The Boston Club: Difference between revisions
| Line 39: | Line 39: | ||
[[File:Canal St NOLA CBD Sept 2009 Boston Club Door 2.JPG|thumb|right|Main Enterance 824 Canal Street]] |
[[File:Canal St NOLA CBD Sept 2009 Boston Club Door 2.JPG|thumb|right|Main Enterance 824 Canal Street]] |
||
The main entrance to the club is a 10×12 vestibule on Canal Street. The foyer is laid with white marble, adjacent the parlor |
The main entrance to the club is a 10×12 vestibule on Canal Street. The foyer is laid with white marble, adjacent the parlor is 55-feet deep from the property line and enhanced with a bay window overlooking a side paved courtyard. There is a Billiard room, a bar, wooden tables, and chairs, with portraits of past presidents adorning the walls. There is a wine closet behind the men's water closet, and there is a winding staircase that leads to the card room and lunchroom on the second floor. There is a Louis XV chandelier, walls papered in terra cotta, and watercolors on the walls. <ref>Times Democrat. 4 June 1899. Quoted in Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 6.</ref> |
||
==Notable Members== |
==Notable Members== |
||
Revision as of 05:45, 4 October 2018
 | The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's general notability guideline. (October 2018) |
| File:BostonClub.jpg The Boston Club of New Orleans, Dr. William Newton Mercer House by James Gallier in 1844 | |
| Location |
|
|---|---|
The Boston Club, is a private gentlemen's club in New Orleans, Louisiana.[1] Its present clubhouse was built in 1844 by noted New Orleans Architect James Gallier, located at 824 Canal Street on the edge of the Central Business District, the home was built as a residence for Dr. William Newton Mercer.
The Boston Club is a traditional gentlemen's city club, providing men the chance to play the game known as Boston (card game), a popular card game of the time. [2] It is the third oldest ‘Gentlemen’s City Club’ in the United States behind The Philadelphia Club in Philadelphia and The Union Club in New York City. Up until 1841 Social Clubs had always played an important part in the social life of New Orleans. A coterie of gentlemen wanted a more laid back club, one not so secretive or formal. “A social, open, liberal, cosmopolitan organization, with an abundance of elbow room and the necessary spirit of progress as its animating motive.” [3]
Membership and Guests
Membership in The Boston Club has “perpetuated the finer traditions of the social charm of New Orleans and the spirit of the fraternal privileges of a convivial gentlemen’s club.”[4]
In 1873, the Boston Club held a luncheon for Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery. [5] In 1880, General Ulysses S. Grant visited New Orleans and accepted an invitation to lunch at The Boston Club. [6] The Duke Edward VIII and Duchess Wallis Simpson of Windsor Feburary 21, 1950.
Other famous guests included General John M. Schofield, commander in chief of the United States army, on May 22, 1985; President Taft; Wu Tang Fan, Chinese prime minister to the U.S., in 1900; General Pershing on February 17, 1920; Henry Clay before the Civil War; and Jefferson Davis after the Civil War. [7]
Customarily Rex and his queen lunch at the club after the Rex parade. [8]
Homes of The Boston Club
1. 1851: Merchants Exchange, 126 Royal Street
2. 1835-1862: 129/130 Canal Street, next to Moreauâs Restaurant at that time
3. 1962-1865: Club closed
4. 1865-1867: 214 Royal Street (currently the location of Hotel Monteleone)
5. 1867-1884: 4 Carondelet Street, the three-story residence of New Orleans financier, Edward J. Forstall
6. 1884: 824 Canal Street (then called 148 Canal Street), the mansion of Dr. William Newton Mercer, designed by J. Gallier. Fully purchased in 1905. [9]
The main entrance to the club is a 10×12 vestibule on Canal Street. The foyer is laid with white marble, adjacent the parlor is 55-feet deep from the property line and enhanced with a bay window overlooking a side paved courtyard. There is a Billiard room, a bar, wooden tables, and chairs, with portraits of past presidents adorning the walls. There is a wine closet behind the men's water closet, and there is a winding staircase that leads to the card room and lunchroom on the second floor. There is a Louis XV chandelier, walls papered in terra cotta, and watercolors on the walls. [10]
Notable Members
John Randolph Grymes, an attorney, member of the Louisiana state legislature, U. S. attorney for Louisiana district, and aide-de-camp to General Andrew Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans.
LeRoy Percy an attorney, planter and politician in Mississippi. In 1910 he was elected to the United States Senate, serving until 1913.
William Alexander Percy a lawyer, planter, and poet from Greenville, Mississippi. His autobiography Lanterns on the Levee (Knopf 1941) became a bestseller. His father LeRoy Percy was the last United States Senator from Mississippi elected by the legislature.
Walker Percy, Obl.S.B., an American author from Covington, Louisiana, whose interests included philosophy and semiotics. Percy is known for his philosophical novels set in and around New Orleans, the first of which, The Moviegoer, won the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction. He devoted his literary life to the exploration of "the dislocation of man in the modern age."[11]
Gen. Dick Taylor, President of the Club 1868-1873, an American planter, politician, military historian, and the Confederate general.
Judah P. Benjamin, a lawyer and politician who was a United States Senator from Louisiana, a Cabinet officer of the Confederate States and, after his escape to the United Kingdom at the end of the American Civil War, an English barrister.
Thomas Jenkins Semmes, President 1883-1892, an American politician who served as a Confederate States Senator from Louisiana from 1862 to 1865.
John Slidell an American politician, lawyer, and businessman. A native of New York, Slidell moved to Louisiana as a young man and became a staunch defender of Southern rights as a Representative and Senator.
Pierre Soulé, an Franco-American attorney, politician, and diplomat during the mid-19th century. Serving as a United States Senator from Louisiana from 1849 to 1853, he resigned to accept appointment as U.S. Minister to Spain, a post he held until 1855.
S. H. Kennedy, father of Hugh Kennedy (New Orleans)
Victor Burthe, son of Dominique François Burthe, President 1866-1868
Charles E Fenner, justice Louisiana Supreme Court, President 1892-1904
Dr E. S. Lewis, father of gynecology in Louisiana[12], President 1904-1913
John M. Parker, an American Democratic politician from Louisiana, who served as the state's 37th Governor from 1920 to 1924. He was a friend and admirer of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt.
Arthur D Parker, brother of John M. Parker, President 1918-1921
See Also
References
- ^ https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/11/exclusive-places-in-new-orleans-youll-never-get-into/the-boston-club
- ^ Landry, Stuart O. History of the Boston Club. New Orleans: Pelican Publishing Company, 1938. p. 5.
- ^ Times Democrat. 18 December 1881. Quoted in Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 6-7.
- ^ Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 8.
- ^ Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 8.
- ^ New Orleans Times. 3 April 1880. Quoted in Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 8.
- ^ Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 8-9.
- ^ Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 9.
- ^ Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 10-13.
- ^ Times Democrat. 4 June 1899. Quoted in Landry. History of the Boston Club. p. 6.
- ^ Existentialism, Semiotics and Iced Tea, Review of Conversations with Walker Percy New York Times, August 4, 1985. Retrieved 2010-06-12.
- ^ https://libguides.tulane.edu/famousalumni/ESLewis2