck sections as chopping blocks for meat cutting, and he made sliced ham and po-boy sandwiches for his regular customers. Robert's daughter Patricia Champagne Massoth remembered that the store had sacks of dry beans that the kids would all come in and mix together. "Another attraction for the children was the candy counter. The kids just loved our penny candy," she said.

Champagne was delivering groceries to his homebound customers even in the last days of the grocery. It was a practice that had been offered since the early days. "My father's clients were some of the elderly ladies in town," she said. "and he would take their orders and have the groceries delivered to them."

Other store interiors

Seven Sisters Oak in Lewisburg

This black and white photograph was taken in 1973, showing the famous Seven Sisters Oak tree in Lewisburg, La. It is such a large tree, that it has served as President of the Live Oak Society for the past 48 years, since 1968. 

Click on the images to make them larger.

 

 

 

In 2021 the property with the tree was put up for sale. Here are the photos of the tree accompanying the real estate listing. 

 

 

To view more photographs of the tree, click here. 

See also:

The Seven Sisters Oak Magazine Cover Photo

Doby's Seven Sisters Oak Information

Antiques and Uniques Festival

The Covington Antiques and Uniques Festival was held April 22 and 23, 2017, in downtown Covington, hosted by the Covington Heritage Foundation. Here are some pictures, just click on them to make them larger.

To view more pictures of the festival, CLICK HERE.

 Items on display included antiques, vintage collectibles and crafts, architectural salvage, and more. Activities included a live auction, appraisals, music, and demonstrations. 

Old Mandeville Bank Building

The NOLA.com website and the Times Picayune recently published a great article on the history of the old St. Tammany Bank building at the corner of Carroll and Claiborne Streets in Mandeville. Built in 1907, it has been used as a bank, store, and various other retail establishments, but the sturdy brick building has always been used as a refuge against the elements when Mother Nature came through with a tornado or hurricane.

The article states that the "St. Tammany Banking Company and Savings Bank" opened its doors Jan. 1, 1907 with $5000 in stock. "It was built in the Beaux Arts style that was so popular in America from 1880 through the 1920s. The two-story building has a gable roof with exposed rafters and decorative cornices, accented by dentils and medallions."

"Although the stretch Girod Street has, of late, evolved into the commercial corridor of Old Mandeville, there was a time a century ago when Carroll Street was considered the downtown," the article said. "Carroll was lined with churches, several businesses such as the David Dry Goods Store, and one a very large bank building."

For more information on the history of the building

CLICK HERE to read more of the Times Picayune article. 

Click on the images to make them larger.

100 Years Ago This Week

What was going on 100 years ago this week? The following link is provided by the Library of Congress and its Chronicling America service. CLICK HERE for a link to the St. Tammany Farmer edition of April 21, 1917. Click on the images below to enlarge them. 

Front Page Article

Advertisements from 1917