Percy Lobdell Building: Cultural Landscape Report, Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve
WLA Studio. 2023. Percy Lobdell Building: Cultural Landscape Report, Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve. Cultural Landscape Report. National Park Service. Atlanta, GA
This Cultural Landscape Report (CLR) is for the Percy-Lobdell Building and the Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center, a unit of the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve, located in downtown Thibodaux, Louisiana, on the south bank of Bayou Lafourche in Lafourche Parish. The study area for this CLR includes the entirety of the Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center site. This CLR includes National Register level significance evaluation. The evaluation is partly based on existing National Register documentation for the Percy-Lobdell Building, which is included in the National Register nomination for the Thibodaux Multiple Resource Area. The National Register nomination states that the building is significant at the local level for Criteria A and C for its contributions to local commerce and architecture. The nomination defines the period of significance for the entire Thibodaux Multiple Resource Area as 1846-1920s. This CLR uses 1846-1921 for the evaluation of contributing and non-contributing features of the Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center site as a whole. Based on analysis of historic conditions and changes to the landscape since the period of significance, the Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center cultural landscape does not retain sufficient integrity to the period of significance to convey its historic associations. The evaluation of landscape integrity in this CLR determined that the cultural landscape as a whole does not retain integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, or association. Furthermore, the cultural landscape does not retain integrity to any historic period and the only remaining historic resource on the site is the Percy-Lobdell Building. Treatment recommendations thus direct park managers to expand the site’s interpretive potential and maximize its use as a cultural center as a means of communicating the history no longer visible on the site, as well as other important regional themes.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- WLA Studio
- Date of Issue
- 2023-07
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- JELA , SER
- Keywords
- Acadian culture, agriculture, commerce, Percy-Lobdell Company, public library, sugar industry, Thibodaux Area