Laurel Valley Sugar Plantation, Shotgun Quarters, 2 miles South of Thibodaux on State Route 308, Thibodaux, Lafourche Parish, LA

Significance: This structure is linear in construction and used extensively in Bayou LaFourche plantations and the surrounding area. The term is derived from the belief that a shotgun could be fired from the front door through the back door without any buckshot damage along its path. For the most part Laurel Valley's twenty-six houses follow the general shotgun design. They are one room wide, two rooms long, and have centered front and rear doors, but they differ in that there is a staggered interior door in the central partition near the single heart fireplace. Tenants used the front rooms for sleeping and the rear for cooking and eating. A wash window was located on a side wall in the rear room. The Laurel Valley shotguns were built between 1904 and 1920 by Barker-Lepine. They were used by individual families who worked on the plantation, undoubtedly as field hands or general laborers.
Survey number: HAER LA-1-J
Building/structure dates: 1920 Initial Construction