Photograph: Susan Walker Anding (Photo from the Opelousas Museum and Interpretive Center Susan Walker Anding Collection.)
Carola Lillie Hartley
Publisher and Contributing Writer
As this year’s National Women’s History Month comes to an end, we share the story of a very special Opelousas woman, one who did great things for the town, the parish, the state and the country.
Through its long history women in Opelousas have contributed in many ways to the betterment of the community. In the early 1900s and until the end of the 1940s decade, a local woman is credited as making a real difference not only in the Opelousas community, but in the state and the nation as well. Her name was Susan Evangeline Walker Anding.
The oldest of six children, born in Opelousas, Louisiana on March 16, 1878, Susan was the daughter of Samuel R. Walker and Mary Elizabeth Boagni. Although her early records indicate her middle name as originally “Eliza,” she later changed it to “Evangeline,” the name of the fictional Acadian woman created by William Wadsworth Longfellow in his poem Evangeline published in 1847.
Having no Acadian ancestors, Susan’s only connection to the Acadians was the circumstance of her birth. Born in South Louisiana she became very much a part of the Acadian Culture. Although she had no Acadian blood relatives, she was very proud of her middle name and the place of her birth, and devoted years of her life to the promotion of the Acadian Culture.
Susan grew up in Opelousas and was educated in the local schools. Following elementary school, her formal education continued at the Academy of the Sacred Heart in Grand Coteau, LA and St. Mary’s Academy in San Antonio, Texas.
Susan married Allen Astor Anding and by 1900 the couple settled in a house on Union Street in Opelousas. There they raised five daughters and one son: Mamie (born in 1901), Eleanor (born in 1903), Susie (born in 1906), Constance (born in 1907), Pearl (born in 1909) and Allen (born in 1910).
She was immediately involved in working for the betterment of Opelousas and in her early years was active in the church, school, civic, and social clubs of the time. Following her marriage to A. A. Anding she became more involved in affairs of the town. Her husband was a member of the Opelousas Progressive League and she became a charter member of the Opelousas Civic League when it was organized in March of 1907. She immediately began to work hard for her community and her state. Opelousas residents knew if they wanted something done in town, they could call on Susan.
Through the Civic League Susan was involved in the creation of the City Park in Opelousas and other notable projects. The Civic League was a very active group, the female counterpart to the Opelousas Progressive League. The organization proposed many project to beautify Opelousas and create a good “quality of life” for its citizens. Besides the City Park, other projects started by the League included creating a public library and managing the town’s public cemetery. Susan was instrumental in moving these projects to completion.
She was very involved in the movement to have good roads in Louisiana. The campaign for good roads started in the late 1800s and soon came to Louisiana and Opelousas by the early 1900s. In 1907 when the St. Landry Clarion ran an article on the importance of having good road in the area, Susan became involved in that movement. She attended local and state meetings and got the women of the town to rally around the cause, which they worked on for many years.
The first straight line highway through the Atchafalaya Swamp region from Opelousas to Baton Rouge was constructed in the 1920s. Susan is credited with spearheading the successful project that created the Evangeline Highway (first known as Louisiana Route 7 and now known as U. S. Highway 190 from Opelousas to Baton Rouge, LA.) She ironed out a deal with the president of the railroad so that the highway could use the railroad bridge, with automobiles traveling right on top of the rails. This got her national attention and she served on four different national Good Roads organizations. In her lifetime she represented five governors—Luther Hall, Ruffin Pleasant, John M. Parker, Henry L. Fuqua, and Huey Long—at national “Good Highways” conventions and was the first female director of the board of the United States Good Road Association and served as the director of the Old Spanish Trail Association.
She was also an advocate of Women’ Rights and was active in the Woman’s Suffrage movement in Opelousas and Louisiana. She was one of the leading ladies in line when women were allowed to vote for the first time in Louisiana in 1920. The voting precinct was at the Town Market on the corner of Market and Bellevue streets in downtown Opelousas. Susan helped to organize the public reception held at the Market to note the occasion on the evening of the vote.
