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New Orleans

The plan for New Orleans may have been issued in 1718, but it took three nations, many wars, and 85 years for the trading colony near the mouth of the Mississippi river to develop from an unfavorable plot of land into one of the main cultural melting pots in the new world.
The story of New Orleans began with the French in need of a new source of income to compensate for the losses to the treasure from war with England. Louis XIV hoped that the New World's colonies would be that cash cow they needed. French-Canadian fur traders brought a plan to the king hoping to fund a voyage to the mouth of the Mississippi to settle trading colonies. Pierre Le Moyne, Sieur d'Iberville and his brother Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville set out with 200 settlers on 4 ships in October of 1698. It took until March of 1699 before the party found the mouth of the Mississippi and began to travel up the river. Iberville settled Biloxi and Ocean Springs before he would take a return trip to France, but returned to the Americas just to die of yellow fever in 1706. His brother had better fortune, however, being named Governor of Louisiana while control of Louisiana was given to Antoine Corzat for a term of 15 years. Control of the colony would pas to the Company of the West (later known as the Company of the Indies)
While the French settlers were working to establish new trading towns, King Louis XIV died, leaving Duc Philippe of Orleans, a Regent, to rule. The regent took to John Law, a Scotsman, as an advisor. Law developed a plan to sell shares of land, and forcibly relocate people to Louisiana. Law chose Bienville to act on his plan and he was named Governor for a second term. Bienville chose a site for the new city, called Nouvelle Orleans in honor of the new regent, but there was much dissention. Everyone, including Law himself and the Royal Engineers, wanted a new site, but Bienville prevailed choosing the site his brother had picked out years ago before his...