Mandeville is a city in St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana, United States.
The population was 10,489 at the 2000 census. Mandeville is located on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain, along Interstate 12, across the lake from the city of New Orleans. Mandeville was listed as one of the "Top 100 Places to Live by Relocate America" (URL: www.relocate-america.com) in 2004, 2005, and now 2007. Mandeville was hit by Hurricane Katrina in August of 2005 and was moderately damaged. However, most of the reconstruction has been finished and the town is mostly now back to normal.
History
The area had long been agricultural land when the town of Mandeville was laid out in 1834 by developer Bernard Xavier de Marigny de Mandeville. In 1840 Mandeville was incorporated as a town. It became a popular summer destination for well-to-do New Orleanians wishing to escape the city's heat.
In the mid-19th century, regular daily steam-boat traffic between New Orleans and Mandeville began, and by the end of the 19th century Victorian times, it became a popular weekend destination of the New Orleans middle class as well. Bands would play music on the ships going across the lake and at pavilions and dance-halls in Mandeville; Mandeville became one of the first places where the new jazz music was heard outside of New Orleans. Bunk Johnson, Buddy Petit, Papa Celestin, George Lewis, Kid Ory, Edmond Hall, Chester Zardis, and many other early jazz artists played in Mandeville regularly.
Ruby's Roadhouse
Two buildings from early jazz history still stand in Mandeville. Ruby's Roadhouse has been in continuous operation since the 1920s and is still a popular bar and live music venue today. The Dew Drop Dance Hall opened in January of 1895. It closed with the onset of the Great Depression and was used only for storage for decades, preserving the dance hall unchanged from the early 20th century until it reopened in 2000 with live jazz as a protected historic landmark. (This was one of the earliest "Dew Drop"s; dance halls across the South were similarly named, including the club in New Orleans where Little Richard got his start. )
In 1956, the first span of the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway opened to automobile traffic. A second span was added in 1969. The new road began the growth of Mandeville and the surrounding area as a suburban commuter community for people working in New Orleans. This trend increased in the 1980s and 1990s, bringing much growth to Mandeville, and bringing it more into the Greater New Orleans Metropolitan area.
Mandeville is the home town of Cajun fiddler and bandleader Amanda Shaw and hometown of the rock group 12 Stones.
Geography
Mandeville is located at (30.369282, -90.078006) and has an elevation of .
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 17.6 km² (6.8 mi²), all land.
Demographics
As of the census of 2000, there were 10,489 people, 4,204 households, and 2,724 families residing in the city of Mandeville. The population density was 595.6/km² (1,543.1/mi²). There...
