Gwen Roland details her time on an Atchafalaya Houseboat

As part of the local Water/Ways exhibit project, the Jeanerette Museum Board and Bayou Teche Museum have partnered to present an evening with Gwen Roland, the author of Atchafalaya Houseboat, at 6 p.m. on Thursday, March 14 at the Sliman Theatre in New Iberia.
Gwen Roland is the author of Atchafalaya Houseboat and Postmark Bayou Chene. Growing up in rural Louisiana, self-sufficiency was a given, so during the back-to-earth movement of the early 70s, Roland and Calvin Voisin moved to the Atchafalaya Swamp where their ancestors had settled before the Civil War. She shared their adventures through magazine and newspaper articles. LSU Press reprinted those essays in the memoir Atchafalaya Houseboat. The book inspired the popular PBS documentary by the same name.
Roland brings an insight into living on a houseboat she and Voisin built that few others can. She lived peacefully off of the land for nearly a decade in the swamp. She later moved away from her beloved swamp and held many jobs until becoming the communications specialist for the Southern Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program at the University of Georgia. She retired after 20 years of writing about Ag research in the country.
During her presentation, Roland will be showing personal photos from her collection during the time of her living in the swamp.
This program is suitable for an adult audience and is being held free of charge, however, seating is limited. This program is a part of Museum on Main Street, a collaboration between the Smithsonian Institution and the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities made possible through funding from the Walton Family Foundation. For more information please contact Gail at 337-380-9057 or call the Bayou Teche Museum at 337-606-5977.