The Bellemont

11/10/2025

June writes:
Now Rose Bennett and I June Duffield played piano bar in the Tradewinds there in 1976 and 77. I don’t see any mention of our name or any pictures. I played the piano Monday through Wednesday Wednesday now. Rose played the piano Thursday through Saturday. It was small when we first went to work there and we drew so many people that Mr. AC Lewis closed it down for a week or two and enlarged the tradewinds to accommodate larger crowds. We had a wonderful time there.
The Belmont was really pumping back then Tommy French and his band played in the plantation room upfront! I sure miss those old piano boys. They were so much fun people loved passing the mic around. I think that we started the karaoke in there.

07/06/2024

This is one of the less common Bellemont postcards that I've come across. I'd love it if one of our Bellemont insiders could identify some of these buildings and maybe the general time frame. I know it's before 1957, because the PanAmerican Suite isn't there. It doesn't really help with dating the image, but in case anyone was wondering, the coat of arms on the postcard was first used in 1946 and became a registered trademark in 1951.
I can't tell if this is an aerial photo or an artist rendering. Thoughts?
The pool at the left is the Tradewinds, and it isn't very visible, but the Plaza pool is at the top right. This is the original facade of the building with the columns visible (it wasn't enclosed until 1985). Did the PanAm Suite fill in the gap on the left side? I don't remember it being so close to Tradewinds, though. And of course the vacant land to the left became The Great Hall.
Also, I am really curious about what happened to the cool arrow sign in front of the hotel. I remember it being there in the 70s. Anyone know?

07/04/2024

Thank you to Matthew Herrin for sharing this high-quality scan of a postcard featuring the Bellemont's Tradewinds pool that he came across in his parents' postcard collection! Did you ever swim in this pool? Hit me up with a comment!

06/13/2024

One of our followers asks:
"Could you please make a post asking if anyone has pictures of the bands playing there? My dad Mike Steen played in the bands and actually lived at the Belmont. Those were great days".
She adds that he played the trumpet.
I would also like to hear from anyone in The Inn Crowd, the Baton Rouge Band. Have pics of them at The Bellemont? We'd love to see them!

06/09/2024

This is one of my favorite pictures of The Bellemont, taken by my friend Dawn as the demolition was winding down. I find it symbolic, showing the beauty of The Bellemont in its former glory and the passage of time. Nature reclaiming what was man-made.
At this stage we were trying to save the mosaic wall that faced the private pool in what many dubbed, "The Honeymoon Suite", but by its formal name was "The PanAmerican Suite." I didn’t know it existed until I saw some colorful tiles peeking through the dense vines on one of my walk-throughs of the property with the demolition guys, who’d given me permission to take pictures. A trip to the library, going through some old “The Register”s -- I guess you’d call it a society page-type publication from the 1950s -- revealed stories about its history, and that of the suite in general, the only one in the Louisiana, or possibly the US, at the time, with its own private pool.
Ultimately, our efforts to save the wall failed, in part because of the impossibility of somehow sawing this giant, thick, concrete wall into pieces that could even be transported, and also in part to vandalism of the demolition equipment that required the demo guys I had been working with to be replaced by another crew.
When I say this wall was "giant", I'm not exaggerating. I paid the demo crew to remove the vines, and they had to use a crane to get up to the top of it. It was HUGE, and there was one young college student from LSU, Pat Harper, who designed it and put it together BY HERSELF. (If you remember the big LSU mural that was in the hotel, she painted it, too.)
Maybe a year after the property was flattened, I drove back to the lot, parked, and walked over to this area. I found a few tiles scattered around. It looked like the wall may have been bulldozed into the pool. At least it got to see the light of day one last time.
If you have any memories of the PanAm and its beautiful, private pool, please post them in a comment. And thank you again to Dawn for taking the photo and sharing it with us.

09/16/2023

Hi, and thanks for coming by, to all the folks coming to visit after the pics on Old Images of Baton Rouge!

09/13/2023

This update is hard to write. Longtime Bellemont manager Howard McBride passed away. His funeral is tomorrow in Baton Rouge. I considered him a friend.
I visited at length with him on two occasions, in 2012 and in 2021. He told me so much about not just the hotel, but his life and how he ended up there. His mind was sharp as a tack despite his advanced age. He was able to draw the layout of all of the buildings at The Bellemont and tell me about which movie stars stayed where. I got to see his autographed photo from John Wayne, and he told me about what a diva Joan Crawford was while Bette Davis was the total opposite. There was a news story I came across in researching the hotel about someone trying to scare Sidney Poitier off because of his race when he stayed there to film a movie in the 1960s, by setting off some kind of fireworks thing, and I asked him about that. He was there that night and said it didn't happen. He said Steve McQueen drove his motorcycle directly into the PanAmerican Suite and it leaked oil on the carpet. Nobody at the hotel was going to complain about it - this was Steve McQueen! He gave me a matchbook from The Bellemont to add to my collection of memorabilia. He had kept it for around 50 years. It meant the world to me.
The last time I visited with him was after he moved to Katy, TX. My daughter lives in Tomball, not too far away. I just noticed that I posted about it two years ago to the day. He was such a gracious man, a gentleman, at 95 years of age, and when he picked up the check for lunch I knew WAY better than to try to stop him. I would have insulted him even to ask. We had a terrific visit, and he told me more exciting stories about his life and the goings-on at The Bellemont.
There were more stories, he told me with a twinkle in his eyes, but he couldn't tell them because, he said, some of those people are still living. That made me smile. He was a real class act.
Mr. McBride, you will be missed.

View Howard L McBride's obituary, send flowers and find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

11/14/2022

If you are looking for a truly unique, one of a kind gift for someone who has a special connection to The Bellemont, this artist has an original acrylic of its iconic sign. Check out her Etsy for other artwork focused on Louisiana, too.

This Acrylic Paintings item by dixielandart has 2 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from Shreveport, LA. Listed on Sep 4, 2022

04/25/2022

Welcome to our new members! If you know someone who might enjoy reading and sharing stories and pictures of the Bellemont, please tag them in a comment!

01/28/2022

Thought this might be of interest to our fans who followed closely the uncovering of the PanAmerican Suite mosaic wall, as well as our hunt for the Plantation Room's mural.

What started out as a couple's renovation project to convert a historic building into a bar has turned into an effort to restore decades-old artwork in a small Washington town.