Category: Patureau

As you all know, I take a lot of time to work out the best title for my posts.  Maybe you don’t know that, and maybe I don’t really spend all that much time doing it.  But I do put some thought into it.  I’m not exactly pleased with this title, but it does have the message that I wanted to say.  Marie Emma Landry Patureau is the matriarch of the Patureau family in the United States.  I usually make sure to not word it this way so I can avoid the use of the plural form for Patureau.  But I wanted a short title, and technically Patureaus is correct.  I thought of using the French manner of pluralizing words ending in -eau.  They add an -x to the word, so we would end up with Patureaux.  But like I said, we’re talking about the American Patureau family.  

Marie Emma Landry Patureau circa 1880.

More important than the title is the fact that I’m posting another photo of Marie Emma Landry Patureau.  I think I’ll just refer to her as Maman Emma.  That’s what I called her when I shared that first photo of her back in 2021.  That photo was a crop of her from a family photo from 1864.  She was younger in that photo, which means that she had given birth to fewer children and had experienced fewer deaths of her children.  Those things can definitely change a person.

I’ve estimated that the photo was taken around 1880, which would mean that she was a widow.  Her husband Ferdinand Pierre Patureau died in 1877 after having an accident in the family sawmill business.  I’m pretty sure she was a witness to this accident, though I can’t find that bit of information presently.  What I did find in my search was a news report that a storm blew through Plaquemine in August of 1879 – The Great Storm of 1879 – and the Patureau sawmill was leveled.  That Maman Emma went through a lot.  I won’t talk about the attempted burglary of her home – that happened a few years after this photo was taken.

Framed print of Emma Patureau (unedited)

In 1880 she was 50 years old, and she had ten living children.   She had given birth to six more children who had died at various ages.   She also had the first three of her many grandchildren.  I descend from her second oldest surviving son Vincent Maximilian Patureau.  We call him Grampa Max.  His daughter Germaine Erie Patureau Landry was the mother of my father Robert Joseph Landry, Jr.

I got this photo in November of 2021.  That’s the same time that I got the other photo of Maman Emma.  It’s from the Pierre Ferdinand Patureau Papers at the Tyrrell Historic Library in Beaumont, Texas.  I had seen the other one before, but this one was new to me.  I was very excited for both of the photos.  This one looks like an original photo, but it is in poor shape.  There is a lot of cracking all over the photo.  I worked on it a bit when I first got the photo but wasn’t too pleased with it.  I finally got around to doing a bit more tonight.   

It’s not perfect, but it’s better.  I’m posting the unedited version of it so you can see what it looked like.  I also like the matt they used for the photo.  Another great thing about it is that someone labeled the photo, so we know with absolute certainty that it is Maman Emma.  Since the Collection in Beaumont was started by Emma’s daughter Victorine and continued by Victorine’s daughter Katherine Winnie “Kitty” Cropper, I would think that Kitty was the one that we can thank for that.

So her name was Emma Landry Patureau.  Her husband Ferdinand Patureau was a French immigrant that came to America with his family.  He had one brother who came here also, but Abel had no children.  Ferdinand was the only one to carry on the Patureau name here in the United States.  And he did that with his Landry wife.  As I once said, “I Am a Patureau,” since my grandmother was a Patureau.  In the same manner, any Patureau in the US can say, “I Am a Landry.”  Isn’t that something that everyone wished they could say?  Well, maybe they don’t.  But a Patureau descendant can.  I’d like all of you to say it at least once, in honor of Maman Emma.

Here, I’ll get you started.  I am a Landry!

Congratulatory letter from 1921 sent to Erie Patureau before her marriage later that month.

The main thing I’m sharing today is a letter that I saw for the first time last year.  It was in Box 301 in my Aunt Wana’s attic.  I’ve shared a few wonderful photos that were hiding away in that box, and there are still a few more to come.  There were a few other documents in there as well.  They mostly were associated with the Patureau family name, which is the family of my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau.  This is a letter that was addressed to her, but in some way it was directed to my grandfather Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.

If you look at the head of the letter (which I just did), you’ll see that it is from the desk of Edwin L. Stephens, who was the president of Southwestern Louisiana Institute in Lafayette, Louisiana, at the time.  He addressed her as Erie and identified himself as her friend.  Young Erie had left Plaquemine, Louisiana, in 1912 after finishing high school.  Her father Max Patureau moved the whole family to Lafayette that year because he was starting a veterinarian practice in the Lafayette area.  Her maternal grandmother had moved there a few years previous.

