Landry Tomb
Ascension Catholic Church Cemetery, St. Vincent and Claiborne Sts., Donaldsonville, LAThe Landry Tomb is significant on the state level in the area of architecture as one of the most outstanding extant examples of antebellum Louisiana funerary architecture. Louisiana is known for its large elaborately designed tombs, but virtually all of the more impressive ones date from the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries. Prior to the Civil War, the finest Classical Revival tombs tended to be sarcophagi (sometimes double sarcophagi) with a pediment at each end and a set of corner pilasters. The Landry Tomb is far pretentious than this. Its two-stage design with four massive corner piers, urns, and a pavilion top which presents a full pedimented portico on each side represent a much bolder and more ambitious approach to funerary architecture than was common at the time.
The Landry Tomb was built in 1845 and is attributed to James Dakin by his biographer, Arthur Scully, Jr. Scully's conclusion that the tomb was "in all likelihood" designed by Dakin is based upon the architectural evidence and a drawing in Dakin's collection of a building which strongly resembles the tomb.
There are 24 vaults in the Landry Tomb. One of the individuals buried there is the one to whom it is dedicated, Joseph Landry, who died in 1814 and was moved into the present tomb in 1845.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.