A new Fairgrounds season is at the gate. Usually, the racetrack opens on Thanksgiving Day, but this year the starter’s gun has been advanced to net Friday, Nov. 18. When the topic is horse racing in Louisiana those prone to digesting history might think of a famous horserace in 1854, which had Superbowl status as a national event. The Louisiana raised horse was named LeCompte. He was named after a town that would be famous for two things; the horse and a cafe named Lea’s.
Lea’s Lunchroom opened in 1928, the same year that Huey Long was elected governor. Both the lunchroom and the Kingfish would have colorful careers, though Lea’s made better pies and has lasted much longer.
Located along La. Highway 71 in Lecompte near Alexandria and just about half-way between New Orleans and Shreveport, the geo-political location was happenstance though founder Lea Johnson was mesmerized by governors passing through. He liked to say that every governor had visited his place since Huey Long except for Edwin Edwards. (According to that claim, by the time Johnson died at age 98 in 1995, approximately 12 chief execs would have passed through his doors.)
Whether a visitor was a Democrat, Liberal or Libertarian the house was never divided on what to order: the signature ham sandwich and a slice of house made pie from among eight daily flavors.
Alexandria is near the cultural divide for the state, an imaginary line between the land of cypress and pine trees; swamps and hills; Creole tomatoes and poke salad.
A ham sandwich is a tempting common denominator especially when served, as Johnson insisted, with ham fixed two ways; sliced or ground, and topped with lettuce, tomato and a pickle. The pie is a grand follow-up. (Eventually, according to the restaurant’s figures, the pie business would expand from making two a day to nearly 65,000 a year.)
In his day, Mr. Lea, as he was known, would walk the floor. If his coffee didn’t wake you his bellowing voice would. His flamboyance and his white hair gave him a Colonel Sanders of the ham sandwich presence.
Prior to Lea’s, Lecompte, the town, had already established some notoriety because of the thoroughbred that was raised on a plantation south of town in 1851. Appropriately, he was named "LeComte" – without the “p” in the town’s name, which was inexplicably added by the railroad. He grew up to be one of the greatest race horse’s of his day. His main competition in life was a Kentucky bred horse named Lexington.
In 1854, the two horses were matched in a series of races held in New Orleans over several days. (The Fairgrounds racetrack would not open until 1872. In earlier days, horse racing was done mostly at the site of today’s Metairie Cemetery. The oblong drive through the cemetery grounds was built on the site of what was the actual racetrack.
LeComte won the first two races impressively. In the third race he was slowed by a bout of colic and lost, but he will always be remembered for those first two wins.
When Johnson first opened Lea’s he hired what he described as a “17-year-old skinny red-haired girl” whom he referred to as “Miss Georgia,” to serve the coffee and manage the café. In 1939 he married her. (A favorite Johnson tease was to say that marrying was cheaper than paying her a $4 weekly salary.) It was from his bride’s mom that the pie inspiration came. Georgia Johnson would go to the restaurant each working day at 3 a.m. to assist the pie maker with her family’s recipes. Like LeComte, Edwin Edwards won all his major races except one. When he last ran for governor in ‘92 I happened to see him out campaigning. Despite the great issues of the day, I had one question that nagged at me. “Governor, you know Mr. Lea at Lea’s in Lecompte, ” I asked. “Yes,” he nodded. “Well, he says that you’re the only governor that never ate there.”
“I know," Edwards responded with a touch of his Cajun dialect. “But it is not true. I’ve been there many times. He just doesn’t remember.”
With so many pies to sell, Mr. Lea could not have been faulted for overlooking a gubernatorial visit.
In March 2001, the Louisiana legislature declared Lecompte to be the “Pie Capitol of Louisiana.”
A 2019 article in Brisnet, a journal for handicappers recalled the 1854 race: “LeComte and Lexington are long gone, and Metairie Racecourse converted into a cemetery the decade after the Civil War, but their echoes can still be heard. Today’s champions, their descendants, breathe the fiery spirit of battles around old Metairie.”
Each year a race called “The Lecompte stakes” is held at the Fairgrounds.
Making history is hard work.
-30-
Have something to add to this story, or want to send a comment to Errol? Email him at errol@myneworleans.com. Note: All responses are subject to being published, as edited, in this article. Please include your name and location.
SOMETHING NEW: Listen to “Louisiana Insider,” a weekly podcast covering the people, places and culture of the state. LouisianaLife.com/LouisianaInsider, Apple Podcasts or Audible/Amazon Music.
BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT: Errol’s Laborde’s books, “New Orleans: The First 300 Years” and “Mardi Gras: Chronicles of the New Orleans Carnival” (Pelican Publishing Company, 2017 and 2013), are available at local bookstores and at book websites.
WATCH INFORMED SOURCES, FRIDAYS AT 7 P.M., REPEATED AT 9:30 A.M. SUNDAYS.WYES-TV, CH. 12.
