Page 70 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Late January 2019

70 The New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum

The New Orleans Historic

Voodoo Museum

Wooden masks, portraits and the

occasional human skull mark the
collections of this small museum

near the French Quarter

By Abigail Tucker

Jerry Gandolfo didn’t flinch when a busload of
eighth-grade girls began shrieking at the front
desk. The owner of the New Orleans Historic
Voodoo Museum simply assumed that John T.
Martin, who calls himself a voodoo priest, was
wearing his albino python around his neck as he
took tickets. A few screams were par for the
course.
Deeper in the museum it was
uncomfortably warm, because the priest has a
habit of turning down the air conditioning to
accommodate his coldblooded companion. Not
that Gandolfo minded: snakes are considered
sacred voodoo spirits and this particular one,
named Jolie Vert ( “Pretty Green,” although it is
pale yellow), also furnishes the little bags of
snake scales that sell for $1 in the gift shop,
alongside dried chicken feet and blank-faced
dolls made of Spanish moss.
A former insurance company manager,
Gandolfo, 58, is a caretaker, not voodoo witch
doctor—in fact, he’s a practicing Catholic. Yet
his weary eyes brighten when he talks about the
history behind his small museum, a dim enclave artifacts of varying authenticity: horse jaw mourners, including voodoo queens in their
in the French Quarter half a block off Bourbon rattles, strings of garlic, statues of the Virgin trademark tignons, or head scarves. Gandolfo
Street that holds a musty jumble of wooden Mary, yards of Mardi Gras beads, alligator took over the museum from Charlie’s son in
masks, portraits of famous priestesses, or heads, a clay “govi” jar for storing souls, and the 2005. Then Hurricane Katrina hit and tourism
“voodoo queens,” and here and there a human wooden kneeling board allegedly used by the ground to a halt: the museum, which charges
skull. Labels are few and far between, but the greatest voodoo queen of all: New Orleans’ own between $5 and $7 admission, once welcomed
objects all relate to the centuries-old religion, Marie Laveau. some 120,000 visitors a year; now the number is
which revolves around asking spirits and the Charlie presided over the museum in a closer to 12,000. Gandolfo, who is unmarried
dead to intercede in everyday affairs. “I try to straw hat and an alligator tooth necklace, and has no children, is usually on hand to
explain and preserve the legacy of voodoo,” carrying a staff carved as a snake. “At one point discuss voodoo history or to explain (in
Gandolfo says. he made it known that he needed skulls, so frighteningly precise terms) how to make a
Gandolfo comes from an old Creole people sold him skulls, no questions asked,” human “zombie” with poison extracted from a
family: his grandparents spoke French, lived Gandolfo says. “Officially, they came from a blowfish. (“Put it in the victim’s shoe, where it
near the French Quarter and rarely ventured medical school.” is absorbed through sweat glands, inducing a
beyond Canal Street into the “American” part of Charlie busied himself with recreating death-like catatonic state,” he says. Later, the
New Orleans. Gandolfo grew up fully aware that raucous voodoo ceremonies on St. John’s Eve person is fed an extract containing an antidote to
some people swept red brick dust across their (June 23) and Halloween night, and sometimes, it as well as powerful hallucinogens. Thus, the
doorsteps each morning to ward off hexes and at private weddings, which typically were held “zombie” appears to rise from the dead,
that love potions were still sold in local inside the building and outside, in nearby Congo stumbling around in a daze.)
drugstores. True, his own family’s lore touched Square, and often involved snake dances and “The museum is an entry point for
on the shadowy religion: his French ancestors, traditional, spirit-summoning drumming. people who are curious, who want to see what’s
the story went, were living in Saint-Domingue Charlie “was responsible for the renaissance of behind this stuff,” says Martha Ward, a
(now Haiti) when slave revolts convulsed their voodoo in this city,” Gandolfo says. “He University of New Orleans anthropologist who
sugar plantation around 1791. To save revitalized it from something you read in history studies voodoo. “How do people think about
Gandolfo’s kinfolk, a loyal slave hid them in books and brought it back to life again.” voodoo? What objects do they use? Where do
barrels and smuggled them to New Orleans. The Meanwhile, Charlie’s more introverted brother they come from? [The museum] is a very rich
slave, it turned out, was a voodoo queen. researched the history of the religion, which and deep place.”
But it wasn’t until Gandolfo reached spread from West Africa by means of slave The eighth graders—visiting from a
adulthood that he learned that countless Creole ships. Eventually, Gandolfo learned how to spell rural Louisiana parish—filed through the rooms,
families told versions of the same story. Still, he voodoo—vudu, vodoun, vodou, vaudoux. It’s sometimes pausing to consider candles
says, “I don’t think I even knew how to spell unclear how many New Orleanians practice flickering on the altars or to stare into the vacant
voodoo.” voodoo today, but Gandolfo believes as much as eye sockets of skulls.
That changed in 1972, when Gandolfo’s 2 or 3 percent of the population, with the highest The braver girls hoisted Jolie Vert over
older brother Charles, an artist and hairdresser, concentrations in the historically Creole Seventh their shoulders for pictures. (“My mom’s going
wanted a more stable career. “So I said, ‘How Ward. The religion remains vibrant in Haiti. to flip!”) Others scuttled for the door.
about a voodoo museum?’” Gandolfo recalls. Voodoo Charlie died of a heart attack in “Can we go now?” one student asked in
Charles—soon to be known as “Voodoo 2001, on Mardis Gras day: his memorial service, a small voice. []
Charlie”—set about gathering a hodgepodge of held in Congo Square, attracted hundreds of