Sugar at LSU: A Chronology
Artifacts on loan from the LSU Rural Life Museum:
- Cane knives, early 20th century, used in harvesting sugarcane
- Skimmer, circa 1840, for removing impurities during open-kettle boiling of cane juice
- Sugar barrel stencil, circa 1858, used to mark shipments of raw sugar from St. James Parish plantation "Bonne Esperance"
- Sugar cone mold and snips, 19th century, used for serving sugar at table
- Windrow hook and stalk shaver, late 19th century, agricultural tools used in sugarcane cultivation
Cane wagon advertisement. Reproduced from: Louisiana Sugar Planters' Association. Year Book, 1910. Louisiana Collection SB215 L6864
Blessing the cane crop, New Iberia, circa 1950. Photo reproduced from: J. Carlyle Sitterson. Sugar Country. Lexington, University of Kentucky Press, 1953. Louisiana Collection HD9105 S5 c.1
John Earle Uhler. Cane Juice. New York, Grosset & Dunlap, 1931. The main character in this novel is a young Cajun from Lafourche Parish who attends LSU in the late 1920's to study at the Audubon Sugar School. Louisiana Collection PS3541 H54 C35 1931.
Longwood Plantation cane syrup label, early 20th century, and "Golden Gate" cane syrup tin, circa 1920. Loan, collection of W.H. "Bill" Lee, Baton Rouge
Louisiana Sugar Cane Festival and Fair programs, 1956 and 1976. Louisiana Collection S555 L685
"Raising cane" bumper sticker and Louisiana sugarcane poster, courtesy of the American Sugar Cane League
Panoramic view of cane fields, Southdown Plantation, Terrebonne Parish, 1920's. Photograph from Henry C. Minor Estate Partnership Papers, Mss. 1509, Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections
Photo of cane harvest near Reserve, 1948, showing workers are windrowing cane cut by a mechanical harvester. Courtesy of the LSU Agricultural Center
Man shaping sugar into cones, 19th century. Hand-colored lithograph. In: Sugar: How It Grows and How It Is Made. London, [1845?] Rare SB231 S84
"Sugarcane Country" cotton afghan. Design created by Cile B. Schmidt, Ashland Plantation, Bunkie, in memory of her father, a lifelong sugarcane farmer. Loan, Cile B. Schmidt
Etienne-de-Bore Street sign, designating an LSU campus road off South Stadium Road. Sign supplied by Dr. Freddie Martin, Audubon Sugar Institute, courtesy of the Office of Parking, Traffic & Transportation
