Culture & Commerce

Black commercial districts in Louisiana thrived during the 1950s and 1960s. Thoroughfares like Texas Avenue in Shreveport and Claiborne Avenue in New Orleans were rich in opportunity as well as culture. 

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Desegregation

In public schools and city swimming pools, on the basketball courts and in courts of law, it took men, women and children of all ages to achieve equality.

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Meeting Places

Restaurants didn’t just serve food, churches didn’t just foster fellowship, and a beauty shop in Shreveport wasn’t just a place for hearsay and hairdos.

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Protests & Confrontations

It took the nation’s first bus boycott in Baton Rouge, the Canal Street sit-ins in New Orleans, and a 105-mile march from Bogalusa to the State Capitol to put Louisiana at the forefront of the Modern Civil Rights Movement.

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Meet the Markers

The Louisiana Civil Rights Trail interpretive markers tell the stories of the role Louisiana people, sites and events played during the 1950s and 60s that shaped American history.

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making rights real
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