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A few weeks ago, the good people of Université Bordeaux Montaigne celebrated their 50th anniversary by publishing photos submitted by people who had studied or worked at the establishment over the years. A couple of posts comprising pictures sent in by one Steve Owen really caught my eye and prompted me to check out his Flickr gallery, where he had published further views of sights and scenes throughout the city, as photographed by Steve himself and by one Patti Larson.

I thought it might be interesting to head back to those same locations nearly fifty years down the line to combine the then and now in single shots… so that is precisely what I did over a couple of weekends, after first checking with Steve that he was happy to see his photos being given this new lease of online life, hence the pictures you can see here!

Place de la Bourse. Steve's original photo sought to demonstrate the difference between the cleaned-up and dirty façades. The modern-day view is conspicuously free of parked cars!

Porte Saint-Éloi/Grosse Cloche. The curve-heavy building on the left is no more.

The view from the top of rue Sainte-Catherine in its pre-pedestrianised era. The photo at the top of the article also shows rue Sainte-Catherine, as seen from place Saint-Projet.

In our correspondence, Steve confirmed that he had been a student at what was then Bordeaux III University during the 1971-72 academic year, as part of the University of California’s Education Abroad programme. “At that time Bordeaux was the only location in France for UC undergrads, and there were 100 of us. We spent six weeks in Pau getting language training, then the academic year in Bordeaux. We took the regular French courses, although UC had to set up separate testing and grading because the two systems were pretty different. I was a History major, and most of the courses I took during his time in Bordeaux were History courses, although I also attended one Art History course that met in the old medical school facility on Place de la Victoire.”

Who then was the Patti Larson credited with many of the pictures, and who also appears on some of the shots? “She was another student from California, and also my girlfriend from about the time we left Pau in late September. We were married in 1974… and went on to have two sons and two granddaughters.”

Patti and Steve posing in the doorway of the house on rue Mouneyra where Patti lived during their year in Bordeaux.

Restaurant universitaire / Bordeaux étudiants club on rue de Cursol.

Steve’s experience in France triggered an interest in French history, and he ended up going to grad school to study it. He and Patti came back to France in 1978-79 and spent ten months living in Paris while Steve worked in the archives. “My academic career never materialized, however, and we both ended up working in administration at U.C. Berkeley, retiring about nine years ago.” Patti and Steve returned to Bordeaux in about 2005 and “we were impressed with how much the city had improved… and how much worse the university campus looked!

Place de la Victoire, including a lovely Renault 12, and signposts to Agen, Mont-de-Marsan, Pau and Toulouse.

Highway code awareness sessions in Parc Bordelais.

Carnival parade season in Talence.

What are Steve’s enduring memories of his year in Bordeaux? “I have very fond memories. Many of them revolve around Patti of course, but my time there (and several weeks in Paris at various times) also led to a fascination with France in general. At the time I was struck by the differences in outlook and living styles between California and France, so the time had kind of an exotic feel about it. France and California are much more similar today, but I am still fascinated by how the French do things. As for Bordeaux itself, I enjoyed myself, but was not unduly impressed with the city at the time. Later, I developed a greater appreciation for the place, due perhaps to the power of nostalgia or to how much better it looked when we went back. We are hoping to make it back again in the next few years!”

Patti and Steve, Bordeaux will welcome you back with open arms!

Here is a video version of the report:

Click here if video does not display properly on your device.

> Click here to view Steve Owen's other 1970s Bordeaux pictures in his Flickr gallery. If you scroll down that page, you may even spot a photo of Steve and Patti today!
> View the original Université Bordeaux Montaigne Instagram posts by clicking here and here.

> Big thanks to Steve and Patti for allowing the photos to be used in this article, and a shout out to Université de Bordeaux Montaigne whose initial posts led to this piece.
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The twelfth episode of the French-language Invisible Bordeaux podcast is now available! This time we're off to meet Jules Gaubert-Turpin, the enviously young and equally enviously charismatic co-author - with Adrien Grant Smith Bianchi - of two fine books: the Journey Through Wine wine atlas of the world (which is available in English), and Le Tour du Monde en 80 Verres.  

Together we talk maps, posters, the story behind the two books, wine, beer... and we get an exclusive heads-up about Jules's next madcap project, which will also involve his other writing partner, Charlie Garros. All will be revealed if you listen to the podcast!

