CAMERON
This parish is almost totally
in the "
coast-marsh" area. On Its
northern
border are some patches of
prairie ; but these are so
inconsiderable as to hardly
deserve mention. Cameron has
not yet had her day. She must
await the future, and abide
her time in patience. She
will, doubtless, at some near
day, be a busy place
in canning fish, oysters, and
shrimp. Her parish-seat,
Leesburg is right on
the Gulf of Mexico, at the
mouth of Calcasieu river; and
it must be that in
the development that awaits
that country, Cameron will be
greatly benefited
by a situation that now seems
like isolation. If deep water
ever comes to
the mouth of the river,
Leesburg will be a great place
by reason of
that alone. When the immigrant
takes hold of the coast-marsh,
(as he .
will before the next quarter
of a century), with its
prodigiously fertile soil,
then Cameron parish will come
to the front. Great will be
the crops of sugar-
cane, rice, sea-island cotton,
oranges, vegetables etc :
while the Gulf will
afford cheap and delicious
food for the agriculturalist,
and an inexhaustible
supply for manufacturing or
preserving canned goods. So
the sea and the
laud will both pour out their
bounteous treasures to this,
thus far, disregarded
parish. This '
coast-marsh" country
ought to have more said about
it than has
been. The entire front of
Louisiana is on the Gulf of
Mexico. Her
south boundary is water, and
her whole length, from east to
west
is gulf-coast. This is an
incommensurable advantage,
upon which space
forbids comment. Source: Col.
Harris' Handbook
of Louisiana :