Perhaps one of the most notable projects Susan became involved with was the marketing and promotion of the Acadian Culture. At the beginning of the 20th century, growing awareness of the needs and interests of tourists led to demands for the beautification and promotion of local sites, such as the so-called Evangeline Oak in St. Martinville, where the real Evangeline allegedly glimpsed her beloved Gabriel. Business leaders in the region implored their neighbors to seize the commercial opportunities that the tourists represented.
No one better appreciated the potential significance of the Acadian past as a draw for tourists than Susan Anding. Although she could not claim Acadian ancestry, she still nurtured a strong attachment to all things Acadian that she traced to her lifelong exposure to the culture and a sentimental bond with her fictional namesake, Longfellow’s Evangeline.
Susan led the way. She organized a group called the Evangeline Girls, and took them to events and activities throughout Louisiana, and the nation. The Evangeline Girls even traveled to the two national political conventions in 1928, and the U. S. Presidential Inaugural in 1929.
Right: The Evangeline Girls and Susan Anding with First Lady Mrs. Hoover in Washington D.C. in 1929.
The successful marketing of the Acadian culture throughout the nation had immediate results. Soon plans were underway to create a National Park of the Acadian Culture in St. Martinville. Although those plans did not materialize, Susan’s work on this campaign eventually resulted in the creation of the Evangeline State Park in that St. Martin Parish town.
During World War II, Susan took time from her other projects to help in any way she could to support the country and the soldiers fighting the war. She constantly organized groups of attractive young ladies from the Opelousas area and chaperoned them to one or another of the army camps of the area, as a contribution to the morale of the soldiers.
Another one of Susan’s special projects was the creation of a blood bank, not just for Opelousas, but also for the entire state. On September 12, 1943 she announced she was organizing a Louisiana blood bank through the American Legion. She did a great job, and Louisiana was the first state in the country to have a blood bank. She also helped to secure the “Louisiana Blood Bank Ambulance Car” that toured the state. Susan was elected as the state chairperson of the first Louisiana Blood Bank.
In September of 1946 Susan was honored for her work with the American Legion and chosen as a delegate to represent the state at the National American Legion and Legion Auxiliary convention in San Francisco.
At the end of World War II, She was the driving force for creating the Garden of Memories, to remember the war dead, in the South City Park in Opelousas. She stared a fund raising campaign and managed to get sizable contributions from local businesses and organizations to complete the project. She also planned activities as fundraisers for the project, such as dances and dinners.
Susan was determined that the Garden of Memories got completed. She did what had to be done to make sure that happened. Like the time she dropped in to the St. Landry Parish Police Jury room to ask that jurors have the ground leveled in the Garden, and one of them pointed out that this was located inside the city, where the jury had no jurisdiction. “Don’t give me that jurisdiction stuff,” she said. They didn’t either. They leveled the ground. The Garden of Memories was competed and dedicated in August 1947.
Susan was very active in many organizations and served on many boards and commissions, locally, state wide and nationally. She was knows as a tireless worker and a real competitor. She was not just a member of these groups, but an officer and a leader. Besides all the ones already mentioned, she belonged of the League of Women Voters, the Catholic Daughters of America, the St. Landry Woman’s War Savings Campaign during WWI (chairperson), the St. Landry Woman’s Suffrage Party (chairperson), the National Tree Planting Association and the National Park Association.
Susan died on Thursday, February 19, 1948 at her home in Opelousas. She was 68 years of age. The entire community was saddened by her death and joined with her family in mourning the loss. She is buried in the St. Landry Catholic Church Cemetery, only a short distance from her home on Union Street.
As a tribute to this remarkable woman, the Opelousas Daily World ran an editorial praising her good works for the community and for the state. The editorial reminded Opelousas citizens and the citizens of the state how much they owed this women for what she did to make things a little better for those who came after. She accomplished so much in her lifetime, including the work she did to make sure that highway between Opelousas and Baton Rouge got done.
The editorial suggested that “the next time you glide along that Evangeline Highway towards Baton Rouge (now highway 190), give a thought to the lady who banged on the desk of the president of the Gulf Coast Lines, over in Baton Rouge, and made him admit that automobiles could use a railroad bridge, too!”
That editorial was a perfect description of the lady that was Susan Evangeline Walker Anding. The title proclaimed “She Was A Marvel!”