That worked out well for Erie because she started at SLI that year.  I think she took three years to get her teaching certificate and started teaching in Lafayette subsequently.  She was teaching elementary school children, so I don’t think she was associated with SLI in any professional way.  In the 1920 Census she is shown in the household of her aunt Clemence Babin Landry.  Clemence was the half-sister of Erie’s mother Marie Therese Landry Patureau, who had died in 1909.  Clemence and Marie Therese were two of the daughters of Marie Amelie “Belite” Bujol Landry Babin.  Grandma Belite was also in this 1920 household.  Her second husband had died the year before.  I descend from her and her first husband, who was Trasimond Landry.  Her second husband was Magloire Babin.

I don’t know why my grandmother was in the household of Clemence and her husband Louis Landry.  I think her dad was living in Lafayette at the time, but I have yet to be able to find Max Patureau in the 1920 Census.  Where was he?  Maybe I haven’t searched with all the possible ways of spelling the name Patureau by various people over the years:  Pattero, Paturo, Pacherou, Patterow, Pattercan, Pastureau.  Sometimes you have to get really creative with your spelling to find someone.

Robert Joseph Landry, Sr. circa 1918 during World War I

If I didn’t know my family, I would think that she might have met her husband-to-be because Rob Landry was the youngest brother of Louis Landry.  But he wasn’t just her aunt’s brother-in-law, he was the first cousin of Erie’s deceased mother.  So she didn’t meet him during that time, but she may have seen him more and heard about his comings and goings from his brother.  

During her time in Lafayette, Rob had been involved with semi-professional baseball and also joined the military.  He went off to training in Virginia.  He never actually saw any action because the war ended and he was discharged.  I don’t know when their courtship began or when they decided to get married.  I have some photos from July 1921 that look like they might be engagement photos, but they could have been engaged for a while.

But when the president of SLI heard about the engagement, he felt a need to send Erie a note of congratulations to the fortunate young gentleman in winning such a fine girl.  I’ve always heard that it was improper to congratulate a woman on hearing of an engagement.  It is appropriate, however, to offer her best wishes.  And that’s what he did – he wished them both long life and happiness. 

So they tried with the best of their abilities to make his wish come true.

Germaine Erie Patureau circa 1910 in Plaquemine, Louisiana.

Here is a photo of my paternal grandmother when she was around 14 or 15 years old.  You remember her, right?  Her grandchildren all knew her as Mee Maw and they all think that they’re her favorite.  I found something my dad wrote years ago, and it said that she tried to make sure that we all felt that way.  It must have worked.

Her name was Germaine Erie Patureau and she was born on August 6, 1895, in Crescent, Louisiana.  That is a small community just west of Plaquemine, Louisiana, along the Bayou Road.  She was the second generation of the French Patureau family that was born in the United States.  Her grandfather Ferdinand Patureau was born in France, but he died in 1877 after a tragic accident in his sawmill.

Her father was Max Patureau who was born in Mexico in 1865 when the family moved there temporarily during the American Civil War.  The family came back to Plaquemine later in 1865 and that’s where Max grew up.  It was a large family, and they spoke both English and French.  Max’s mother was Marie Emma Landry.  When he got married in 1888, he married Marie Therese Landry.  Marie Therese’s father was Trasimond Landry, who was a first cousin of Max’s mother Emma.

Max and Therese had a large family as well, and Erie was the fourth child.  After her birth, Therese gave birth to ten more children over the next fourteen years.  Her mom didn’t have much of a break during that time.  On top of that, not all of those children survived.  A set of twins born in 1900 only lived for a few days.  In 1904 Therese’s sister Manette died after giving birth to a daughter with the same name.  Therese and Max’s last three children were born in 1906, 1907, and 1909.  Then they died in 1908, 1908, and 1909, respectively.  Sadly, Therese died in 1909 as well.  She gave birth to a daughter on September 28th, she died on October 4th, and the newborn daughter died on October 9th.

This must have been a really tough time for our Erie.  This photo was taken some time around then.  She was a young high school girl growing up in a Cajun/French household in southern Louisiana and she just lost her mother.  If you think of that when you look at this photo, you might see some sadness in her eyes.  Or that could just be the characteristic shape of her eyes that has been passed down to many of her grandchildren. (I’ve always thought of them as droopy eyes.)

My line of the family didn’t stay in Plaquemine much longer.  Erie would finish high school in 1912.  At around the same time, Max decided to move the family to Lafayette to build a larger veterinarian practice.  Erie would enter higher education at Southwest Louisiana Institute (SLI) to study to become a teacher.  She taught first grade in Lafayette a few years but then decided to marry a Landry of her own.  She married Rob Landry on November 12, 1921, at St. John’s Cathedral in Lafayette.  They then made their home in Lake Charles and lived happily ever after.

