Madame John’s Legacy, located at 632 Dumaine Street, is one of the finest and oldest Creole colonial buildings in the New Orleans French Quarter. Constructed in 1788 for the Spanish military official Manuel de Lanzos, Madame John’s is an excellent example of the raised galleried cottage built in Louisiana during the earlier French colonial era.
Ironically, the builder, Robert Jones, was an American. In addition, it was not the original house on this site. Through historical records and archaeological digs, historians have determined Madame John’s is located on the ruins of an earlier house built in the 1730s and heavily damaged by the fire of 1788, which destroyed much of the colonial French Quarter. Historians also believe the pre-1788 house was once owned by the pirate Rene Beluche who sold it to De Lanzos shortly before the fire. After the fire, De Lanzos hired Jones to rebuild or renovate the structure, using salvaged materials from the original house. Historians are unsure of what the original building looked like, but Madame John’s resembles more an earlier Louisiana French colonial style of dwelling than the later and more sophisticated Spanish brick edifices found in post-1788 New Orleans. Since 1788, it has survived hurricanes, floods, neglect, the great fire of 1794, and the ravages of the city’s oppressive semi-tropical humid climate.
And then there was Madame John who never lived here, nor did she ever exist. She was a ficticious character in New Orleans native George Washington Cable’s 1874 short story, Tite Poulette. As the story goes, when the owner Monsieur John died, he left the house to his mistress, Zalli, known as Madame John. A half century later, Stella Hirsch Lemann bought the property where she set up a small artist colony. By that time, the French Quarter had become a rundown but popular bohemia for artists and writers and a refuge for poor Sicilian immigrants. In 1947, Lemann donated the building, now on the National Historic Register, to the Louisiana State Museum. In more recent years, Madame John’s appeared in two major movies, “Interview with the Vampire” and “12 Years a Slave.”
Madame John’s is temporarily closed while it undergoes renovation. A reopening date has yet to be announced.
Madame John's Legacy, ca. 1895. The Historic New Orleans Collection[/caption]
Madame John’s Legacy, located at 632 Dumaine Street, is one of the finest and oldest Creole colonial buildings in the New Orleans French Quarter. Constructed in 1788 for the Spanish military official Manuel de Lanzos, Madame John’s is an excellent example of the raised galleried cottage built in Louisiana during the earlier French colonial era.