Breaux, Samuel Locke

Submitted by Mike Miller

Breaux, Samuel Locke, leading rice factor, first vice-president Pan-American Life Insurance Co., member board of directors New Orleans board of trade, prominent and leading citizen of New Orleans, is a son of Col. Gustave Aurelien and Emelie (Locke) Breaux, and was born at New Orleans, La., Feb. 13, 1860. Gustave A. Breaux, the father, was born in Lafayette parish, La., December 28, 1828. His early education was obtained at the Jesuit college in St. Charles parish. When 16 years of age he went, by sailing vessel, mainly, to Northfield, Vermont, and there entered Norwich university, a military school. After having completed the course of study at this institution he matriculated in the law department of Harvard university, Cambridge, Mass., from which in due time he graduated with his legal degree. He returned to Louisiana in 1853 and began the practice of law in the city of New Orleans. In 1856 Mr. Breaux was married to Miss Emilie Locke, a daughter of Samuel Locke. At the beginning of the Civil war he raised a battalion and was made colonel of the 13th Louisiana regiment, subsequently serving throughout the whole period of the war. About the year 1867 he reentered the profession of law with Mr. Charles E. Fenner as a partner, and continued in the profession until 1898, when he retired from practice and subsequently gave his attention to the direction of his plantation and allied interests. During all of the period of his residence in the city of New Orleans he took a very active and prominent part in the commercial, industrial and political affairs of the municipality. He served as a member of the constitutional convention of 1879, and twice represented the 5th senatorial district in the Louisiana state senate. He was active in the promotion of the New Orleans Cotton centennial and served as a member of the board of administrators of that enterpise and celebration. During all the time of his residence in the city he was owner of a plantation in Lafayette parish, and as his hearing became defective, he determined to remove to the country and devote his talents to agricultural development, being especially interested in sugar cane culture. In the subsequent development of his plantation interests, he became engaged in the manufacture of sugar, and the Lafayette Sugar refinery stands today as a monument to his zeal and energy ni this direction. Col. Breaux 's death occurred Feb. 24, 1910, at his home in Lafayette parish, where he was born, and where he passed the last years of an active and useful life, honored and loved by all who knew him. In May, 1911, a portrait of Col. Breaux was presented to the Louisiana Sugar Planters' association, to be hung with the portraits of other ploneers who toiled for the upbuilding of the sugar industry in Louisiana. Samuel Locke Breaux has from childhood lived in New Orleans. His early education was obtained at St. Philip public school. Later he attended St. Stanislaus college, conducted by the Jesuit Brothers at Bay St. Louis, Miss., and still later the Virginia Military institute, at Lexington, Va. Following his graduation from the latter institution in the year 1875, he entered the service of Payne, Kennedy & Co., New Orleans cotton factors, and was successively employed by several firms handling cotton and rice until the year 1896, when he entered business on his own account, handling both staples, cotton and rice. Since 1904, he has confined his business exclusively to rice, and a large experience, combined with a naturally keen and alert mind, and unfailing energy, has brought Mr. Breaux into general recognition as a leading authority in all matters pertaining to rice. He occupies the position of the leading rice factor in the city of New Orleans, where fully one-third of all the rice grown in the United States is handled. March 1, 1914, Mr. Breaux formed a connection with the firm of Gibert & Clay, and thus returned to cotton business in which he was educated, and in this connection still continues the rice business as a department of the above firm. On several occasions he has appeared before the Louisiana railroad commission in the interest of more equitable treatment of the rice interests of the region tributary to New Orleans, and has been uniformly successful in his efforts in this direction. Pending consideration both of the McKinley and the Payne-Aldrich tariffs, he went to Washington as chairman, and as champion, of the rice interests, and on each occasion acted as spokesman of those interests at the hearings before the ways and means committee of Congress. During the years 1898 and 1900 he filled the position of president of the New Orleans board of trade, and is at this time an active member and member of the board of directors of that body; also, chairman of the rice committee, the rice freights committee and the freight and transportation committee of the board of trade. In Jan., 1911, he went to Washington as a member of the New Orleans committee to work in the interest of securing the Pan-American Exposition, and on that occasion acted as one of the speakers in presenting the claims of New Orleans before the committee on industrial arts and expositions. Mr. Breaux is first vice-president of the recently organized Pan-American Life Insurance Co. of New Orleans, is a member of the Young Men's Gymnastic club and is affiliated with various other organizations and associations--altogether a man of many affairs and complex interests, and above all things vigilant and fully alive to the interests of the people among whom he lives. April 6, 1885, Mr. Breaux was married to Miss Nina Williams, and to their union 1 son Samuel Locke Breaux, Jr., was born, April 21, 1886. Mrs. Breaux died Nov. 20, 1892, and April 19, 1894, Mr. Breaux was married to Miss Nina Alice Rogers.

Source: Louisiana: Comprising Sketches of Parishes, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form (volume 3), pp. 63-65. Edited by Alcée Fortier, Lit.D. Published in 1914, by Century Historical Association.