Rob Landry & Erie Patureau

Today completes nine full years of writing a weekly blog about family history.  That’s right!  I’ve written at least one post a week for the past nine years.  I’ve had a few weeks where I’ve added a Surplus Sunday or FollowUp Friday to the mix.  With all of that and including this post, I’ll be just four posts short of 500 posts.  Wow, that’s a lot of words and pictures.  The first post I wrote and the one from last week were about my maternal grandmother Myrtle Phenice Bucklin.

So it’s time for something from my Landry side of the family.  You would think with all of these posts I would have covered all of the major milestones in my families’ lives.  But I haven’t.  I’ve missed a few important anniversaries along the way.  So instead of giving a greatest hits recap, I’ll give a recap of a couple of posts that should have been.  

Newspaper article from Nov. 12, 1921, in Lafayette, Louisiana.

The post that I didn’t write in November of 2021 was about the marriage of my paternal grandparents Robert Joseph Landry and Germaine Erie Patureau:  Today is the 100th anniversary of the wedding of my paternal grandparents.  Rob Landry and Erie Patureau were married on November 12, 1921, in Lafayette, Louisiana.  I still find it hard to believe that there are no photos of that wonderful event.  I’ve never seen a single one.  According to the newspaper article, Erie was given away by her father Max Patureau and her sister Therese “attended” her.  There doesn’t seem to be any family disharmony going on.  It even says there was a nice reception with friends and family in attendance.  A few years later Therese was married and there are lots of photos of that event. 

I don’t know the story of their courtship either.  I think they knew each other their whole lives.  Rob Landry was a first cousin of Erie’s mother Marie Therese Landry Patureau.  Even though Rob was born and grew up in Westlake, Louisiana, and Erie was born and grew up in Crescent, Louisiana, the families would have gotten together through their formative years.  Even though I’ve heard that back then marriage between cousins was very common, it wasn’t true on my mom’s side of the family or other family trees I’ve seen.  My dad’s family tree is an entangled mess!  I think a big influence on that was the fact that they were of Cajun and French heritage, and they spoke French.  So there was more of a motivation to marry within your own group.  You could understand each other.  It doesn’t happen as much nowadays, so everyone looks at you oddly when you tell them your grandparents were related as closely as they were.

The other post that I didn’t write at the end of April in 2023 was about my paternal grandparents becoming parents:  Today marks the 100th anniversary of the day that Rob and Erie became parents.  On April 30, 1923, in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Rob and Erie Landry welcomed to their household little Marie Therese Landry.  Even though they started their family somewhat late, Rob was 30 and Erie was 27, they went on to have seven more children – ending up with a balanced group of four boys and four girls. 

They grew up in a close family and those siblings were close all of their lives. I’m glad to be part of that close-knit family.

Vincent Maximilian Patureau and Marie Therese Patureau circa 1888.

I suppose this is a strange title for this really beautiful photo of my great grandparents.  But there is a reason for it.  Eight years ago I posted their wedding photo from 1888.  In the accompanying newspaper article, it talked about the bride and groom looking at their best.  So that post was titled “At Their Best.”  Since those people knew them personally, I’ll take their word for it that they were at their best.

But this photo shows them off pretty good, too.  Wouldn’t you agree with that?  I was so excited to find this photo in a group of photos that my Duffy cousins were showing to a few of us other cousins after a family funeral.  I’m certain that the photos come from my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry.  The couple in the photo are her parents Vincent Maximilian “Max” Patureau and Marie Therese Landry.  We knew our grandmother as Mee Maw, and she was the mother of my dad Bob Landry.  Daddy’s sister was Wana Landry Duffy and she was the one who had these photos after Mee Maw died in 1973.  They were sitting up in Box 301 in her attic for many years waiting to be discovered.

So we were exploring the contents of Box 301.  When I first saw the photo, I was thinking it was another copy of their wedding photo.  But then I realized that they were not wearing the same thing as from that other photo.  The photo was taken at the same studio with the same background, so I’m thinking it was taken the same day.  I’ve seen more than one copy of the one of them in their wedding attire, but this is the first time I’ve seen this version.  They were married on October 10, 1888, in Brusly, Louisiana, so I’m thinking this was taken a short time previous to that.

Max was 23 years old at the time.  He had been born in Matamoras, Mexico, but grew up in Plaquemine, Louisiana.  When he was growing up, his French immigrant father Ferdinand had a sawmill.  Max was just 11 years old when Ferdinand died as a result of an accident at that sawmill.  He helped his mother Emma Landry Patureau and older brother Leobon out with the sawmill as he got older.  According to one newspaper article, he cut his leg while shaving barrel hoops in 1885.  He set up a business of selling and delivering groceries in 1887.  So he was known as an enterprising young man in 1888.

