Armory

It’s been a fixture on Cynthia Street for well over half a century.
The National Guard Armory building hasn’t been staffed in a dozen or so years, but it remains in the memories of those who served in its purpose.
It once housed a shooting range, offices, a gym and outside on the grounds, a secure ordnance storage facility.
There are still many locals who recall the building in its heyday, the sound of drills and range fire, a kitchen at work, lockers and duffels and desks in offices filled with paperwork.
Constructed about 1957, withand an open house held for the public in 1958, now the building is being repurposed to serve the St. Mary Parish Office of Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security, and its new director, David Naquin, is overseeing its rebirth.
The building was given to the City of Franklin some years ago, and in turn was transferred to the parish.
“We’re going to use it for bulk storage,” Naquin said. “It’s hot in here, obviously, but we’re going to put exhaust fans in the two louvered windows, that should suck a lot of this hot air out.
“This building trained our parish president, David Hanagriff,” he added. “National Guardsmen used to train out of here. Several people have come by to look at it, just to tell me about their time here.”
Naquin took over from former director Duval Arthur in February. The dominant supply feature in the expansive gym area right now is cots for use in emergency situations if residents are driven from their homes. Though in a bit of disarray at the moment, Naquin is having them shrink-wrapped on pallets and stacked neatly against the walls.
“The main thing with wrapping them is to keep the dust and moisture out,” he said.
The supply room has a secure, walk-in locker, marked “RESTRICTED AREA” and “NO SMOKING”; a nearby door stenciled in black, “MASTER GUNNER,” and there is a sort of shadowy ambiance that speaks of a time when the old brick building bustled with activity, voices and proud Guardsmen.
Racks and shelves line the walls where arms and personal items were stored. Due to the structure’s age, Naquin said all lead and other hazardous materials have been abated.
There are signs of vandalism and attempts at forced entry, but there were no apparent intrusions.
Stacks of wooden chairs dating back decades were used for classes, now at rest along a long, gray wall with one bright window.
Naquin, a former four-term sheriff of St. Mary Parish, also pointed out a number of Hesko baskets, which can be filled with sand and utilized to hold back flooding.
There’s a supply of mops, brooms and buckets for emergencies.
Items that require cooler conditions, such as MREs and bulk cases of bottled water, will be stored at a more appropriate location, Naquin said.
A brand-new fire suppression system is in place in the kitchen.
Supplies will be situated in rows that leave room for a newly-acquired forklift to move them into and out of a large roll-up door at the rear. There are pet carriers, too.
With doors long ago marked “Male Latrine” and “Female Latrine” the halo of its military presence remains in place, if diminished.
The old building is in remarkably good shape considering its age, though the hedges out front have grown wild and wooly, and various other species of plants peek out from the gutters. A main roof at the sides and a higher one at the center once had many windows, but Hurricane Andrew broke them all, and it was re-sided with sheet metal panels.
“How many hurricanes this thing has been through?” Naquin noted.
OEP’s office will remain in the courthouse, and the Armory will only be used in an emergency situation.
A generator will be installed to power the building in the event of an outage, Naquin said.
“We’re going to try to keep the flora and fauna of the National Guard Armory as we can, because there were so many people that were here,” he said. “You can name a lot of people who have been through this building over the years. We’ve got all the price quotes in. I’m trying to get approval on the next grant cycle, and I think it’ll go through. I think we’ll spend $13,000 to $15,000 and we’ll be up and running.”
As Naquin closes and locks the old door with a clang that reverberates within the Armory, one might be tempted to believe they heard a shout of order or a call to chow.
Or perhaps it is just the memories of an old building, an old soldier in its own right, stirred again by footsteps on its tile floors and voices between its walls.