I took the notes for this story on Friday, February 17, 2012 and finished it on the plane ride to Lafayette on February 26, 2014. I guess I'm good at letting a story marinate. Gerry's holding his 12th annual King Cake Mardi Gras party March 1, 2014. I first attended his King Cake party in 2011 (story). I've been to every one since.Here's the skinny on its history.
Louisiana can get in your psyche with the force of a sledgehammer or the soft touch of a velvet glove. When it comes to music and dancing, it’s usually the velvet glove, the purple and gold one that keeps crooking its fingers with that come hither gesture.
That’s one reason why Gerry Spanger bought a house in Breaux Bridge. And why he began hosting Mardi Gras dances in 2003. And why he’s hosting his tenth anniversary Mardi Gras party on February 18, 2012. “I’m going to be 70 later this year, so it’s doubling as my birthday party,” he says with a conspiratorial grin.
There are two Holy Trinities in Louisiana, When it comes to food, it’s the onions, bell peppers and celery that are the base of traditional Cajun and Creole dishes of gumbo, jambalaya, and etoufées.
The other Trinity is music, dancing, and people. Years ago, when Arn Burkhoff of Philadelphia introduced Gerry Spanger of New Jersey to Don Walker of Memphis at the Café des Amis dance one Saturday morning, Spanger and Walker bonded together like brothers from another mother.
What they cooked up is the reason Gerry Spanger is hosting his tenth anniversary King Cake party this Saturday… but I’m getting ahead of myself, way ahead.
Gerry first came to Louisiana in 1997. The velvet glove kept beckoning. “I keep loving it down here so I decided to buy a place. 321 Baldwin Street was the first place the agent showed me in 2002. I said, ‘This is it.’”
“I was the instigator of all this,” Walker says while holding down a gray tarp dancing in gusts from the gray skies. “In early 2003, I thought it would be fun to go somewhere after the café and get to meet the people we’d been dancing with all morning. Who are they? Where do they come from? What are their stories? Why don’t we have a Mardi Gras party at your house where we can sit down and talk to each other."
There was a slanted porch roof extending from back of Gerry’s Baldwin Street house, so low you had to duck at the far end of it but it would do for a small gathering. It was minutes from the Café des Amis where their target audience danced every Saturday morning and Mardi Gras was right around the corner. When it comes to house parties in southwest Louisiana, the invitees are good at making the parties work. That shed would do fine. The Saturday before Mardi Gras, they invited everyone over for a party.
“I bought some beer, soda and a King Cake. We set up a few tables and chairs and were good to go,” Gerry says, “but pretty soon people began saying where’s the music?”
“I found a boom box and some CDs, pounded a nail into a tree, hung the box to it and cranked it up,” says the Instigator. Gerry’s Mardi Gras tradition began then and there.
These two guys love to have fun. Every year they find a new way to tweak the Mardi Gras party. They’re probably the kind of kids who got an erector set or tinker toys for Christmas then started using them to build tree houses. The low shed was the first big tweak.
One long weekend before Mardi Gras, they ripped it down and set six twelve-foot posts into the ground. Don began framing the beams and by Sunday they had a tin roof over the new and improved space for what was becoming Gerry Spanger’s wildly popular Mardi Gras King Cake party.
“Gerry is setting up for his tenth annual Mardi Gras party in Breaux Bridge tomorrow (Saturday February 18, 2012) and might need a hand, why don’t you head over there,” Bernard Ussher, my Lafayette buddy, tells me.
I show up at 11 AM Friday morning expecting to see a crowd of people scurrying around, maybe some beer on ice and music blasting from a boom box. Instead, I see Gerry and another guy straddling stepladders to erect a tarp in a breezeway, protection from the rain that’s supposed to fall in buckets tomorrow.
If Gerry’s worried that a few inches of rain might spoil his party for a couple hundred dancers, you’d never know it. Don Walker nimbly steps down to introduce himself with a firm handshake. While securing the tarp, Walker happily recounts the history above.
Don’s wife is used to losing him for the day before Jerry’s party. One year it might have been more than a day because they decided to pour a concrete floor under the new shed.
Saturday was a meteorological car wash without the suds. Lowlands flooded. Mother Nature pointed her finger at the gray tarps on Baldwin Street and giggled. Ever the improviser, Jerry held his tenth anniversary King Cake party at a local club, everyone found their way, and the food and Geno Delafose and His French Rockin’ Boogie band were terrific.
By now most of the celebrants who show up know each other from the Louisiana dance halls in which they’ve met over the years. Gerry’s party is the place to be on the Saturday before Mardi Gras. Some of the folks who made their way to Gerry’s house a mile from the Café des Amis still flock to Baldwin Street every Mardi Gras. Now Gerry and Don have lots of stories to tell in between Mardi Gras parties.
Party prep Friday February 17, 2012, the day before it poured buckets.
321 Baldwin Street, Breaux Bridge,LA
Saturday, February 18, 2012 - Since Plan A is rained out, Gerry Spanger makes Plan B. He secures The Bridge Bar in Breaux Bridge for an inside King Cake party
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Gerry and Merrie
Post Script 2014
Gerry’s holding his twelfth King Cake Mardi Gras party March 1, 2014. I wonder what little tweak he and Don devise this year.
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
I remember. Nothing like it!
Posted by: Pam | February 27, 2014 at 05:10 PM
No rain in sight for tomorrow (as you know, the last two were held at a local club since it poured), should be a fun time at 321 Baldwin Street!
Posted by: Paul A. Tamburello, Jr. aka pt at large | March 01, 2014 at 12:34 AM
Interesting story of history of Gerry Springer's annual King Cake Mardi Gras party. Does Gerry make sure to get the piece of cake with the baby in it so he will be the lucky one to hold the next year's King Cake party at his place on Baldwin Street? The photos look very familiar to me. Remembering I met you at Gerry's party a couple years back. Fun memories :) Lassez Les Bon Temps Rouler, Carole Blossom
Posted by: carole blossom | March 07, 2014 at 09:35 PM
I was hoping you'd make it to this year's party,Carole. I'll bet Gerry has the King Cake made without the baby in it...he wants his party to stay right where it is on 321 Baldwin Street!
Posted by: Paul A. Tamburello, Jr aka pt at large | March 07, 2014 at 10:11 PM
Note from pt at large: i got permission to post this email. Gerry and Merrie are apparently global emissaries of Cajun dancing...
Hi Gerry and Merrie,
Without any information I found you on the net.
What a small world!
Yesterday you both danced in front of my door in Amsterdam on the King's Birthday Festival, where I was playing a cajun song on my portable radio.
You certai
nly brightened up
a beautiful day.
Everybody enjoyd your spontanious action very much and it makes me glad to be able to thank you for it.
I'm totally not clever with computers but it was the magic word Raamsdonkveer that set me on your track.
Maybe I will meet you nice people there once.
God bless you.
Posted by: Ad Middendorp | April 27, 2014 at 06:55 PM