Friday, January 25, 2013
Some History Behind the Gumbel Memorial Fountain
If you enter Audubon Park in New Orleans from St. Charles Avenue, you will find a large fountain. There is an inscription at the center that reads "In Memory of Simon and Sophie Gumbel."
And as many times as I've walked by this fountain, enjoyed its presence and allowed my own dog (which is not the dog in the pictures posted before) to run around in the water in the fountain; this is all I knew about it until today.
So who are Simon and Sophie Gumbel? And why do they get a glorious fountain dedicated to them? Are they in any way related to Bryant Gumbel?
Well, the fountain and bronze sculpture was dedicated to Simon and Sophie in March of 1919 by two of their daughters, Beulah Joseph and Cora Moses (so says wikimapia.org). It was installed at its current location in 1918 and designed by the sculptor, Isidore Konti (flickr.com/photos/wallyg/4583303086/).
Simon Gumbel was born in Kircheimbolanden, Rhein, Bavaria and at 14 years old immigrated to Pointe Coupee Parish, LA in 1846. He began working as a peddler and eventually opened his own merchandise store before he relocated to New Orleans in 1864 and opened a wholesale business. Then in 1873 he formed the firm of S. Gumbel and Co., Ltd., cotton commission merchants. He also established himself as a prominent member of the Jewish community and served as treasurer of the Association for the Relief of Jewish Widows and Orphans. Simon Gumbel became the first man to build and conduct a cottonseed oil mill and also invested in real estate. At the time of his death in August 1909, he was a millionaire and the number one individual taxpayer for the City of New Orleans.
Sophie Lengsfield was born in New Orleans in 1844 to natives of Bavaria. After marrying Simon Gumbel, they had four sons and seven daughters. In 1917, heirs of Sophie Gumbel founded the Sophie L. Gumbel Home which originally provided education and job training for girls and young women with mental disabilities. The City of New Orleans took over the operation of the Home in 1943 and today it provides services for the developmentally disabled.
Three of their sons Joseph, Lester and Henry went on to manage their father's holdings. Henry Gumbel later became president of the S. Gumbel and Co., Ltd. as well as several other enterprises including Pelican and Amelia Cotton Press Co. of New Orleans, the Lafayette Sugar Refining Co. of Lafayette and the Sea Food Co. of Biloxi, MS to name a few.
-----As a side note, if you were 14 and leaving Germany, wouldn't you choose Pointe Coupee, LA as your number one destination to start the rest of your life? -----
Did not find if there is any relation between them and Bryant Gumbel. However, Bryant Gumbel's parents were Rhea Alice and Richard Dunbar Gumbel, a judge and Bryant Gumbel was born in New Orleans (so says en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryant_Gumbel).
Isidore Konti designed the sculpture to depict the meeting of air and water. Konti was born in Vienna and came to the US in the early 1890s. He spent most of his American life and created the majority of his work while living in New York State eventually settling in Yonkers.
Konti has an extensive portfolio but, notably, he worked on decorative models for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, created fountains for the Atlantic and Pacific for the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis and created sculpture for the Palaces and Courts for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco.
Isidore Konti's art can now be found across the eastern portion of the US from New Orleans to Cleveland to Yonkers to Swan Point Cemetery, Rhode Island. The Peabody Art Collection of the Maryland State Archives in Annapolis and the Mint Museum's Collection in Charlotte, NC both hold pieces of his work. In 1974, the Hudson River Museum in Yonkers, NY gave a retrospective exhibition of his work titled The Sculpture of Isidore Konti, 1862-1938.
I now have a much fuller appreciation for that fountain. Also it's almost 100 years old and speaks to the wealth of the City of New Orleans back during that time.
-----Another side note, this entire post was created while music from a nearby Mardi Gras parade reverberated across Uptown and through my window-----
Simon & Sophie Gumbel information found here:
http://www.lib.lsu.edu/special/findaid/1490family.pdf
http://files.usgwarchives.net/la/orleans/bios/g-000041
Isidore Konti information found here:
http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/isidore-konti-papers-9160
http://www.askart.com/askart/artist.aspx?artist=89934
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isidore_Konti
Gumbel Memorial Fountain - Audubon Park
Gumbel Memorial Fountain - Streetcar - facing Tulane University
Gumbel Memorial Fountain - facing Loyola University of New Orleans
Gumbel Memorial Fountain - Tulane University - hot doggie
Gumbel Memorial Fountain - Tulane University - end of doggie
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Stairs to Nowhere
if you can't see the spray-painted wording on the side of the stair, it says:
"You can only go up from here"
Of course, there used to be a house behind those stairs before the hurricane.
