Old Fort Rosalie Gift Shop, 500 South Canal Street, Natchez, Adams County, MS

Significance: Although not initially envisioned as a restaurant, the plan for the building was always tied to the tourist trade. It served as the gift shop and visitors' entrance for Jefferson Davis Dickson's 1940-41 reconstruction of the eighteenth-century, French fort called Rosalie. The entry, paired as it was with a merchandising endeavor, necessarily pandered to the public. It was situated on Canal Street to accommodate the increased automobile traffic heading through town toward the newly constructed Natchez-Vidalia (Louisiana) Bridge. It also took the form of a log cabin, an architectural choice intended both to catch the attention of the passers-by and to be an authentic reproduction.

Dickson's replica of Fort Rosalie was located just as the original French fort was, on the bluff, behind what is now Canal Street, and high above the Mississippi River. The twentieth-century interpretation of the fort included features such as a stockade and double stockade, storehouse, chapel, barracks and officers quarters, Commander's headquarters and bedroom, Council room, powder magazine, observation tower, blacksmith shop, guard house, kitchen and mess hall, and parade grounds, in addition to the entrance building at 500 South Canal Street. All of the buildings and rooms, moreover, were furnished. Of these, eight structures in addition to the entrance and gift shop building are marked on the Sanborn map that was updated beginning in the mid-1940s and finished in August of 1950.

Dickson's reconstruction of Fort Rosalie resembled other, larger-scale preservation and restoration efforts occurring elsewhere in the country, notably Henry Ford's Greenfield Village, John D. Rockefeller and W.A.R. Goodwin's Colonial Williamsburg, Henry Francis DuPont's Winterthur, Mr. and Mrs. Henry Flynt's Historic Deerfield, and the Wells Historical Museum (Old Sturbridge Village). These men sought to preserve remnants of the past, specifically the colonial era, and, at times, chose to recreate that past or their vision of it. The places they shaped also were intended to present a history lesson, if only as a reminder of what was. Dickson capitalized on this trend toward preservation and history education, a movement that gained momentum in the National Park Service during the 1930s and guided work at privately-owned historic sites. Dickson's version of the French fort was built in a manner identifiable with the pioneer, the frontier, and the conquering of the American west. It was an irresistible lure, for the showman with a fondness for his birthplace and for those tourists out to "see America first."

Unprocessed Field note material exists for this structure: N1055

Survey number: HABS MS-274

Building/structure dates: 1940 Initial Construction

gift shops restaurants natchez miss rosalie gift shop old fort rosalie gift shop south canal street natchez adams adams county mississippi fred l decker jefferson davis dickson historic american buildings survey tommy jones virginia b price mark schara noah steffes photo ultra high resolution high resolution john d rockefeller old house maps cabin library of congress old magazines archive

1940 - 1980

Library of Congress

http://www.loc.gov/

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