This tiny souvenir booklet of miniature postcards includes curious images of the New Orleans Mardi Gras. For 12 days preceding Mardi Gras, more than 60 parades and hundreds of private parties, dances and masked balls are scheduled. These are organized by non-profit clubs called krewes, many named after mythological figures such as Aphrodite, Eros, Hermes, Pegasus and Thor. Each krewe is completely autonomous and there is no overall coordinator of Carnival activities.
“Les Mysterieuses, Carnival’s first female organization, staged its premiere ball in 1896, but it was not until 1941 that the Krewe of Venus presented the first ladies’ Mardi Gras parade. In 1909, Zulu, Carnival’s first African-American parading krewe, was founded as a spoof of white Mardi Gras. Its parade is now one of the early highlights on Fat Tuesday.”
