New Orleans Founded

May 7, 1718

Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville chose a crescent in the Mississippi delta, above swamps and below bluffs, and had his men cut a grid from the cane. He named it for the Regent of France. In time the river town would speak French, Spanish, English, Creole, and jazz. Built below sea level and rebuilt after every flood and fever, it became America's most improbable and irreplaceable city.