reflections, updates and homilies from Deacon Mike Talbot inspired by the following words from my ordination: Receive the Gospel of Christ whose herald you have become. Believe what you read, teach what you believe and practice what you teach...
Thursday, March 15, 2018
The Bread Lady of New Orleans; celebrating 300 years of the Crescent City
For decades, she was one of New Orleans' most beloved Irish immigrants. Can you name her?
A portrait of Margaret Haughery by artist D. Lammie Hanson of Where Y'Art, as commissioned by NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune for its "300 for 300" celebration of New Orleans' tricentennial. (NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune)
The Times-Picayune is marking the tricentennial of New Orleans with its ongoing 300 for 300 project, running through 2018 and highlighting 300 people who have made New Orleans New Orleans, featuring original artwork commissioned by NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune with Where Y'Art gallery. Today: Margaret Haughery.
The icon: Margaret Haughery. The legacy: When Margaret Haughery died in 1882 at the age of 69, the headline on her front-page obituary in The Daily Picayune consisted of but one word: "Margaret." She was that well-known, and that beloved, after decades of caring for the orphaned, the overlooked and the underprivileged people of New Orleans, with her bakery on New Levee Street (now South Peters Street) providing funding and food for her good works. That earned her nickname "the Bread Woman of New Orleans," as well as a statue at the corner of Camp and Prytania streets -- not to mention the enduring affection of an entire city. The artist: D. Lammie Hanson. The quote: "She never had upon her hand a kid glove, and she never wore a silk dress, though she earned by hard labor many thousands of dollars. But no woman has been borne to the tomb within the limits of New Orleans who was more generally respected and loved." -- The Daily Picayune, Feb. 12, 1882, upon the death of Margaret Haughery
Explore more of D. Lammie Hanson's work online at WhereYart.net and in person at the Where Y'Art gallery, 1901 Royal St.
TRI-via
She was born Margaret Gaffney in Tully, Ireland. Her family immigrated to Baltimore in 1818, when Margaret was 5 years old.
When she was 9 years old, both of her parents would be claimed by yellow fever. Of Margaret's five siblings, the three oldest had been left behind with relatives in Ireland, due to the cost of the trans-Atlantic voyage. Of the two that came over with Margaret, the youngest, Kathleen, would die soon after the family's arrival in the United States. The other, a brother, named Keith, would go missing, never to be heard from again.
All alone in a new country, she was taken in by a family friend. By age 21, she had married and moved to New Orleans with her husband and daughter. Not long after, her husband -- who was sickly -- died suddenly while on a trip to his native Ireland, followed soon after by the death of her daughter.
It was at that point that she dedicated her life to charity, opening a dairy, and later a bakery, to help feed the city's orphans.
Though illiterate, she was business-savvy -- and strong-willed -- turning her bakery into a thriving business that further financed her good works.
Margaret helped establish the St. Vincent's Infant Asylum on Magazine and Race streets for children ages 7 and younger, and she played a key role in the building of the New Orleans Female Orphan Asylum at Camp and Prytania (near where her statue still stands), which would care for children between the ages of eight and 14; and St. Elizabeth's orphanage, which would raise and educate them through the age of 17 or 18.
Among other things, she helped feed the city in the lean years of the Civil War. She helped families of the Confederate dead. She supported the Home of the Age and Infirm, run by the Little Sisters of the Poor. Upon her death, she left nearly all of her accumulated assets -- valued at close to $50,000 at the time -- to charities.
She was a woman of many nicknames. In addition to "The Bread Woman of New Orleans," she was also known as "The Angel of the Delta" and "The Orphans' Friend."
When word got out in 1881 that she, at the age of 69, had contracted a terminal illness -- the nature of which went unrecorded -- none other than Pope Pius IX reportedly sent a crucifix to her from Rome.
Among the pallbearers at her funeral were the sitting governor of Louisiana (Samuel D. McEnery), a once and future governor (Francis T. Nicholls), the mayor of New Orleans (Joseph A. Shakespeare), and an editor of The Picayune (George Nicholson).
The day after her death, efforts were started to build a monument to Margaret. It still stands today -- with the inscription "Margaret" and featuring her likeness, seated in a chair and with her arm around a child -- at Camp and Prytania in the city's Coliseum Square neighborhood.
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