A Girl's Life in New Orleans

The Diary of Ella Grunewald, 1884–1886

Hans C. Rasmussen

• Publisher: LSU Press
• Year: 2023
• eBook ISBN: 9780807179970
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

A Girl's Life in New Orleans presents the diary of Ella Grunewald, an upper-middle-class teenager in New Orleans at the end of the nineteenth century. Grunewald, the daughter of one of the Crescent City's leading music dealers, used her journal to record the major events of her day-to-day life, documenting family, friendships, schooling, musical education, and social activities. Her entries frequently describe illness, death, and other tragedies. Though attentive to the city's classical music scene, Grunewald also recounts theater shows, Carnival balls and parades, Catholic religious observances, and the World's Fair that the city hosted in 1884.Expertly annotated and introduced by Hans Rasmussen, Grunewald's journal is a rare window on the life of a young woman in the South between 1884 and 1886. Adding depth to that account, Rasmussen includes a shorter journal Grunewald kept of her family's travels in Italy and Germany in the spring of 1890. In it, she describes visits to Catholic churches, museums, Roman ruins, and other tourist attractions. Tragically, Grunewald contracted malaria during the latter part of the journey and died overseas at age twenty-two.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• A Note on the Diaries
• DIARY OF LIFE IN NEW ORLEANS (September 21, 1884–April 16, 1886)
• INTERLUDE (April 1886–May 1890)
• DIARY OF TRAVELS IN EUROPE (May 22, 1890–June 23, 1890)
• NEWSPAPER ACCOUNTS ABOUT ELLA GRUNEWALD (July 5, 1890–April 1, 1896)
• Note on the Ella Grunewald Journal
• Index