Therese, meanwhile, turned 20 years old just a month before their wedding.  She had been born in Brusly, Louisiana, which is where she grew up.  Her father was Trasimond Landry.  He had been a Veteran of the Civil War from the south.  He worked as a farmer and was also a clerk of court.  He died when Therese was only 10 years old.  Her mother, Marie Amelie “Belite” Bujol Landry remarried shortly afterward to Magloire Babin.  Therese went to school at St. Joseph’s Academy, which was in downtown Baton Rouge at the time.  She was a devout Catholic and sang in the church choir.

Custom has it that the wedding takes place in the bride’s hometown.  That’s what happened with Max and Therese.  They were married at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Brusly.  I’m sure there were lots of family members that showed up for the exchange of nuptials.  Since Max’s mom was Landry, he was related to Therese.  They were second cousins, in fact.  So some family members might have had a hard time deciding what side of the church to sit on! 

Even though both of their father’s died when they were young, both of their mothers were probably in attendance at the wedding.  Emma Landry Patureau would likely be there for her son.  Belite Bujol Landry Babin was surely there to see her daughter as the bride and her younger daughter Kate Landry as a bridesmaid. Besides being with her husband Mack Babin, she probably was sitting with her mother who was still alive at the time. Her mother was yet another Landry family member – Anna Adele Landry Bujol.  Adele was living with Belite and her family during the 1880 Census, so she would have been close to her granddaughter Therese.

I’m so glad we have this other image of the young couple from the time of their marriage.  I’d be tempted to say that they look to be at their best.  And I might be right!

My godfather has died.  It was pretty much expected, but it is always sad when family members die.  I’m talking about my Uncle Johnny, the last of my dad’s siblings to pass away.  There were eight children in all.  I recently got a new photo of the family from the new Box 301 Collection.  It’s only new in that I had never seen it before.  The photo itself was taken around 1939 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

The Rob & Erie Patureau Landry family circa 1939 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

I usually start with the oldest first, but since this is a post about the youngest, I’ll start with him first.  You can see little Johnny standing in the front of this photo.  He’s only about three years old, so I estimate that it was taken around 1939.  John Alfred Xavier Landry was born August 2, 1936, and died July 28, 2024.  He was five days short of his 88th birthday.

The sibling closest in age to him was Frances Mae (1934-2020).  She’s standing in front to the right.  She was about two years younger than Wana Lidwin (1932-2014).  She’s the little girl standing behind Johnny. The next older sibling was Robert Joseph Jr., who is also standing in the front of the older ones.  That’s my dad, and he was known as Bobbie back then.  He lived from 1929 to 2017.  He was seven days short of his 88th birthday.  So he lived just two days less than his younger brother Johnny.

Less than two years older than Bobbie was his sister Germaine (1927-2020).  She is standing next to him in the dress with the white collar.  Her older siblings are the first three shown on the back row on the left.  Hubert was the third child and he lived from 1925 to 2006.   A. J. (Alcide Joseph) was second and he lived from 1924-2018.  He lived the longest at 94 years, 5 months, and 25 days.  Of the girls, Germaine lived the longest at 93 years, 3 months, and 9 days.  The oldest child was Aunt Marie.  Marie Therese lived from 1923 to 1998.  She had the shortest lifespan.  She died a month short of her 75th birthday.  All eight of the siblings were born in Lake Charles, Louisiana, to Rob (1893-1957) and Erie Patureau (1895-1973) Landry.  They can be seen on the right in this photo.

Bobbie and Johnny Landry in 1946 in Lake Charles, LA

This second photo is one I’ve had for a while.  I decided a few years ago that I would use it for when Uncle Johnny died.  It’s such a sweet photo of him with my dad.  My dad and all of his siblings were close to each other.  Most of them lived in Lake Charles, so there were lots of get togethers through the years.  Plus, they would get three or four of them together regularly to play cards till all hours of the night.  There was a lot of laughing involved.  There may have been some discussion of rules, but I wouldn’t really call it arguing.  It was mostly fun and games.

Daddy and Johnny were really close.  He was my dad’s handy man!  Johnny told me that my dad informed my mom quite early in their relationship that he was not a handy man.  He reminded me of that at our last visit with him a few weeks ago.  I’m glad I got a chance to visit with him then.  He also told me that my mom used to hitchhike when she was in college.  I don’t remember hearing that before.  Maybe she was just catching rides with friends and acquaintances. 

They also liked to hunt together.  I’ve written a post about that before.  Another thing he told me at our last visit was that he had never heard my dad curse, even when he brought the wrong ammunition for the gun he brought for hunting.  I think Johnny was not averse to using colorful language, because he remembered that event as a time when Daddy would have been justified in using a few choice words.

And now they’re both gone.  As are their parents and siblings.  It’s the end of an era.  A spectacular era.