Oh boy. The things we are finding in our Special Collections vertical files! We have found things we didn’t know we even had and wonder how they have been kept safe all these years!
As part of my job, I have been indexing the places vertical files that have been kept upstairs ever since I can remember, and I have been here for twenty four years! I happened to glance in a bottom file drawer and notice a little booklet in the Tensas Parish file. I pulled it and brought it downstairs with me.
From the typescript, I thought it would be from the 1920’s. I typed in the title in newspapers.com and got two hits…from 1900. They were thanking Mr. Lacey for the wonderfully done booklet on the lands he had for sale. My jaw hit the floor. What I had was a publication that was one hundred twenty years old. It also was NOT about Tensas parish! It included a map showing the area the book was about.
How in the world this survived all these years, I have no idea. It is a treasure! Over the next several days, I will share some of the photos in it that depict scenes from Ouachita Parish. Some I had never seen before!
Ouachita Parish History Tidbits 