An obituary scrapbook

I don’t know how an obituary scrapbook ended up in a batch of Orleans Parish court records that were scanned at some point. However, I can imagine.

Clerk to archivist: You’ve scanned all the civil records dated before 1900. Oh, there’s also this.

Archivist: What’s this?

Clerk: Miss Ruby’s scrapbook. Well, you didn’t know Miss Ruby, but she worked here for 55 years and she liked to paste obits into a scrapbook. Anyhoo, would you like to scan it? She mostly collected obits for European royalty, but she occasionally pasted in a local obit.

Archivist: Okey dokey.

Actually, I don’t know who put together this scrapbook. I’m willing to bet it was someone who’d worked for the clerk of court long enough to always be known as Miss, but I’m just guessing.

I was amused to see a black-edged death notice for the queen. Were these pasted up in New Orleans? The queen in question was Victoria, who died in 1901.

I also found a long obit for Michel Bergeron who died on his 42nd wedding anniversary. Despite his inclusion in a scrapbook mainly devoted to long forgotten European royalty, he was very much a Louisiana man.

Enjoy!