Some tours focus on the lives of the owners, some focus on historical furnishings, and one is dedicated to slavery. ![]() Over a dozen of the plantation homes are open to the public for tours, and all are different so it can be difficult to decide which to visit. ![]() Today, the River Road reflects both the past and present, winding past bayous, levees, strip malls, oil refineries, sugar cane fields, historic communities, majestic live oaks, and a handful of remaining plantation mansions. Not surprisingly, the Civil War and the end of slavery left most of the large plantations unprofitable, and many Louisiana plantations slowly declined into states of ruin or were converted into industrial estates. Louisiana would become the most wealthy state in the country by the onset of the Civil War, made possible only by the forced hard labor of thousands of slaves who worked at these plantations. Many early Louisiana plantations grew rice, indigo, or tobacco, but by the mid-nineteenth century the majority were growing sugar cane, which became the most profitable cash crop in the state. Prior to the American Civil War, this river road was lined with approximately 350 antebellum plantation homes, from relatively simple farm houses to grand Versailles-like mansions. Louisiana’s River Road parallels the east and west banks of the Mississippi River for about 70 miles (about 100 miles of actual road) through the Louisiana parishes of St. ![]() We recently visited 12 Louisiana plantations along Louisiana’s River Road between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.
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