St. Anne Catholic Church

St. Anne's Catholic Church is locally significant because it is a landmark within the architectural patrimony of Assumption Parish.

Assumption is one of Louisiana's older parishes, having been legally established in 1807. Its early population consisted of persons of French, Spanish, Acadian, and German descent. This mixture was expanded by the addition of Anglo-Americans after Louisiana became, first a territory (1803), and finally a state within the United States (1812).

Agriculture has always been the parish's economic mainstay, with sugar cane as the dominant crop. Perhaps because of its rural focus, Assumption has never developed large communities. The small town of Napoleonville is the only place of any size, and its population is only 802.

Despite its long history, Assumption Parish has few real architectural landmarks. The Division of Historic Preservation's Standing Structures Survey for the parish records approximately 2,000 buildings defined as historic (50 years old or more). According to survey records, the vast majority of Assumption's residences are small Creole cottages, shotguns, bungalows, and simple versions of Queen Anne Revival and Eastlake cottages. A handful of the latter display well-developed gallery decoration, and a few houses have projecting Queen Anne bays. Nevertheless, most of the parish's domestic architecture can only be described as undistinguished. Additionally, the survey shows that, for the most part, the region's commercial buildings also fall into the undistinguished category.

Against this background, the parish's few landmark buildings assume added importance. These include one otherwise simple cottage whose major feature is a large octagonal turret reflecting the influence of the Queen Anne Revival style, two historic school buildings (one a restrained version of the Beaux Arts style, the other displaying a restrained Neo-Classical design), a small Neo-Classical style bank, two Romanesque commercial buildings, an Italian villa style parish courthouse with its accompanying Italianate jail, two major antebellum Greek Revival plantation houses found along Bayou Lafourche, and four architecturally important churches.

St. Anne is also architecturally significant because its ornate basilica is one of the very few grand interiors in the parish. The others of note are the Greek Revival style Madewood Plantation House, the 1889 dining room at Belle Alliance Plantation House (both National Register), and four National Register-listed churches. The only other possibility for an elaborate interior would be the 1896 parish courthouse, but here the public spaces were never richly styled.

Historical Note

St. Anne is the second church to stand within the two-block parcel. The first, known as St. Napoleon (but not named for the town), was built in 1874. It was replaced because its congregation had outgrown the facility. Work began in 1908 and ended the following year. The building was constructed by C. C. Stewart of Baton Rouge for a cost of $30,000. Parishioners chose to name the new church after St. Anne, to whom they had prayed for assistance during a previous yellow fever epidemic.