River Road African American Museum

The River Road African American Museum in Donaldsonville, Louisiana, preserves and shares the history, culture, and contributions of African Americans in the River Parishes region.

Planning your visit

The River Road runs along the Mississippi between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, past the sugar plantations that made this stretch among the wealthiest regions in nineteenth-century America — wealth built entirely on enslaved labour.

The River Road African American Museum in Donaldsonville tells that history from the perspective of the people who were enslaved and their descendants: the work of sugar cultivation, which was among the most lethal forms of American slavery, the Civil War and emancipation, Reconstruction, the free Black community that made Donaldsonville notable, and the twentieth century.

Genealogical resources are a substantial part of the offering, helping visitors trace ancestry through plantation records — difficult research given how enslaved people were documented.

The plantation houses along the same road present a very different account, and the contrast is instructive.

Allow ninety minutes. The main booking is an entry ticket. Current availability is listed below.