Imperial Calcasieu Museum

Imperial Calcasieu was the nickname of the original parish, created on March 24, 1840 from St. Landry Parish and the largest in Louisiana. The name Calcasieu is traced to an Atakapa leader, Katkosh Yok, "Crying Eagle," whom the French recorded as Quelqueshue. The seat moved to Lake Charles in 1852, Cameron Parish was split off in 1870, and in 1912 Allen, Beauregard and Jefferson Davis parishes were created from it. In 1860 the parish counted 5,928 people, 1,171 of them enslaved.

The Junior League of Lake Charles founded the museum in March 1963, first in City Hall and then in a small brick building on Lakeshore Drive. Its permanent home at 204 West Sallier Street, a 4,000-square-foot Louisiana Colonial-style building completed for $100,000, was a gift of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Gibson and Dr. and Mrs. Garnett Barham. The museum's Sallier Oak is believed to have been planted by Charles Sallier in 1783; Catherine LeBleu Sallier donated the land in 1860. The tree belongs to the Live Oak Society and carries a Daughters of the American Revolution marker.

The collections include Native American pottery fragments and arrowheads from the Lake Charles region, cannonballs believed to come from one of Jean Lafitte's ships and found while dredging Contraband Bayou, photographs of early Lake Charles, replicas of the ten flags that have flown over Louisiana, and the uniform of Gen. Claire Chennault with Anna Chennault's wedding gown. The Gibson-Barham Gallery hosts changing exhibitions. Hours are short, Tuesday to Saturday, and adults pay $5.