Choices and Changes: The Investigation of a Slave/Tenant Cabin Magnolia Plantation, Derry, Louisiana

The brick cabins of the Magnolia Plantation Quarters in Derry, Louisiana were occupied continuously from the early to mid 1840’s thru the late 1960’s where 7.5 of the brick cabins stand today. The investigation of a number of the home and yard spaces of this community conducted by Kenneth Brown, have yielded evidence of changing beliefs, landscape, architecture, use of space and a changing sense of unity and individualism. As a component of this larger project, the research presented in this thesis show these changes as they are manifested in one of the extant cabins and its associated yard spaces. Only a limited amount of archaeological research has been performed in and around postbellum tenant communities. The results of this research demonstrate the importance of the tenant community sites to the study of the continued development and evolution of African American culture.