Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, November 25, 1997

Weeks Island was once known as Grande Côte

Island remains center for salt production

by Jim Bradshaw

Weeks was the son of David Weeks, a native of Baltimore, and Mary Clara Conrad, who were among the early settlers of St. Martin Parish. In 1843, the estate of David Weeks was operating a sugar plantation, and the firm of William F. Weeks & Co. was operating another, both located on Grande Côte Island on the original Spanish claim of William Weeks.

(It is through David Weeks' marriage to Mary Clara Conrad that the Weeks family claims connection to George Washington. Mary Clara was the daughter of Frederick Conrad and Frances Thruston and the sister of Charles M. Conrad. Charles M. Conrad, who was cashier at the Gas Light Bank in Franklin, married George Washington's niece, and she is buried at Mount Vernon alongside her famous uncle.)

William Henry Perrin described the area in his history written in 1891:

"Grande Côte Island ... is a beautiful place. It is some two miles in diameter and nearly round. On one of the bluffs there is a fine view of the surrounding country of hillsides, valleys, ravines and level plains, timber and open lands, cane brakes and pastures. In one direction is a bold elevation covered with a heavy growth of timber and hillsides almost as steep as mountains. In another direction, away down below, between steep elevations, a fine, fresh water lake is spread out, with water lilies upon its surface, the branches of magnificent forest trees extending far out over the water. It needs but a few white swans to complete the picture, and make it perfectly enchanting.

"... a dwelling is on a handsome bluff of regular shape, about one hundred and fifty feet above the level of the gulf," Perrin continues. "Beautiful shade trees and the sea breeze keep the yard and the house cool, even in the hottest summer days. The yard all around is well set in Bermuda grass. In front, the sea marsh extends out a hundred yards, and beyond this the water of the gulf spreads out under a blazing sun. To the right is a bayou twenty feet deep, with five feet of water on the bar at its mouth. Any of the bayou steamers can run up to the landing, a few hundred yards from the dwelling. Redfish and many other fine fish are found in abundance in the bayou. There are oyster reefs not far off. In the garden there is a splendid arbor of scuppernong grape vines, about thirty feet square, roof nine feet high, the vines flowing down to the ground on all sides, making a complete room, with fruit walls and ceiling. These vines produce a bountiful crop of grapes every year. ...

"At various localities, all over the island," the Perrin description continues, "fine, thrifty forest trees may be seen, which add much to the beauty of the scenery. The island, viewed from the highest pinnacle, is picturesque and beautiful beyond anything in the State. Its gentle undulations, its peaks, hills, valleys, ponds, and its towering magnolias and noble oaks, its ash and cypress, its fields of blooming cotton and waving cane -- all inspire the most pleasant emotions in the breast of any beholder who loves to look on nature when she puts on her finest robes and appears in her most bewitching mood.

"The plantation known as Weeks plantation, under a high state of cultivation on this island, has on it all the buildings and improvements common to the largest and most successful sugar estates in Attakapas," Perrin said, "(including) a large brick sugar house, (with a) slate roof and powerful engine and sugar mill, capacity for taking off and saving six or eight hundred hogsheads of sugar yearly. ...The plantation is in fine condition, soil is of unsurpassed fertility, and the estate has always been one of the most productive and successful in this section of Louisiana."

In 1897, David Weeks and Gen. F. F. Myles, formed the Weeks & Myles Corp. to mine salt on Weeks Island. Today the island remains a center for salt and oil production.

The salt dome here was also used for a time as an oil storage site for the national Strategic Petroleum Reserve program. The oil was moved to other SPR sites when engineers detected water seeping into the storage cavern.

Indian mounds and an alligator shaped shell midden have been excavated on Weeks Island.

This article is copyrighted © by the Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser and is used with permission.  This web site was originated through a grant awarded to Carencro High School (Joel Hilbun/Bobbi Marino, Grant Administrators) by the State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education from the Louisiana Quality Education Support Fund - 8(g).