It did not really matter at the time as there were insufficient people to fill the grid until 1800.
From the beginning, New Orleans had a reputation as a very important place; and for most of the eighteenth century, image was more important that reality. Although its geographical situation, strategically important site, and master plan for development guaranteed New Orleans a bright future, the realization of that promise was dependent upon the ambitions of the dominant political powers of the day.
Like so many American cities, but in in particular, for early New Orleans, promise and growth depended upon which political power controlled the interior of North America. In the eighteenth century, three European powers, France, Spain, and Britain were rivals for dominance.
Oddly, it was France's economic policy of regulating all mercantilism to the benefit of the state, that held back the growth of New Orleans. Odd, because America's growth at that time depended on sea trade. The French viewed Louisiana and the Mississippi Valley as a buffer against British expansion westward from their seaboard colonies and, so, saw no point in investing large sums in Louisiana, except for the brief period from 1716-1722, that saw the founding of New Orleans.
John Law, a Scotsman, gambler, and financial advisor to the Duc d'Orleans, developed a scheme to form the Mississippi Company to assume the French Crown's debt in return for a charter to operate Louisiana as a colony. Law's ingenious proposal called for the proceeds from the sale of shares in the Mississippi Company to the French public to be used to back the Crown's debt and currency. Shareholders would receive dividends on the profits the Mississippi Company would reap.
Law thereby launched one of the first modern public relations campaigns to convince thousands of Frenchmen of the fortunes to be made in a Louisiana rich in gold and fertile land. For two years, frenzied speculation shot the value of Mississippi Company stock upwards as Frenchmen of all persuasions rushed to invest their savings. But, by 1720, when no bonanza of dividends had been forthcoming, the company collapsed when thousands of Frenchmen rushed to unload their shares, and Law fled France just ahead of an irate mob.
Both Spain and France proved unable to hold New Orleans as part of an empire against the Americans flooding into the Mississippi Valley after 1800. Napoleon tried to reestablish the French Empire in Louisiana, taking control of New Orleans from Spain in 1802; but financial troubles and the difficulty of holding French conquests in Europe and the Caribbean led him to sell all of Louisiana, including New Orleans, to the United States. In December 1903, Thomas Jefferson had pulled off one of the great real estate buys in history.
Commercial families from many European countries established branches in the city, and John Law's efforts accounted for 2,000 German immigrants. Spain made serious attempts to encourage Spanish emigration, settling several thousand Canary Islanders in the 1780's twenty miles south of New Orleans and also to the west of New Iberia. Ironically, the biggest influx under Spanish rule was that of French-speakers: the Acadians who, expelled by the British from Canada, settled from the late 1760's through the late 1700's on all sides of the city, particularly to the west, near modern Lafayette. In the last years of Spanish rule, growing numbers of Americans settled and around New Orleans.
For New Orleans, American annexation brought population growth and economic development. The Louisiana Purchase removed the political barriers to the development of New Orleans' natural economic and situational advantages. From 1803 until 1861, New Orleans' population increased from 8,000 to nearly 170,000. The 1810 census revealed a population of 10,000 making New Orleans the United States' fifth largest city, after New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Baltimore and the largest city west of the Appalachians. From 1810 until 1840, New Orleans grew at a faster rate than any other large American city.
In 1803, New Orleans was basically 8,000 people directly or indirectly tied to moving goods from river vessels to dock to ship and vice versa. Its primary industry was the port, moving and storing goods. Ship chandling, repairing, and building were a distant second industry, but rapid economic growth after 1803 spawned new economic interests. By the 1820's and 1830's, New Orleans was the commercial and financial intermediary for goods from all reaches of the Mississippi.
The first steamboat came downriver in 1812, providing a more efficient of transportation for cotton. In 1821, 287 steamboats arrived in New Orleans; by 1826, there were 700 steamboat arrivals. In 1845, 2,500 steamboats were recorded, and during the 1850's an average of 3,000 steamboats a year called at the city. After 1830, then, steamboats were in general use on the Mississippi, allowing two-way packet lines to operate, carrying both cargo and passengers on regular schedules. Flatbed boats, which were once the main river vessels, virtually disappeared after 1857.
In spite of the huge volume of steamboats that called at the city annually, New Orleans never became a center for building either ocean vessels or riverboats before the Civil War. As it grew larger, the city's location at the bottom end of the steamboat market made it a less attractive choice for steamboat construction than more centrally located cities, like St. Louis or Cincinnati.
French Quarter Manual
Numerous black and white photos are presented along with explanatory text and captions discussing the history and describing the features of various styles, and of particular buildings. Arrangement of information is in sections on types of French Quarter houses; components of French Quarter buildings an illustrated "parts" list focusing on doors, windows, shutters, stairways, dormers, and carriageways, among others; and the many styles represented in the Quarter an illustrated "glossary" covering 16 styles, among them French colonial, Spanish colonial, federal, Greek revival, Gothic revival, Italianate, Egyptian revival, Craftsman, 20th-century restoration, and modernism. Spiral wire binding (in a hard cover). Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.
Historic Buildings of the French Quarter
: More than 100 illustrations describe the building styles of each historical era and highlight some 60 buildings of particular importance.
Ocean-going ship building was slow to develop for similar reaons. Attempts were made in the 1850's to enlarge New Orleans' shipyards, but Northeastern financial sources were not interested in starting new shipyards to compete with the already well established Atlantic seaboard shipbuilding industry. By 1860, New Orleans did have fledgling machine shops, ironworks, several shipbuilding firms, located mainly on the westbank in Algiers. Algiers also supported a dry dock and a ship repair industry, so that in all, over 500 men were employed in ship repair and buildng by 1861. However, the Civil War slowed the development of the indsutry, delaying for decades the emergence of a major shipbuilding industry in New Orleans.
As a seaport and major point of entry for the country, New Orleans always had a transient population of seamen, immigrants, and tourists, and what might be called a "hospitality" industry—restaurants, theatres, operas, bars, gambling houses, and redlight establishments. This industry has always been much larger than what the resident population alone would support. The streets near the docks—in, above, and below the French Quarter—were lined by bars, flophouses, and clip joints.
Visitors of all classes seemed to enjoy the luxuries, and perhaps the depravities, of the city that care forgot. Residents also enjoyed cultural and recreational opportunities far beyond what most cities of New Orleans' size could offer.
