Jim Bradshaw: When the snow was flying on Mardi Gras

Big preparations had been afoot for weeks for Mardi Gras celebrations across south Louisiana in 1899.

It was to be especially festive because Mardi Gras fell on Valentine’s Day that year.

Nobody anticipated that what may have been the worst blizzard ever to hit the state would undo it all.

Feb. 14, 1899, remains to this day south Louisiana’s coldest Mardi Gras on record, and the chill that came with its frigid winds was long remembered as among the coldest for any day — Mardi Gras, Christmas, or whatever.

The Weekly Messenger reported in mid-January that the Board of Trade was planning a big “Flower Parade … [that] promises to be the prettiest ever seen in St. Martinville,” and that “the great and mighty Potentate,” King Progress, had invited “all loyal subjects to decorate their carriages with flowers” and particularly invited the ladies “to ride in the procession which will be formed at my arrival in the lovely city of the Teche.”

But, when the day arrived, the flowers were frozen and instead of lovely ladies the Potentate was greeted by what the Messenger called “a blizzard that came direct from the frozen regions of North Dakota.”

It covered most of south Louisiana with three or more inches of sleet and snow and brought “the severest cold known for many years.”

Official Mardi Gras events were canceled in St. Martinville.

The Greig Orchestra did give “a little ball” that hardly anybody attended, because “very few ventured outside, unless it was absolutely necessary.”

It was so cold, that “the butchers could not cut their meat because it was frozen hard, and the milk froze in the cans so the milk men could not supply their customers with so indispensable an article,” The Messenger said.

The Lafayette parade and pageant, staged by the hardy volunteer fire department, went on “notwithstanding the very disagreeable weather,” according to the Advertiser, but “maskers were few.”

Attendance would have been even lighter if 24 brave firefighters from Crowley had not joined the parade and participated in the pageant’s grand march, “executed by all the firemen present in full uniform.”

Back in Crowley, a few people gathered in the relative warmth of the post office to see if they got any Valentines, but there was no parade and, again, only a handful braved the weather.

The Rex and Comus parades rolled in New Orleans despite several inches of snow and a wind chill below zero, but the Krewe of Porteus postponed its parade because the owners of the mules that pulled the floats refused to risk them on the ice-slicked streets.

A large delegation from the Teche country had traveled to New Orleans for the celebration, but The New Iberia Enterprise reported that “festivities in the Crescent City were seriously marred by the intense cold, and many people left before the festivities were well under way.”

The Enterprise reported also that in New Iberia, “for the first time within the recollection of man the bayou Teche was frozen over its entire surface.”    
St. Martinville’s celebration was postponed until Easter, which was probably a more appropriate occasion for a Flower Parade, anyway.

It turned out to be a bright day when “Spring smiled upon us … in all its beauty, and … the roads being smooth and dry, permitted people from adjoining towns and the country to come in large numbers,” all of whom cheered as the Potentate finally had his procession.

We’ve had some memorably cool celebrations since then, especially when the day falls in early February. (Mardi Gras is always 47 days before Easter, which varies according to lunar phases. The earliest Mardi Gras can fall is Feb. 3, the latest is March 9.)  

The coldest in recent times was probably on February 7, 1989, when the high temperature in Lafayette was only 33 degrees.

The celebration in 1978 was only slightly warmer, as a shivering King Gabriel greeted his Lafayette subjects in a parade most remembered for the sleet storm that accompanied it. 

But none of them seem to have matched the Mardi Gras that ran head-on into “a blizzard direct from the frozen regions,” and we can hope that no more of them will.

You can contact Jim Bradshaw at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.