ROMEVILLE TOWN HISTORY

Romeville took its name from one of the oldest families in St. James Parish, that of Rommel.� The village of Romeville was the site of the former Webre plantation and, when the Rommels arrived in the area, led by Johann Rommel on March 1, 1721, the two families intermarried in time.

The Rome family traces its ancestry to Kirchardt, Germany, a town 20 miles southeast of Heidelberg.� The earliest ancestry found so far is Heinrich Rommel, who married in 1691.� One of his sons, Johann Rommel, his wife, Anna Maria, his mother, Ursula, and his sister, Suzanne, were numbered among the 40 who survived the dangerous voyage across the Atlantic aboard the Les Deux Freres, which launched in November 1720 with 213 passengers.� Heinrich died during the journey.

The ship arrived in Biloxi on March 1, 1771, mingled with German settlers who arrived on other ships and journeyed up the Mississippi River to the Karlstein settlement, which extended from present day Killona to Lucy.

Anna Maria died shortly after arrival and Johann married again, this time to Anna Steiger, who gave birth to their nine children.

By 1731, the Rommel family moved upriver near Bonnet Carre Point (present day Lucy).� In December 1771, Rommel died and in 1775, his widow sold off the property and moved in with her daughter and her husband, Benjamin and Marie Anne Barbe Autin.� In the document, Rommel is referred to as Jean Baptiste Rome.� She died in March 1791.

Jean Rome, the second son of Johann, was born in 1728.� In August 1751, he married Marguerite Oubre, and they had seven children before he died in 1776.� Later, Marguerite Rome and her children all moved to upper St. John and St. James parishes and she died in 1822 at the age of 90 and is buried at St. Michael's cemetery in convent.

The Rome family continued to infiltrate St. James Parish, with one child married to a Poche and another to an Schecksneider.� The third child of Jean and Marguerite was Abraham Rome, who settled in 1791 around the later location of the fabled Valcour Aime property on the West Bank of St. James Parish.� Abraham had married Jeanne Baudoin two years earlier.� She died in 1816 and he died in 1827, both buried at the St. James Church cemetery, with 12 children being born to the couple.

The sixth of those 12 children, Nicholas Rome, sired four children and died in 1835 at the age of 39.�� His son, Jean Edouard Rome, was born in 1829, married in 1857, and moved to the East Bank near the Webre Plantation.� His son, Joseph Adhemar Rome, was born in 1860 and died in 1913, the same year the Romeville School was built, graduating in its first class in 1914.� Joseph's son Audry Joseph Rome, was born in 1905, the same year the Belmont and White Hall schools were built, and among his children was Ferdnand Rome, 55, present day patriarch of Romeville.

Ferdanand was born in the original Romeville School, a massive wooden structure with a large enough porch for his and his seven siblings to play football on, he recalled.�� "My earliest memories include the fact there were only two automobiles in Romeville and only one telephone, that of Ed Rome (his father's cousin), who was on the school board then."

He added, "Every house in Romeville had a Rome. There were about 100 in a half mile stretch." Ed Rome had a small grocery, where students for the school bought their lunches, and Denis "Parrain" Rome drove the school bus.� Teachers included Lilly Weber, Mable Gaudet and Rita Rome LeBlanc.� Romeville was one of several small villages strung along River Road like a string of beads, including Oneida, Welham, College Point, Jefferson College, Convent, Model Farm, Uncle Sam, Malacher, Romeville, Hilton, Orville, Helvetia, Rapidan, Central, White Hall, and Union.�� "Everywhere, there was a post office and a little grocery or bar,"Ferdnand added.

Audry Rome, who also ran a small store and the Half Moon Inn nearby, donated Land for the Romeville High School, which succeeded the earlier one.� At the rear of Romeville, from the 1870's to 1917, was Timberton, a lumber camp harvesting cypress timber Audry Rome worked at the lumber camp when he was a young boy, stacking timber.� "Back then, we didn't have money but we were shrimp rich, " he recalled.�

In 1931, with the completion of the new Romeville High, the old White Hall and Belmont schools closed.� The old structure had been jacked up and a new ground floor was added, along with restrooms, auditorium and stage.� During construction, the students attended classes at the Malacher House, near Uncle Sam Plantation.

Romeville's first post office was established on September 8, 1917, with Rita Rome the first postmistress, and closed in 1955, serving at its height the stretch of river from Malacher House to Hymel's Restaurant in Central. The railroad depot, which originally started with the Timberton camp, closed in early 1950

Ferdnand Rome's own graduation class was 21 students, one of the largest in years.� He started his greenhouse business in 1967, the same year he began teaching in Gramercy.� He later taught at Romeville and in Lutcher before he went back to his green house business full time in 1991.� As school desegregation began in St. James Parish, the old Central High became Romeville boy's school in 1969 and Convent became the Romeville Girls School.

Romeville continued to thrive until April 10, 1974, when Romeville High School burned down, leaving only the cafeteria, which is now the Romeville Senior center at Romeville Park.

"We're losing our heritage,"Rome commented, as he scanned the fast emptying region surrounding his home.� "What are the tourists going to come see, a plaque on the side of the road?"� Looking around where his grandmother's house once stood. Where Timberton once operated, where Romeville High once educated scores of children, he wonders - and waits.