Dew Drop Social and Benevolent Hall

The Dew Drop Social and Benevolent No. 2 of Mandeville was founded in 1885 as a mutual assistance organization — the kind of self-reliance Black communities built when Jim Crow locked every other door. Ten years later, in 1895, they built themselves a hall. It served as meeting space and dance floor, the major center of social life for African Americans in a Mandeville that offered them almost nothing else. The building's period of significance as a social center and benevolent association hall ended around 1940, but the structure survived — rare for a Black fraternal hall in southern Louisiana, where most were lost. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000, the hall now hosts live jazz concerts under the Dew Drop Jazz Hall name. The shows sell out frequently; seating is limited. Check the schedule before you go. What you're walking into is not a restoration project or a museum — it's a place that still does the work it was built to do, which is gather people and make music where they're welcome.