Sugar cane plantations of Louisiana

As I was walking the halls of the Whitney Plantation the other week, I came across an old map hanging over a water fountain in the back corner.  It was a map showing a section of the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge to New Orleans circa 1860.  Slivered and smooshed along the rivers banks were property lines indicating the boundaries of old sugar cane plantations numbering over FOUR HUNDRED in all…this is just from Baton Rouge to New Orleans.  It is heartbreaking to imagine the thriving industry of the slave labored fields in Louisiana just 170 years ago in which over 20,000 men woman and children unwilling worked, making fortunes for their undeserving captors.  I got chills looking at the clutter and expanse of the sugar cane plantations listed on this map.  This is our history.  It is important to know our past and study the atrocities that we have inflicted others with for the personal gains of the elite as to not repeat.  I still see this exploitative anthropocentrism in our world today and it makes me sick.  We have a sickness in our government of pardoning racists, sexists and other mediums of hatred.  We must learn to live together and not climb backs to reach our goals.  Below is the map I mentioned.  It is very valuable to have a place like the Whitney Plantation to teach us these lessons and offer a perspective we might have otherwise overlooked.