Jeanine Lemoine Owner of the Rock House
Our Living Legend owner of the Rock House in Innis, Louisiana talks about the history of The Rock House right down to a recent concert by the Blues Legend and hometown hero Buddy Guy.
Count Time Podcast Living Legend Jeanine Lemoine
Selected quotes and notes from Count Time Podcast with LD Azobra Interview with Jeanine Lemoine – Women’s History Month
Good evening. Good evening. Good evening it’s 4:00 PM. Stand up it’s count time, time for every man and woman to stand up and be counted. Welcome to another edition of Count Time podcast. I am brother LD Azobra. Thank you for joining us today.
Now, we made a special trip out here in the big city, the big town, the country of a town called Innis, Louisiana. We have this place that has so much history, so much has happened here in this little town. And this place has been a place of refuge for a lot of local artists, a lot of local musicians who traveled this way. But we got someone here going to give us some history about how this place come about, a family who got it started and how it ended up where it is today. We have Ms. Jeanine Lemoine. Welcome to Count Time.
JPL
Well, good morning. Glad to be here.
LD
So we’re going to get started because we want to hear about this great place in Innis, Louisiana, off the Morganza Spillway, way out here, where a lot of good deer hunting take place. A lot of good hunting, period. So we got this place we call The Rock House. How long The Rock House been here?
JPL
Well, my grandfather built it in 1944.
LD
Your grandfather, what was his name?
JPL
Vincent Purpera.
LD
What was the story behind The Rock House? What made your grandfather, what kind of work was he into?
JPL
Well, my grandfather came over from Sicily in the early 19 hundreds, married my grandmother, and they ran a small store at Bachelor. Well, in the early 40s, he built the old store, which is next to the store that’s here Now, my dad and he had three other sons. So there were four boys and five girls in his family. Well, two of them were in the service in the military. And my grandfather was thinking, well, I’m going to go ahead and build a store in Innis and build a ballroom, The Rock House. So he built it knowing that when my uncle came out of the service, anthony, also called Tony, would run the RockHouse, and my dad and his older brother Joe would run the store. And then the younger brother Vince would help Tony in the RockHouse.
