Pre-history St. Tammany was originally inhabited by numerous Indian peoples, including the Colapissas, Bayou Goulas, Chickasaw, Biloxi, Choctaw and Pensacola nations (although Frederick S. Ellis, in his book ''St. Tammany Parish: L'autre Côté du Lac'', claims that the regionally prominent Choctaw tribe did not arrive in the area until after it had begun to be settled by Europeans). In 1699,
Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, a French explorer, was the first European to visit the area of present-day St. Tammany Parish. While exploring lakes
Pontchartrain and
Maurepas, Iberville wrote in his journal, "The place where I am is one of the prettiest I have seen, fine level ground bare of canes. The land north of the lakes is a country of pine trees mixed with hard woods. The soil is sandy and many tracks of buffalo and deer can be seen."
West Florida After the 18th-century founding and development of
New Orleans,
French settlers began to enter the region. The primary industry was the production of
pitch,
tar,
turpentine and
resin from the forests. After
France was defeated in the
French and Indian War, St. Tammany (along with the other future "
Florida Parishes") became part of
British West Florida. During this period, the area comprising today's St. Tammany attracted British
loyalists who wanted to escape persecution in the
Thirteen Colonies. After
Great Britain was defeated in the
American Revolutionary War, West Florida was governed by
the Spanish. The West Florida period ended with
the West Florida revolt, which precipitated annexation by the United States.
Creation and naming of the parish In 1810, President
James Madison annexed West Florida as part of the United States and had Governor
William C. C. Claiborne incorporate the area into the
Territory of Orleans. Claiborne established the boundaries of the
Florida Parishes with the creation of its first four parishes: East Baton Rouge, Feliciana, St. Helena, and St. Tammany. St. Tammany Parish was named after the
Delaware Indian Chief
Tamanend (c.1628-1698), who made peace with
William Penn and was generally renowned for his goodness. Among the nine
Louisiana parishes named after saints, St. Tammany is the only one whose
eponym is not a
saint of the
Catholic Church, the ecclesiastical parishes of which had formed the basis for the state's civil parishes.
Tamanend is not known to have been Roman Catholic or Christian, but he had been popularly revered as a "Patron Saint of America" since the post-
Revolutionary period, long after his death.
19th century In the early 1830s, there were only two towns in St. Tammany:
Covington, a retreat with summer homes and hotels; and
Madisonville, a shipbuilding and sawmill town. The area south of Covington to Lake Pontchartrain's northern shore and extending eastwards to the
Pearl River border with the state of
Mississippi was known as the Covington Lowlands. This region included the present-day towns of
Mandeville,
Abita Springs,
Lacombe,
Slidell, and
Pearl River. Mandeville was founded in 1834 by
Bernard de Marigny de Mandeville and was developed as a health resort for wealthy New Orleanians, because it was believed that
ozone was both salutary and naturally emitted by the numerous trees in the area (both beliefs later proven false), giving rise to an early name for the region — the "Ozone Belt". Regular ferry service commenced across
Lake Pontchartrain, and shortly thereafter another resort community was founded, Abita Springs. A railroad was constructed in the 1880s connecting Covington and Abita Springs to Mandeville and to
New Orleans, allowing for further growth, particularly in Abita Springs, where underground spring waters permitted supposedly healthful baths.
20th century and
Covington, Louisiana, for the date of December 30, 1915 With the completion of high-speed road connections to St. Tammany from
New Orleans and its older suburbs (
Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, the
I-10 Twin Span Bridge), the parish began to develop as a bedroom community.
Suburban sprawl first took root in and around
Slidell, Louisiana, in the eastern part of the parish. Though the Causeway was completed in 1956 and linked suburban
Metairie with western St. Tammany, growth in and around western St. Tammany towns like Mandeville, Covington, and Madisonville only gathered momentum in the late 1960s.
21st century While St. Tammany was sparsely populated and almost wholly rural in the 1950s, its population exceeded 200,000 in the wake of
Hurricane Katrina's landfall in 2005. A major event in the parish's transition from a bedroom community of commuters to a more diverse and independent economic unit occurred in 2008 with the relocation of
Chevron's regional corporate headquarters from
downtown New Orleans to an office park outside of Covington. One of the parish's most powerful figures was Jack Strain, who served as St. Tammany sheriff from 1996 to 2016. After losing his bid for a sixth term, Strain was the subject of a federal corruption investigation into his privatizing a parish work release program in exchange for kickbacks. After being charged with 16 federal counts, Strain agreed to plead guilty to one count of bribery. But the federal investigation also uncovered accusations of sexual abuse involving juveniles. Strain was charged with four counts of aggravated rape, two counts of aggravated incest and one count each of sexual battery and indecent behavior with a juvenile. In 2021, he was found guilty on all counts and sentenced to four life terms in prison.
Hurricane Katrina effects Hurricane Katrina made its final landfall in eastern St. Tammany Parish. The western
eye wall passed directly over St. Tammany Parish as a
Category 3 hurricane at about 9:45 AM CST, August 29, 2005. The communities of Slidell, Avery Estates, Lakeshore Estates, Oak Harbor, Eden Isles and Northshore Beach were inundated by the storm surge that extended over inland. The storm surge impacted all of St. Tammany Parish's coastline, including Lacombe, Mandeville and Madisonville. The storm surge in the area of the Rigolets Pass was estimated at , not including wave action, declining to at Madisonville. The surge had a second peak in eastern St. Tammany as the westerly winds from the southern eye wall pushed the surge to the east, backing up at the bottleneck of the Rigolets Pass. The twin spans of I-10 bridges between Slidell and New Orleans East were virtually destroyed, and much of I-10 in New Orleans East was under water. The Lake Pontchartrain Causeway and the
U.S. Highway 11 bridge, connecting the north and south shores of Lake Pontchartrain, were open only to emergency traffic. Initial search and rescue operations were conducted south of
U.S. Highway 190 from Lacombe east to the state line. Fire District No. 1 and the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's office evacuated over 3,000 people from flooded homes and rescued about 300 people in imminent danger. Radio communications among first responders functioned throughout the rescue period, but the 9-1-1 system was not operational for ten days. Utility services were not available anywhere in the parish. Generator power was available for hospitals and a special needs shelter. Hospitals were running at capacity on generator power. The hurricane-force winds toppled trees and telephone poles parish-wide, blocking all transportation routes. Land debris cleanup continued into 2007, with over 6.6 million cubic yards (5 million m3) collected. Debris cleaning in waterways continued at least through 2009. Hurricane Katrina damaged 48,792 housing units in St. Tammany Parish from flood waters, high winds, or both. ==Geography==