Blast into the Past Step back into the 1800s with the West Baton Rouge Museum

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Blast into the Past!Step back into the 1800s
with the West Baton Rouge Museum!
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Welcome to the West Baton Rouge Museum

• The original museum building was built in 1882.
  The building was the third parish courthouse of
  Port Allen. In 1933 the building was scheduled
  to be demolished because a new courthouse was
  being built. The building was saved and became
  the first parish library! Then in 1957 the
  building was partially demolished, only the back
  part of the building remained in tact. In 1968
  the remaining part of the building became the
  West Baton Rouge Museum. The new addition was
  added in December of 2003.

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West Baton Rouge and Sugarcane

• The Museum is dedicated to telling the story of
  sugarcane production in West Baton Rouge Parish.
  Currently there is one sugar mill, Cinclare Sugar
  mill, still in operation in WBR Parish.
• Left and center photo below Sugar mill model
  built in 1904 for the St. Louis World Fair
• Right photo below Fire cart from Cinclare Sugar
  mill in Brusly, LA

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Sugar Stories

• Learn about the past through the voices of the
  present. The Sugar Stories Oral History Wall is
  full of photos of the past. You can view photos
  of plantation homes, plantation stores, slave
  quarters, people cutting sugarcane in the fields,
  and much more. You can hear the voices of those
  who worked in fields and the mills. You can also
  see displays of sugar products.

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How do they do that?

• In the Sugar Gallery you can learn about the
  past and present production of sugarcane in WBR
  Parish.

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1850 Slave CabinA Cabin from Allendale
Plantation

• All of the cabins on the museum grounds were
  built in Port Allen. The cabins were built to
  house slaves on the Allendale Plantation. Each
  cabin has a total of four rooms. Each cabin was
  divided into two sides, each side housed one
  family. Each side had only two rooms (one large
  room with a fireplace and one small room) for
  each family to occupy. The people who lived in
  the cabins used the cabin for eating and
  sleeping.

Lets take a look inside.
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Inside the Kitchen .

• In the first room you will find that the room is
  set up as a kitchen. To the top left you see a
  fireplace. The fireplace was used for cooking
  and heat during the winter months, but it was
  also used to keep mosquitoes and insects out of
  the cabin during the summer months. To the
  bottom left you see a homemade broom and a corn
  shuck mop which were used to clean the cypress
  floors. To the top right you see household tools
  such as a meat grinder, and a no. 3 wash tub.

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Inside the farming life .

• You will also see farming tools on display
  inside the cabin. These tools would have been
  housed in a barn or tool shed.

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Inside the Household Chores .

• Would you like to iron and wash clothes using
  these instruments? Or maybe you would like to
  sleep in a bed like the one at the bottom right?
  

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1830s Plantation HouseThe Aillet House

The Aillet house was built in Brusly, LA in 1830
and it was moved to its current location in 1991.
This is a typical French Creole Cottage
plantation home in WBR Parish. Notice it is not
very large, it is has a total of four rooms. The
house does not have a bathroom, closet or a
kitchen. Looks take a look around.
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The Parlor The 1830s Living Room
Notice the candle sticks on the mantle, remember
this is 1830, no electricity!

• Inside the first room you will see a a fireplace,
  a table in the center of the room, and a
  sideboard against the wall. This room was used
  for dining, reading, sewing, or to conduct
  business deals.

Notice the glass container on the table to the
right. The container is called a fly catcher.
It was filled with sugar water and placed on the
table when eating, so that flies were attracted
to the sugar water and not your dinner!
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Take a Look in the Parents Bedroom

• Notice at the bottom left the fabric that
  surrounds the bed. It is called mosquito net.
  Remember there is not any air conditioning in
  this house, so people had to open the doors and
  windows to cool off the inside of the house, and
  the flies and mosquitoes would come in the house.
  In the center there is a spinning wheel and an
  example of a ladies dress. To the bottom right
  you see the fireplace, which was used for heat
  during the winter.

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The Girls Room

• Girls would have slept in this room. Usually
  boys would have slept on the porch during the
  summer and in the attic during the winter. The
  furniture in this room is original to the house,
  this is the Aillets bedroom set.

Notice the toys to the right. Do you recognize
any?
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Where did the boys sleep?

• The boys slept either on the porch (during the
  summer months) or in the attic (during the winter
  months). The staircase leads upstairs to the
  attic where the boys would sleep. The children
  would also play upstairs.

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Where are the bathrooms?
There was no indoor plumbing in the Alliet house.
This pitcher and bowl was used as an area to
wash your face and hands.
On most plantations and farms outhouses were used
as a bathroom, however there were also chamber
pots that were indoor for night time use.
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Where did they put their clothes?

• Plantation homes did not have built in closets,
  instead people built armoires. Today most people
  use armoires as entertainment centers but long
  ago people used armoires as closets.

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Other Things to See at the Museum

• Stop by the local museum with your family to
  see much more. A few other things that you can
  see at the museum are old photographs from around
  the parish, exhibits that are constantly changing
  throughout the year, and there is also a gift
  shop to purchase a souvenir. You can even make
  homemade butter and ice cream if you wish!