Two minutes of the 1898 New Orleans Carnival, in the rare footage searched for decades

This 1898 footage may be the oldest surviving footage from New Orleans and was found, thanks to the involvement of several historians and archivists, in the Eye FilmMuseum in Amsterdam. The images show the famous Mardi Gras parade (Shrove Tuesday) planned, in this specific case, by the Rex Organization. Rex Organization historian and archivist Will French considers it one of the earliest video news releases globally. The footage was first shown to visitors to the Louisiana State Museum on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Rex Organization (1872 – 2022).

by Eleonora Giovinazzo