The saints went marching in and around the Faubourg Tremé on Wednesday as the Backstreet Cultural Museum hosted their 19th annual All Saints’ Day Tribute to Jazz Funerals. This year the second line marched in honor of Charlie Lee Sims, Ed Harris and Thelma Hubbard, starting at Rhodes Funeral Home and stopping at Charbonnet Family Service and Little People’s Place, then ending at the Backstreet Cultural Museum.

The All Saints’ Day Parade has been a Backstreet Cultural Museum tradition since its founding in 1999 as a way to raise awareness of jazz funerals. Each year, the museum’s All Saints Day Parade marches for loved community members who have recently passed away.

The All Saints’ Day Parade is part of the Backstreet Cultural Museum’s mission of celebrating the New Orleans African American community, specifically the community’s various rituals of marching and masking. Its collections and exhibits encompass everything from the Mardi Gras Indians, Baby Dolls and Skull and Bone gangs to social aid and pleasure clubs and, of course, jazz funerals.

The museum has a variety of other community events and programs centered on the Tremé and its traditions. These include a Mardi Gras Indian sewing program, projects to archive oral histories, and a back to school picnic that provides attendees with school supplies hosted in conjunction with the Mandingo Warriors “Spirit of Fi Yi Yi” Mardi Gras Indians. The museum building itself serves as a meeting point for second lines Mardi Gras Indians and the North Side Skull and Bone Gang on Mardi Gras day.

Click on the image below to check out our photo gallery of the November 1, 2017 event. All photos taken by Kim Welsh.