Four Corners, Louisiana Raise High The Roof Beam

• Share

Josephine Roberson positions a chalk line along the top of a sheet of plywood as Nolan Derouen flicks the taut string and imprints a fuzzy red stripe across the board. They slice the wood to size, carry it into Betty Hines' living room and nail it to the ceiling. Hines works at the back of the room, straining from the rungs of a ladder as she attaches tiles to the plywood with the aid of one of Derouen's assistants. Heavy rains, excessive groundwater and years of neglect in southern Louisiana's sugarcane region have led to creeping decay in Hines' home. Now, instead of harsh sunshine peeking through rotting walls, daylight filters through brand-new window frames.

Through a mixture of sweat equity and private financing, the women of Four Corners are replacing old wood with fresh clapboards, drying up stagnant pools and sealing busted pipes. The homes are livable again, and the community has found a new pride and hope for a better future. "It is a hard job, but together we can do a lot," says Roberson in a soft, raspy voice. "What gives us so much courage and strength is that we have so many people standing behind us helping us build our community."

Roberson, 59, is one of a determined band of women in this small unincorporated hamlet 20 miles east of New Iberia. Most of the 150 houses have antiquated wiring and leaking roofs; few public services reach places like Four Corners. As the cane industry became mechanized, many people lost jobs that their families had held for generations. The average annual family income in this town of 400 is below $10,000.

Life appeared grim until March 1989, when the directors of the Southern Mutual Help Association, a New Iberia-based organization that has been working for 22 years to improve the lives of sugarcane workers, met with 15 of Four Corners' women and offered to help them help themselves. The women founded the Four Corners Self Help Housing Committee and pledged to work together to rebuild their lives. The five-year project has not only shored up the homes but has also created a sense of accomplishment among the residents. "We held up a mirror to them, so that they could see themselves," says Lorna Bourg, Southern Mutual's assistant executive director. "They are reflecting their sense of self-worth."

Since 1969, Southern Mutual has worked to improve the lives of those who toil in the fields. Back then, many farmworkers lived behind the "cane curtain" in self-contained plantations with names such as the Bottoms, Oxford and Dog Quarters, filled with rented shacks reminiscent of the tarnished side of the antebellum era. The field hands were paid with chits and exchanged the paper for goods at overpriced company stores. Since crops are seasonal, the field hands ran up large tabs, which were then deducted from their pay and resulted in a lifetime of indenture. Those who quit were ordered off the land. Virginia Sutton, 74, a graying yet dapper great-grandmother of 17 and co- chairwoman of the group, once labored in the sugarcane fields for 70 cents a day. "We used to work from can't to can't," she says, recalling the long days. "You go to work, it is so dark you can't see your hand, and when you finish, you still can't see your hand."