Islanders), and French-speaking Gens de Couleur Libres from the Caribbean.

As a group, mixed-race Creoles rapidly began to acquire education, skills (many in New Orleans worked as craftsmen and artisans), businesses and property. They were overwhelmingly Catholic, spoke Colonial French (although some also spoke Louisiana Creole), and kept up many French social customs, modified by other parts of their ancestry and Louisiana culture. The Creoles of Color often married among themselves to maintain their class and social culture. The French-speaking mixed-race population came to be called "Creoles of color". It was said that "New Orleans persons of color were far wealthier, more secure, and more established than freed unmixed Black Creoles and Cajuns elsewhere in Louisiana."

Under the French and Spanish rulers, Louisiana developed a three-tiered society, similar to thatApparently, no one told Chicago that the Fourth of July holiday weekend was over. The shootings continued into Monday.

"In the roughly 84 hours from 3:10 p.m. Thursday until 3:30 a.m. Monday, gunfire struck 82 people, 14 of them fatally," reports the Chicago Tribune. "Both tallies include two boys shot by police: a 14-year-old who allegedly pointed a long-barreled .44-caliber revolver at officers, and a 16-year-old who—after first eluding cops who had responded to a report of shots fired—allegedly refused officers'...