New Orleans, Louisiana may soon rename its Robert E. Lee Boulevard after famed musician Allen Toussaint. Toussaint once lived on the street, where he wrote and produced some of the most acclaimed rhythm and blues music of the 20th century. According to a report by local CBS News affiliate 4WWL, it is one of more than 30 name changes New Orleans is considering.
The New Orleans City Council’s Street Renaming Commission met on Tuesday evening and voted to recommend changing Robert E. Lee Boulevard to honor Toussaint. It is not clear if the “Boulevard” will remain or if an entirely new name will take its place. Toussaint’s son, Reginald Toussaint, attended the meeting and thanked the commission for its consideration.
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“Everbody’s happy. You’re humbled by these things,” he said. “You’d like it if he was here to celebrate with us, but I can imagine how he’d feel right now.”
“These choices are our initial recommendations and may be tweaked as we complete the process based on additional public feedback and the final expert report,” added the commission’s vice chairman Mark Raymond. “We want to hear from as many people as possible about these recommendations. We’re not doing this in a silo. We want to hear from the public about these streets, about the history, about what they want to see in the future.”
The commission’s main goal in the short term is to remove the names of Confederate leaders and known white supremacists from public monuments around the city. They have a list of almost three-dozen such locations that will need new names, but the city’s rich history provides plenty of figures like Toussaint to take their place.
So far, two others have been made public. The first was Jefferson Davis Parkway, which has been approved to be renamed Dr. Norman Francis Parkway in honor of the longtime president of Xavier University, a historically Black university in Louisiana. The other is Lee Circle, which might be renamed for Leah Chase, a civil rights icon and beloved Creole cook. A statue of Lee was removed from Lee Circle in 2017.
Toussaint lived from 1938 to 2015, and wrote some of the most iconic songs of the century, such as “Whipped Cream,” “Java,” “Mother-in-Law,” “I Like It Like That,” “Fortune Teller,” “Ride Your Pony,” “Get Out of My Life, Woman,” “Working in the Coal Mine,” “Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky,” “Freedom For the Stallion,” “Here Come the Girls,” “Yes We Can Can,” “Play Something Sweet” and “Southern Nights.” He received the National Medal of Arts from former President Barack Obama in 2013, shortly before he passed away due to a heart attack. He was 77 years old.
