My father, who presently lives nearby here in Fort Lauderdale, spent a number of his childhood and early teenage years living in Venice, Louisiana. If you don't recognize the name of the town, don't be embarrassed, even today it has a population of about 2200 and encompasses 2.6 square miles of levee land south and east of New Orleans.

Here are some photos of Buras, Venice, Boothville and the surrounding area after Hurricane Katrina.

Dad's family eventually moved to Bastrop, Louisiana where two of his brothers still live today.

Dad's sister, Diana, has been keeping close tabs on them in the aftermath of Katrina. She is sending us letters about family, friends and people we know in the affected area. I will be sharing them with my family and friends here on the blog.

In addition to serving ourselves, maybe someone else will find information about someone or some place that they care about in the letters.

I spoke with Jim today and he said they had found all the students they had been looking for in Pine Bluff at a campground. They are staying put as all the campgrounds are loaded to capacity. Of the eleven people that are at his house he thinks only one of them is going back to Austria. He expects that the rest will be there for awhile. They heard from Alice's sister's husband and he is driving a truck up above Lake Ponchitrain at a red cross shelter. He brings in supplies and leaves them at the camp. Since Alice's sister Margaret Ann and her husband are both retired they will be fine on income. Not as good for the other folks as they are out of jobs. Jim said the church is feeding many of the refugees tonight.

He said the banks and phones go through Baton Rouge so they can't use credit cards at all and the land lines are sporadic. His cell does not work at all. They do have electricity but may run out of gasoline for the cars soon. This all in about as far north as you can get in Louisiana.

Word from Martha is that Judy (Uncle Zeb's youngest)and her family had evacuated. Not sure about her house since Slidell was hit pretty hard.

Posted by Michael at September 2, 2005 08:56 AM

Posted by: Diana at September 2, 2005 09:43 PM