Skip to main content

Louisiana State Capitol And Gardens

Louisiana State Capitol And Gardens

The present state capitol building of Louisiana, a 34-story, 450-foot Alabama limestone-clad skyscraper, is the final resting place of politician Huey Long.

The present state capitol building of Louisiana, located in Baton Rouge, will forever be entwined with the political career of Huey Pierce Long. It was Long's idea for the state to construct a new building for the statehouse in 1928 when he was running for Governor of the State of Louisiana. The construction of the building was part of his political platform, as well as the notion to place the state capitol on the site, which was once Louisiana State University and formerly a military post known as the Pentagon Barracks. Included was a strip of land on which the Arsenal Museum was located. Long had contracted with a New Orleans architectural firm, Weiss, Dreyfous and Seiferth, to design the building. Next, Governor Long had pushed through an amendment which financed the new capitol by the end of the 1930 Legislative Section. Within 36 days of the completion of the final design, actual construction by the George A. Fuller Company of Washington, D.C. had begun. The construction work took 29 months to complete and the dedication was coordinated with the inauguration of Oscar K. Allen as Governor on May 16, 1932. Ironically, Long was not present because he had been elected to the U.S. Senate and was in Washington, D.C.

The Louisiana Capitol, a 34-story, 450-foot Alabama limestone-clad skyscraper, is an excellent example of a greatly simplified classicism with Art Deco details that were in vogue for monumental buildings in the late 1920s. Only two other state capitols had been built with this design and its 34-story frame is to date unrivaled by any other building in Louisiana. The tower is decorated with important groups of sculpture representing the history of the State. Long was assassinated in the Capitol Building, the building for which he fought to be constructed and used as the state's government seat, and died on September 10, 1935. However, he was fittingly buried in the center of the public Capitol Gardens on the State Capitol's grounds. His memorial, a statue showing him holding a model of his monument, stands proudly in the English Garden in the shadow of the skyscraper that was part of his political platform for governor.

We hope you enjoy our work.

Please support this 72-year tradition of trusted historical writing and the volunteers that sustain it with a donation to American Heritage.

Donate

Featured Articles

Often thought to have been a weak president, Carter was strong-willed in doing what he thought was right, regardless of expediency or the political fallout.

Rarely has the full story been told how a famed botanist, a pioneering female journalist, and First Lady Helen Taft battled reluctant bureaucrats to bring Japanese cherry trees to Washington. 

Why have thousands of U.S. banks failed over the years? The answers are in our history and politics.

In his Second Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln embodied leading in a time of polarization, political disagreement, and differing understandings of reality.

Native American peoples and the lands they possessed loomed large for Washington, from his first trips westward as a surveyor to his years as President.

A hundred years ago, America was rocked by riots, repression, and racial violence.

During Pres. Washington’s first term, an epidemic killed one tenth of all the inhabitants of Philadelphia, then the capital of the young United States.

Now a popular state park, the unassuming geological feature along the Illinois River has served as the site of centuries of human habitation and discovery.  

The recent discovery of the hull of the battleship Nevada recalls her dramatic action at Pearl Harbor and ultimate revenge on D-Day as the first ship to fire on the Nazis.

Our research reveals that 19 artworks in the U.S. Capitol honor men who were Confederate officers or officials. What many of them said, and did, is truly despicable.

Here is probably the most wide-ranging look at Presidential misbehavior ever published in a magazine.

When Germany unleashed its blitzkreig in 1939, the U.S. Army was only the 17th largest in the world. FDR and Marshall had to build a fighting force able to take on the Nazis, against the wishes of many in Congress.