The Pitot House Museum

This guide to The Pitot House Museum in New Orleans traces the raised Creole house Spanish colonial official Bartolome Bosque built in 1799 as a family escape from the fevers and noise of the young city, and the bayou-side stretch that made it possible, where boats from Lake Pontchartrain could glide almost to the back door. It follows the house's namesake, James Pitot, a French-born businessman who became New Orleans's first mayor after the Louisiana Purchase and ran the company controlling boat traffic on that same bayou. Look up at the wraparound galleries and outdoor stairway, and notice there is no hallway inside at all.