Bastia Marlowe~Ancester of a Legend-Marie Laveau

Bastia Marlowe

Bastia Marlowe was born in and grew up in New Orleans, LA under another name.  There, she lived amongst the living and the dead, spent her early adolescence immersed in rain, attended Catholic church, and roamed the city's haunted and flavored streets.  She loved all things New Orleans and once stood in line for 5 hours to be included in the film adaption of fellow New Orleanian Anne Rice's "Interview with a Vampire."  After a stint of performing theater and writing, she moved to Los Angeles in 2001 in her 20s hoping to experience ghosts but mainly exists among the walking dead.  She mostly misses Audubon Park, the low-hanging branches of trees lining St. Charles Ave., stage lights, hole-in-the-wall restaurants, NOMA, driving through City Park, creaky floors in old houses, old cemeteries, and rain. Bastia Marlowe is the great-grand daughter of Marie Laveau.

About Marie Catherine Laveau (September 10, 1801 - June 16, 1881 ) was a practitioner of Voodoo renowned in New Orleans. (As for the date of her birth, while popular sources often say 1794, the records indicate 1801.) Her daughter, Marie Laveau II, (1827 c. 1895) also practiced Voudoun, as well as Voodoo. She and her mother had great influence over their multiracial following. In 1874 as many as twelve thousand spectators, both black and white, swarmed to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain to catch a glimpse of Marie Laveau II performing her legendary rites on St. John's Eve (June 23–24)