Begin Again at La Petite Grocery, New Orleans
Corner of Magazine and General Pershing. Lunch. Glass of rose, white tablecloth. Here's to a new start! ....Never mind that it's my fifth, sixth or seventh new start, lost count, but who's counting anyway?
Yesterday, while looking through Traveler magazine, I read the caption to a picture from one of the scenes in the recent film version of Jack Kerouac's On the Road that listed a number of spots where the movie had been filmed. One area was in the bayous of Louisiana and, while the cast was here filming the movie, they chose La Petit Grocery as their hangout. So naturally, I pulled on my high heel boots care of a good friend I met while living in Seattle and came straight here for lunch to discover what their experience was like. I mean, what better way to celebrate yet another new beginning than by some loose connection to On the Road.
Bibb lettuce, boiled quail egg, buttermilk dressing, lump crabmeat, bacon and finely grated fancy cheese (that I can't pronounce).
La Petit Grocery has an Old World feel in its design with jazzy, New Age and sometimes French music playing in the background. It's a sunny, blue sky, partly cloudy day and the light is streaming through their storefront windows overlooking Magazine. A group of six enjoy wine and lunch out on the sidewalk. Shoppers pass by in both directions on their way to the next boutique clothing store, gallery or antique shop. To my right, in the hull of the dining room a table of ten or twelve ladies in their twilight enjoy lunch together. I could be in France right now but discussion a table over is embedded in the strength of secondary education at McGehee's and Newman.Two pivotal topics for any well-bred Uptown New Orleans lunch conversation. From my booth seat facing LPG's extensive bar, I look out across Magazine and to the right is the Model Cleaners with a sizable neon sign with rolling messages that includes a sort of Japanese-looking character dancing before the words go sliding by. Next door to the left of the Model Cleaners and above the parked delivery truck hauling antiques, I can see the faded sign of Vicky's Supermarket with their retro Coca Cola light-up sign. Just before marching with a brass band in the 2012 Proteus parade, a group of us had some fried catfish and shrimp with fries from Vicky's and, boy, were they good. I actually don't suggest eating them before marching in a parade but otherwise very tasty. Now completely aware that I am still, in fact, in New Orleans and not France, I move for dessert.
Louisiana Style Strawberry Shortcake with Columbian drip coffee and cream. Strawberries from Ponchatoula, as they should be.
Not a bad start for a new life, LPG is a fancy spot and I'm really more of jeans girl but I would go there again and again.
Yesterday, while looking through Traveler magazine, I read the caption to a picture from one of the scenes in the recent film version of Jack Kerouac's On the Road that listed a number of spots where the movie had been filmed. One area was in the bayous of Louisiana and, while the cast was here filming the movie, they chose La Petit Grocery as their hangout. So naturally, I pulled on my high heel boots care of a good friend I met while living in Seattle and came straight here for lunch to discover what their experience was like. I mean, what better way to celebrate yet another new beginning than by some loose connection to On the Road.
Bibb lettuce, boiled quail egg, buttermilk dressing, lump crabmeat, bacon and finely grated fancy cheese (that I can't pronounce).
La Petit Grocery has an Old World feel in its design with jazzy, New Age and sometimes French music playing in the background. It's a sunny, blue sky, partly cloudy day and the light is streaming through their storefront windows overlooking Magazine. A group of six enjoy wine and lunch out on the sidewalk. Shoppers pass by in both directions on their way to the next boutique clothing store, gallery or antique shop. To my right, in the hull of the dining room a table of ten or twelve ladies in their twilight enjoy lunch together. I could be in France right now but discussion a table over is embedded in the strength of secondary education at McGehee's and Newman.Two pivotal topics for any well-bred Uptown New Orleans lunch conversation. From my booth seat facing LPG's extensive bar, I look out across Magazine and to the right is the Model Cleaners with a sizable neon sign with rolling messages that includes a sort of Japanese-looking character dancing before the words go sliding by. Next door to the left of the Model Cleaners and above the parked delivery truck hauling antiques, I can see the faded sign of Vicky's Supermarket with their retro Coca Cola light-up sign. Just before marching with a brass band in the 2012 Proteus parade, a group of us had some fried catfish and shrimp with fries from Vicky's and, boy, were they good. I actually don't suggest eating them before marching in a parade but otherwise very tasty. Now completely aware that I am still, in fact, in New Orleans and not France, I move for dessert.
Louisiana Style Strawberry Shortcake with Columbian drip coffee and cream. Strawberries from Ponchatoula, as they should be.
Not a bad start for a new life, LPG is a fancy spot and I'm really more of jeans girl but I would go there again and again.
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