St. Joseph, Louisiana

St. Joseph is a town in and the parish seat of Tensas Parish in northeastern Louisiana, United States.Template:GR The population was 1,340 at the 2000 census. The town is 69 percent African American. St. Joseph is the entry community to Lake Bruin State Park located on Lake Bruin, a clear ox-bow lake of the nearby Mississippi River.

The town has a black mayor, Edward L. Brown, who unseated the long-term white incumbent, Whitfield "Whit" Jones, in the jungle primary held on October 7, 2000. Brown polled 447 votes (64.9 percent) to Jones' 242 (35.1 percent).

Downtown St. Joseph, Louisiana

St. Joseph is the entry point to popular Lake Bruin State Park.

Sanctuary of First United Methodist Church of St. Joseph

St. Joseph Baptist Church, a Southern Baptist congregation located across from Tensas High School in St. Joseph

Consolidated Tensas High School in St. Joseph

Tensas Academy in St. Joseph opened in 1970.

File:Fashionable home on Lake Bruin IMG 1252.JPG

A fashionable gated house on Lake Bruin east of St. Joseph

Prior to 1968, each parish regardless of population had at least one member in the Louisiana House of Representatives. The last member to represent only Tensas Parish was Democrat S. S. DeWitt (1914-1998) of Newellton and later St. Joseph. DeWitt represented Tensas Parish from 1964-1968, and then from 1968-1972, he and Lantz Womack of Winnsboro, the seat of Franklin Parish, together represented Franklin, Tensas, and Madison parishes. Womack defeated DeWitt in the 1971 primary; DeWitt later switched to Republican affiliation.

Troyce Guice, a St. Joseph native, ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for the United States Senate in both 1966 and 1996.

Jack Keahey, another St. Joseph native, was the president of the Tensas Basin Levee Board, based in Columbia, the seat of Caldwell Parish. He joined the district in 1992 and served as its president from 2000 until his death in 2007.

Education

Tensas High School, a consolidation of the former Joseph Moore Davidson High School (usually known as Davidson High School) in St. Joseph, Newellton High School in Newellton and Waterproof High School in Waterproof, began operating in the fall of 2006 on the Davidson campus. The school board goal is to improve educational quality by focusing on one high school for the entire parish, the smallest in population in Louisiana. Troubles broke out at the school on November 2, 2006, and fourteen black males were arrested by the sheriff's department. Overt tensions thereafter subsided.

The Tensas Parish school superintendent is Carol Johnson. Her husband, Neal "Lanny" Johnson is a former Tensas superintendent and the current superintendent in Winnsboro in neighboring Franklin Parish. A Democrat, he was a member of the Louisiana House from 1976-1980 in a district including Franklin and Tensas parishes. He ran unsuccessfully for the Louisiana State Senate in 1979, having been defeated by Dan Richey, then of Ferriday in Concordia Parish.

In 1970, the private Tensas Academy opened in St. Joseph during the first semester of school desegregation.

Geography

St. Joseph is located at 31°55′7″N 91°14′18″W (31.918513, -91.238284)Template:GR.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 0.9 square miles (2.3 km²), all of it land.

Demographics

As of the censusTemplate:GR of 2000, there were 1,340 people, 500 households, and 337 families residing in the town. The population density was 1,505.2 people per square mile (581.3/km²). There were 607 housing units at an average density of 681.9/sq mi (263.3/km²). The racial makeup of the town was 29.78% White, 68.58% African American, 0.07% Native American, 0.22% Asian, 0.30% from other races, and 1.04% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.75% of the population.

There were 500 households out of which 32.2% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 38.2% were married couples living together, 25.0% had a female householder with no husband present, and 32.4% were non-families. 29.2% of all households were made up of individuals and 14.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.64 and the average family size was 3.29.

In the town the population was spread out with 30.5% under the age of 18, 10.4% from 18 to 24, 26.0% from 25 to 44, 19.7% from 45 to 64, and 13.4% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 34 years. For every 100 females there were 83.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 80.4 males.

The median income for a household in the town was $19,539, and the median income for a family was $22,935. Males had a median income of $22,321 versus $15,288 for females. The per capita income for the town was $9,049. About 33.0% of families and 37.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 47.5% of those under age 18 and 33.3% of those age 65 or over.