DONALDSONVILLE • DUTCHTOWN • GEISMAR • GONZALES • PRAIRIEVILLE • ST. AMANT
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Outdoor Expo coming to Gonzales Louisiana Outdoor Expo starts Friday and runs through Sunday at Lamar-Dixon Expo Center. The event features more than 200 vendors and displays on boats, power equipment, ATV, hunting and fishing gear, dockdog exhibition and more. Tickets are $15 for adults and $5 for children 6-12. For more information, visit https://www.louisianaoutdoorexpo.com/schedule-of-events/.
Rodeo action planned Bulls, Bands and Barrels is coming at 6:30 p.m. Saturday to the Robbie G. Savoy Arena at Lamar-Dixon Center. The event features Tracy Lawrence and Tyler Nance For tickets, visit https://tinyurl.com/3t9zbcyp.
RRAAM 32 March marks a meaningful milestone for the River Road African American Museum. In March 1994, the museum first opened its doors with a mission to preserve and share the stories, culture and lived experiences of African Americans in Louisiana’s River Parishes. Today, the group celebrates RRAAM 32, honoring 32 years of preserving history and serving the community. Since its founding, the museum has been dedicated to telling the stories of African Americans who lived and worked throughout Louisiana’s plantation country from the era of enslavement through generations of resilience, achievement and cultural expression. After the loss of its original home in 2003, the museum relocated to Donaldsonville, where the museum continues to grow as an educational and cultural resource for residents, students and visitors. This anniversary also marks an important homecoming. After two years of being closed due to storm damage and renovations, the museum will reopen its doors at 406 Charles St., welcoming the community back to the heart of the RRAAM campus. To commemorate that legacy, the group is holding Preservation, Place & People: Celebrating 32 Years of History & Community, a two-day anniversary celebration taking place March 13-14 across the museum’s campus in the Historic District of Donaldsonville.
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Seeds of Sinners
Darlene Denstorff AROUND ASCENSION
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Film alliance promotes opportunities BY FRANCES Y. SPENCER Contributing writer
Jasmine Fenner is a young aspiring actor. She has talent, confidence and a personality that speaks to the camera. What she lacks is opportunity. She found her mecca of opportunity in Donaldsonville, the same place where Ryan Coogler found the canvas for his acclaimed blockbuster “Sinners.” Donaldsonville was as hot as fish grease March 7 when Fenner and others participated in Roots & Reels, the launching point for a series of community events organized by the Rolling on the River Alliance. The alliance fuses several disciplines — including production, acting, training and casting — designed to connect River Parishes residents with opportunities in Louisiana’s film industry. “We see this series of events as an entry point — not just for careers in film, but for entrepreneurship rooted in preserving our history and heritage,” Ashley Gaignard, CEO of Rural Roots Louisiana, said. “When our community members have the tools and connections they need, they can build businesses and livelihoods that honor where we come from while shaping where we’re going.” The open house and film experience was organized by Rural Roots Louisiana and was a buffet of industry excitement and opportunity. The event featured wig installations, costuming and makeup stations, and conversations with local
PHOTO BY FRANCES Y. SPENCER
Costumer and film wardrobe buyer Pamela Woods, left, fits actor Jasmine Fenner in retro fashions as she would on a movie set. Woods was one of many exhibitors at the Rolling on the River Alliance press conference ä See FILM, page 4G Saturday.
Small businesses celebrate springtime at Merry Market BY WENDY LOUP Contributing writer
Spring home decorations, Easter-themed lawn signs, and pastel children’s clothes were among the offerings at this weekend’s Merry Market in March in Gonzales. More than 350 booths sold jewelry, food, clothing and wellness items during the two-day event at the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center. The popular Merry Market is held twice a year, typically in NoPHOTO BY WENDY LOUP vember and March. Spring and Easter decorations donned the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center The event attracts both Ascenduring this weekend’s Merry Market in March. The popular shopping sion Parish and statewide vendors. A portion of the proceeds from the extravaganza featured more than 350 booths.
Merry Markets go to the Sparrow Foundation, which aims to help fight human trafficking in Louisiana. The family-friendly event included a children’s play area, known as the Kidz Zone, as well as pictures with the Easter Bunny. A Children’s Entrepreneur Market was held for youth ages 5-17. Many Ascension and Baton Rouge vendors featured homemade items and niche offerings. Renee Knighten, owner of Geaux Wrap Gifts, sold various gift-decorating accessories, such
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‘We could visibly see the missiles’
Prairieville family in Dubai as conflict began BY CHRISTOPHER CARTWRIGHT Staff writer
A cellphone suddenly buzzes with the sound of an emergency alert. The interview pauses. It’s a notification of a possible missile attack. That was the daily life for Christian Walker, his wife, Kate SinclairFaulkner, and their two children, while the Prairieville family was in the United Arab Emirates city of Dubai during the war with Iran. They finally made it home Saturday night but not after having to deal with the war. “We were eating dinner, and it was the first time we could visibly see the missiles breaking up,” Walker said about the evening after the war broke out. “It kind of looked like shooting
stars, almost. Meteors.” The conflict started March 7 with U.S.-Israeli strikes, including one that killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and has spread across the Middle East. Walker said his family felt relatively safe where they were, but the war’s presence was never far removed. “We’ve seen some (missiles), but we really feel and hear them, because I’ll be … kind of sitting inside while the kid naps, and then you can just hear it, feel it,” he said. “And then the wall and the curtains slightly shake.”
be much harder with three little ones when we’re outnumbered,” he stated. “So those things kind of prompted it.” He said that when the conflict began, his children were napping and his wife was enjoying time outside. “She came in just with this look on her face, you know,” he said. “She had received a message about the conflict beginning.” Until Thursday, Walker said the last alert to come in warning of missile and drone attacks had been about three days before, in the middle of the night. He said an alert came in around an hour before speaking with The AdMissile alerts during interview vocate, and another one buzzed during The family arrived Feb. 18 after the interview. planning the trip for a while because they had accumulated airline miles, Trying to find ways home Walker said. A few days after the strikes began, “We kind of finally had to come now the U.S. Department of State urged because my wife’s pregnant and we Americans in more than a dozen couldn’t do it much later in the pregä See DUBAI, page 2G nancy, and then we figured it would also
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Christian Walker, his wife Kate Sinclair-Faulkner and their two children in Dubai. The Prairieville couple was on vacation in the city when the war with Iran broke out.