The center is a unit of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve, set in Eunice, a prairie city lying in St. Landry and Acadia parishes. Exhibits cover Cajun history, language, music and architecture, with bilingual French and English panels on the Acadian deportation and the arrival of other cultures in Louisiana. A Courir de Mardi Gras exhibit shows costumes and photographs of the chicken run. The center's own motto is Ici on parle francais.
The Park Service dates the removal of the Acadians to 1755 and says nearly 4,000 had settled in rural areas west of New Orleans by the early 1800s, some in bayou country and others on the southwest Louisiana prairies raising cattle and rice. According to 64 Parishes, by the 1810s they had split into wealthy planters who held enslaved people, a middle class, and a large body of poor subsistence farmers from whom the Cajun people grew.
Admission and programs are free. The center has offered Cajun French conversation, cooking demonstrations, quilting and dance lessons, and Saturday evening music, and it served as a temporary home for the Rendez-vous des Cajuns show while the Liberty Theatre was closed. The Liberty, opened July 19, 1924, had a balcony segregated by race, joined the National Register in 1987, and is not open to the public as restoration continues.
The closest stops worth working into your route
Roadside plaques and monuments within a short detour