The Yellow House

Broom researches the history of her apartment at the Williams Research Center in the Historic New Orleans Collection. The lineage of every address is organized digitally. The history of the address dates back to 1795, when it was a lot owned by Marianne Dubreuil dite Brion, a free woman of color. Brion was the daughter of a former enslaved person, and Marianne likely inherited the property from slaveholders. Finding the history of the Yellow House is more complicated. She consults the “the Conveyance Office, the Office of Vital Records, the Real Estate and Records Office in city hall, the Notarial Archives, and libraries” (434). Broom tells the city planner that she is interested how a residential neighborhood became an industrial neighborhood. Unattended houses revert to the classification of light industrial. Ultimately, Broom discovers that New Orleans East is a light-industrial zone where the homes of residents are the exception.

In late January, Carl tells Broom that the marshes are burning. Meanwhile, Broom saves a newspaper article about a man shot by the grandfather of his child. Carl tells her that the man who was shot was their cousin Antonio “Tony” Miller. He was 21 years old. Carl and Broom go to the funeral.