From A History of Pointe Coupee Parish by Brian J. Costello, copyright 1999.

Costello, one of Louisiana's most prolific authors, has published 15 books on Louisiana history, culture and genealogy and various minor works. He is an 11th generation Pointe Coupeean and a native and lifelong resident of False River drive, near New Roads. Costello is a 1992 graduate of Louisiana State University, President of Le Cercle Historique and chairman of the New Roads Lions Carnival Parade.

Pointe Coupée Parish commands a strategic location on the west bank of the Mississippi River in east-central Louisiana, upriver from Baton Rouge, and near the apex of the state's geographical and cultural French "Triangle." The parish is surrounded by major rivers on three sides, boasts two of the Mississippi's oxbow lakes, and is covered by a network of smaller streams. The Mississippi River figured prominently in Pointe Coupée's early history and continues to define much of the parish's character at the close of the 20th century.

The lower Mississippi Valley, of which Pointe Coupée Parish forms a part, appears to have been populated by aboriginal peoples as early as 1500 BC. In time, they came to settle and engage in agricultural pursuits on the natural levees of the Mississippi and its complicated network of daughter channels.

Generations of local tradition and early histories contend that Spanish explorer Hernando DeSoto and/or his party were the first Europeans to touch Pointe Coupee soil. In 1682, Rene Cavelier, Sieur de LaSalle, and his party became the first Europeans to descend the Mississippi Rivier past what is now Pointe Coupee. On April 9, they reached the river's mouth and claimed the entire valley, in the name of Louis XIV, for France.

From the expedition of Pierre LeMoyne, Sieur d'Iberville, and his band of Canadians up the Mississippi in 1699 comes the first known direct reference to what is know called "Pointe Coupee". This expedition was authorized by King Louis XIV and the Comte de Pontchartrain in order to take possession fo LaSalle's claim for France. Travelling upriver in two longboats on March 18 of that year, the Iberville party found a six-foot wide creek running from the river, the detour through which, Bayougoula Indians guides employed from downriver told Iberville, would save the party a day's journey around a great bend of the river.

"...after a great effort," in Iberville's own words, his men were able to remove a log jam from the 350-foot long portage and drag their pirogues through to the upper end of the great bend. Again in the main channel of the Mississippi, on what is now Pointe Coupee soil, Iberville and his crew set up tents and prepared supper.

Whether the name Pointe Coupee (French for "cut point") stemmed from the act of Iberville's portage or that the Mississippi's gradual adoption of the portage as its main channel has long been debated.

Three centuries have elapsed since Iberville's portage across the pointe coupee in 1699. During those 300 years, the parish's aboriginal cultures have entirely disappeared, their presence being supplanted by French, African, Spanish, Anglo-Saxon, Jewish, Asian and other peoples and mixtures of the above, Some immigrated to Pointe Coupee voluntarily, even expectantly, while others arrived in chains. Most of the parish's present-day 24,000 residents and countless others who have since moved on to other communities all cherish Pointe Coupee as a place where people form many walks of life can call "home."

In spite of the tenacity with which the Pointe Coupee population holds on to its old way of life, there are urban influences which are entering the parish and disturbing the status quo. Urban cultural characteristics are becoming more widespread with time. The population is more mobile than formerly, and experiences a greater variety of contacts with other areas. Recreation is now highly commercialized. Educational attainment, like the level of living, is gradually becoming higher than in by-gone days. In short, forces have been set in motion which seem to insure future social changes of great significance.