Here then is the podcast, which you'll also find on miscellaneous platforms including Anchor, Apple Podcasts/iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Breaker, PocketCasts, RadioPublic, Overcast, Podbean, Podcast Addict and Stitcher. Feel free to hit the subscribe button on the app of your choice! And scroll on down for all the links that will lead you on into the weird and wonderful world of Jules, Adrien and Charlie!

Click here if player does not display properly on your device.

> The official website, shop and blog can be found here: www.lacartedesvins-svp.com
> You can Jules and the team's projects on social media here: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter
> This was not our first encounter! Read the 2015 Invisible Bordeaux interview with Jules to see how far he's come in the meantime... You'll find it by clicking here.

One of the first items to run on the Invisible Bordeaux blog after its launch eight years ago was focused on the bust portraying the Haitian leader Toussaint Louverture, to be seen on the right-bank waterfront in Bordeaux. At the time, the sculpture was one of the only visible acknowledgements in the public domain of the city’s slave trade past. But times have changed and today there are further signs that Bordeaux is becoming more open about its inconvenient legacy. 

For, yes, between 1672 and 1837, ships departed from Bordeaux on the first legs of around 500 triangular slave trade voyages that resulted in 150,000 – possibly more – Africans being deported to the Americas. Bordeaux was not alone. In France - which ranked alongside Spain behind Great Britain and Portugal in terms of the scale of its slave trade - the city of Nantes organized 1,744 expeditions, and the ports of La Rochelle and Le Havre were on a par with Bordeaux.

Before the triangular voyages began (they peaked in the 1780s), the boats departing from Bordeaux conducted straightforward two-way commerce with the Caribbean. Boats would carry wine, oil and flour, all of which would be exchanged for local produce. With the onset of triangular trade, vessels would leave from Bordeaux loaded with foodstuffs, cloth, arms and trinkets which, upon arrival on the eastern coast of Africa six to eight weeks later (the “outward passage”) would be exchanged for slaves. The dangerous middle passage would then follow, with the slaves being ferried in inhumane conditions to the colonies, mainly Saint-Domingue (now known at Haiti) as far as the Bordeaux ships were concerned. The death rate on board the boats was between 10 and 20 per cent.

Ground-level panel recently installed on square Toussaint-Louverture.

Upon arrival, the (surviving) slaves would be sold or auctioned off and set to work on the plantations where the average life expectancy was a lowly five to six years. Meanwhile, the boats would embark on their return passage to Bordeaux carrying sugar, cocoa, tobacco, cotton and other produce, making a substantial contribution to the city’s wealth.

Until the mid-1990s, this chapter in the city’s history was more often than not glossed over, but around the turn of the millennium Bordeaux took its first tentative steps to bring the subject out into the open. In 2006, then-mayor Hugues Martin inaugurated a ground-level plaque on the waterfront opposite the Bourse Maritime building, and in 2009 came a dedicated section within the permanent exhibition at the Musée d’Aquitaine. As for the Toussaint Louverture bust, sculpted by Haitian artist Ludovic Booz (who died in 2015), it was donated to the city by the Republic of Haiti in 2005.

Returning to the spot today, I note that what had previously been a lone, isolated plinth and its bust are now surrounded by a landscaped area that makes the (refurbished) statue more prominent. Interestingly, the design of the “square” is in fact in the shape of a triangle, no doubt in reference to the triangular trade routes. On the ground, information panels explain who Toussaint Louverture was and his connection with the city (as detailed in the previous Invisible Bordeaux item) and provide a brief overview of Bordeaux’s role in France’s slave trade history.

The triangular square.

Meanwhile, on the left-bank quayside, the barely-visible plaque was replaced in 2019 by a poignant statue created by another Haitian sculptor, Filipo (full name: Woodly Caymitte), which depicts the slave Modeste Testas. The accompanying information panel explains who she was: born Al Pouessi in East Africa in 1765 and captured when she was young, she was bought around 1780 by two Bordeaux brothers, Pierre and François Testas, who owned a business in the city and a plantation in Saint-Domingue.

Pouessi was deported and worked on the plantation, going on to become the slave and concubine of owner François Testas, who gave her the name Marthe Adélaïde Modeste Testas. After François died, she was set free (as symbolized by the broken chains at the feet of the statue) and he bequeathed her 51 acres of land. She married a fellow former slave and died in 1870 aged 105. In the following years, her grandson François Denys Légitime became president of Haiti.

