“I can’t wait as good as it looks now I can’t wait until the final brush has been put on it,” said Franklin native Diane Wiltz.
Wiltz is the owner of Lamp Post Reception Hall, Lamp Light Coffee House and Bistro and Lamp Station Ice Cream Shoppe.
Back in February, she attended a community feedback meeting to gather input for what should be on the mural.
She wanted to see the lampposts that line main street incorporated, and is now seeing that idea come to life in the mural.
“I just thought if you’re going to do a mural that represents who we are, and we consider ourselves to be lamplighters, then there has to be a lamppost,” Witlz said.
“I think that one lamppost that we have in this picture speaks volume.”
Muralist Robert Dafford has been working on the mural for eight weeks alongside his assistant muralist Chris Fruge.
His inspiration came from the sidewalks within the park imitating the body of the Bayou Teche, and the rest unfolded.
“I immediately saw mirroring the sidewalk in the mural was the way to pull you from the sidewalk into the mural,” Dafford said.
“And also to see the origin of the name the Bayou Teche. I thought of multiple curves mirrored in the wall and then it occurred to me that would be the way to show different times on the Teche.”
The murals framed by native flowers, begin with a sepia post card showing multiple scenes in different eras.
It begins with the Chitimacha Tribe thousands of years ago, progresses to the Acadians’ arrival in the 1700s and ends with the1800s Plantations Era.
The second postcard in color begins with the 1900s industrial development on the riverfront and goes to the 2000s, featuring recreational activities on the Teche.
“I didn’t have the idea of a timeline when I got here, it developed as we went,” Dafford said. “And research and development has carried it to where it is now.”
That development included incorporating images from Franklin, such as an 1800s African American baptism and books on Chitimatcha basketry.
He hopes visitors in the park remember where the origins of Franklin began.
“A realization of how long people have used the Bayou for life ways,” Dafford said.
"I would just like us to think about that as we wonder through this Bayou sidewalk to think about where we are now but life here didn’t start when we got here.”
Dafford said his mural should be complete by next week.
This project was funded in part by the Louisiana Office of Cultural Development Division of the Arts and the City of Franklin.
Contribution were by Al Kuhlman and the Kuhlman Family/Forest Restaurant and Marnie Vaughn/Bargain Barn Too.
