Page 22 - Hancock County Tourism ~ 2021 History

Do you know about...
Union Street, Bay St. Louis
The town of Bay St. Louis, previously known as Shieldsboro, was nearly decimated during the Civil War. Four wounded Yankee soldiers were being treated by
the Sisters of Charity at Our Lady of the Gulf Church when eighty Union soldiers arrived by gunboat with the intent of burning down the
entire town in retaliation for resistance against the Union. Father Henry Le Duc arrived on the scene with a silver crucifix, imploring the soldiers
to halt their attack. The soldiers complied, knelt to the cross, and returned to their ship. Shieldsboro was spared, and the street where this took place was named Union Street.
A Union Street home, built in 1860 with 1900 alterations
Do you know about...
Pete Fountain
Jazz clarinetist extraordinaire Pete Fountain once owned
a home on South Beach Boulevard in Bay St. Louis. Born in 1930 as Pierre Dewey LaFontaine, Fountain began playing the clarinet as a boy when doctors recommended it to improve his lung function. He performed with many jazz bands, joined the Lawrence Welk Show in 1957, and played on TV shows, at U.S. State Dinners, and for a mass in New Orleans with Pope John Paul
II. He also played with Louis Armstrong and Harry Connick, Jr. For years he owned his own jazz club in New Orleans called The French Quarter Inn, and
in 2003 he became a frequent performer at Casino Magic/ Hollywood Casino in Bay St. Louis until his last show there in 2010. His home was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. Political commentators James Carville and Mary Matalin purchased the bayfront property in 2012. Fountain died in 2016 at age 86.
Pete Fountain in 1962
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