Then, the latest addition to the Bordeaux landscape came in December 2019 to mark the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, in the shape of "Strange Fruit", a tree-like sculpture by the Réunionnaise artist Sandrine Plante-Rougeol. The tree’s three branches also echo back to the “triangular” notion, and each carries a wine barrel hoop containing a man’s head. Their faces have been blindfolded to suggest a lack of identity, and they reportedly symbolize fear, pain and abandonment.

That same December day, the city announced that explanatory panels were being affixed on streets which had been given the names that harked back to shipowners, traders and sailors involved in the slave trade, a compromise response to years of lobbying by various associations (particularly Mémoires et Partages) asking for those street names to be changed. Each panel provides a concise and factual overview of the connection, as researched by teams at the city’s archives department. The initial rollout concerns six streets or squares (see footnote) but, when preparing this item, I headed out to see the various locations and can state that, at the time of writing (February 2020), those panels have yet to be installed.

Street signs awaiting their information panels.

Whatever, the city’s slave trade past is no longer the taboo subject it once was, and it will be interesting to see what further developments occur throughout the 2020s. Will similar moves be observed in the city’s relationship with its Second World War history, Bordeaux’s other great untold story? Only time will tell… 

> Find them on the Invisible Bordeaux map: Statue of Toussaint Louverture, Quai des Queyries; Statue of Modeste Testas, Quai Louis XVIII; Strange Fruit sculpture, jardin de l'Hôtel de Ville, Bordeaux.
> The first six panels will be affixed alongside the street signs on rue Desse, rue David-Gradis, rue Grammont, passage Feger, cours Journu-Auber and place Mareilhac. 

> See this Sud Ouest item for the background story and this France Bleu Gironde article to see the plaques (including a misspelt one for rue Grammont). 
> Cet article est également disponible en français.

Invisible Bordeaux recently came across this nice set of aerial views of Bordeaux from the 1950s-60s, offering an unusual way of seeing Allées de Tourny, the Triangle d’Or, Place Gambetta, Jardin Public and Cité de la Benauge! Scroll on down for a closer look at each picture! 

First up is Allées de Tourny, which still boasted its two fountains and its Gambetta statue. Bottom right: the old Grands-Hommes market. There are parked cars on Place de la Comédie and a small event is taking place on Place des Quinconces (or is perhaps being set up or dismantled). The Garonne waterfront is a succession of cranes and warehouses. Over on the right bank, Gare d’Orléans railway station is still clearly connected to the rail network and the brand new Benauge fire station is in position. Saint-Jean bridge is still a few years from being built so the only crossings that can be seen are Pont de Pierre and the Eiffel railway bridge. 

Photo: éditions aériennes Combier (Macon).

Here is the so-called Triangle d’Or quarter, with Cours Clémenceau and Cours de l’Intendance forming one of the three angles. You can make out the words “Petit Paris” on the white building towards the bottom, and “Français” on the cinema-house which is still known as such. The old Grands-Hommes covered market building can be seen once again towards the middle of the picture. Over in the distance, check out the row of cranes on the Garonne waterfront and, on the right bank, the Grands Moulins de Paris factory which is still a fixture on the landscape 70 years later! 

Photo: éditions Lapie (Saint-Maur).

This is Place Gambetta, as viewed from the south, demonstrating the near-perfect alignment between Rue du Dr Charles Nancel Penard (known as rue Dauphine until 1946) and Cours Georges-Clémenceau.

Photo: éditions Lapie (Saint-Maur).

Here’s another view of Place Gambetta (with its handful of cars and a single bus), looking towards Cours Georges-Clémenceau and Jardin Public.

Photo: éditions Lapie (Saint-Maur).

This is the Jardin Public, as viewed from the north-western side. In the foreground you can make out the buildings and inner yard of Lycée Montesquieu (previously known as Lycée Longchamps). 

Photo: édition Renaud & Buzaud (Bordeaux), cliché P. R. Larrey/Delboy.

Finally, key 1950s large-scale building project the Cité de la Benauge. Left and middle: the tall towers and more compact residences of Cité Pinçon. The circle in the middle is still known as “le Rond des Mamans”. Bottom you can see the Jean Dauguet sports hall. Top left: Benauge primary school. And further in the distance on the right, Stade Galin sports stadium, the neighbouring swimming pool had yet to be built.

Photo: Chatagneau (Bordeaux), cliché Herlec – Libourne, opérateur M. Le Collen/Elcé.

 > Ce dossier est également disponible en français !