COURSEY HARRELLS FERRY MILLERVILLE OLD JEFFERSON PA R K V I E W SHENANDOAH TIGER BEND WHITE OAK
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T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M
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W e d n e s d ay, J u ly 23, 2025
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Where’s the thunder in the La. music industry? July kicked off with another banner week for Louisiana music, especially grooves that originate from Lafayette and the surrounding area. “A Tribute to the King of Zydeco,” the star-studded Clifton Chenier salute that’s making headlines from New York City to Bangkok, Thailand, sat at No. 2 on the iTunes Herman World Music AlFuselier bums Chart. It was knocked from No. 1 by “Songs from the Heart,” a new release from 87-year-old swamp pop legend and retired school principal Johnnie Allan, of Lafayette. The album jumped to the top spot within two days of its July 3 debut. Many are celebrating the latest lightning strikes for Louisiana music. But where’s the thunder — the business infrastructure that keeps music flowing and growing at home? The question is as old as 1920s trailblazer Amedé Ardoin, who had to go as far as San Antonio and New York City to record songs that laid the foundation of zydeco and Cajun music. The answer remains missing like Joline, the mysterious figure in Ardoin’s French songs of love and lost. Lafayette journalist Christiaan Mader, of thecurrentla. com, opined: Where are the booking agents, managers, publishing houses and other must-haves for a sustainable, brick-and-mortar industry? Mader points out music’s $1.5 billion impact to Louisiana is “almost 10 times the output in Mississippi, birthplace of Elvis Presley, and about twice the output of Alabama, home of recording mecca Muscle Shoals.” In light of the Chenier tribute success, Mader asked the sustainability question to some local insiders. He was met with the usual head-scratching. Our music is powerful enough to influence the influencers, like the Rolling Stones. They barely blinked when asked to perform on the “King of Zydeco” tribute. Yet the state is filled with Grammy nominees who work as carpenters, teachers, truck drivers and other jobs because music doesn’t pay the bills. There are no easy answers. But one strategy must be continued public awareness. Keep the business of music in people’s eyes and ears. Few fans stop to consider in this digital age, when their favorite artist is a push button away. Yet that musician earns fractions of a penny for each stream. One thousand streams fetch a fat check of $4. Changing the public mindset is particularly hard in Lafayette, a city now entering its third generation of major music events that don’t cost a penny to attend. That’s 50 years
STAFF PHOTOS BY HILARY SCHEINUK
State Archaeologist Chip McGimsey discusses a handful of artifacts July 2 at the State of Louisiana Archaeological Archives in Baton Rouge. After decades of serving in the position, McGimsey retired July 4.
Louisiana’s chief archaeologist steps down after decades of digging
C
BY JAN RISHER
also recovered from the Mardi Gras shipwreck. n Thousands of dart points, often called arrowheads, gathered from sites throughout Louisiana line the shelves. n Boxes of ancestral remains line a long shelf and await their return to Native American tribes. McGimsey, 71, can tell the story of every item, every box.
Staff writer
hip McGimsey is no Indiana Jones seeking the Holy Grail. “Indiana Jones was looking for individual artifacts and stealing them — and we don’t do that,” McGimsey said as he walked by box after box of carefully labeled artifacts in the state’s archaeological storage warehouse in Baton Rouge. The site looks like a smaller version of the anonymous government storage site where the Ark of the Covenant is placed at the end of the first Indiana Jones movie. However, with McGimsey as a guide, the anonymity evaporates. A walk through the boxes and bundles is like a walk through time: n He points out cannons from a ship that sank between 1812 and 1820. It was found in the 1990s during the Mardi Gras pipeline exploration at about 4,000 feet in federal waters about 40 miles off the coast of Louisiana. n Nearby, there’s another cannon that was made in 1697 in Sweden. It has a fleur de lis on top and was
Archaeologists don’t collect stuff
McGimsey shows off a stoneware jug from the Mardi Gras shipwreck at the State of Louisiana Archaeological Archives in Baton Rouge. probably used by the French military, maybe as ballast. n Then there are artifacts from El Nuevo Constante, a Spanish ship that sank in 1766 off the Louisiana coast and was recovered between 1980 and 1982. n There are beautiful oversized crockery jugs, made in America,
While the nation celebrated its 249th birthday on July 4, the day marked the end of McGimsey’s 30-year career as Louisiana’s state archaeologist. He’s spent the time uncovering and protecting the stories of Louisiana’s past. There were no fireworks. Just the quiet significance of time passing — a life dedicated to bridging what was and what remains. Instead of Indiana Jones’ obsession with trophy artifacts, McGimsey sees them as pure information. Simply handing a pile of artifacts to McGimsey doesn’t reveal a story. “That’s really what archaeologists are after,” he said. “We don’t
ä See ARCHAEOLOGIST, page 2G
ä See INDUSTRY, page 3G
What is Louisiana’s longest-running lawsuit? Myra Clark Gaines, photographed between 1855 and 1865, fought for 57 years to win her birth father’s property in the longest suit in American history. PROVIDED PHOTO FROM THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
BY RACHEL MIPRO
Contributing writer
What was the Myra Clark Gaines case and is it true that it was the longest-running lawsuit in the history of the United States Supreme Court? A dead father, a hidden will and a jailed husband: Meet Myra Clark Gaines, a 19th-century celebrity whose now-historic New Orleans legal battle turned her into a model for female persistence. Gaines, who had a life filled with
twists and turns regarding her parentage and inheritance, set the record for the longest-running civil lawsuit in American history. Her fight to win her birth father’s property lasted 57 years. “To see that a woman was fighting for this, over 100 years ago, is just incredible,” said Katherine Jolliff Dunn, a curatorial cataloger with The Historic New Orleans Collection. “She continued and she did not stop. She really helped kind of set the path for women to really take a stand and not give up.”
Gaines was determined to receive her inheritance from her father, the wealthy New Orleans businessman and landowner Daniel Clark. She started litigation in 1834, helped along by her first husband. She would die in 1885, years before the case was finally settled in her favor in 1891, according to Dunn’s research. “I think that she was very strong-willed,” Dunn said. “And once she knew that she was the
ä See CURIOUS, page 3G