With help from the Belmont Townsend Foundation, the house was moved in 1976 from Bayou Boeuf to Bunkie with the intention of preserving it and turning it into a museum. ![]() The house as it stands today is only a sliver of the house that Northup helped construct. Northup would go on to write about his enslavement in the 1853 book “Twelve Years a Slave.” It was during this time that Northup, known as Platt to his slave owners, became friends with Bass, who later informed Northup’s family of his ordeal which helped Northup regain his freedom. Epps, a planter and slave owner who owned Northup for a decade, hired a Canadian architect and carpenter named Samuel Bass to build the house, and Northup was assigned to assist Bass. The Edwin Epps family home was constructed in 1852 on Bayou Boeuf in Avoyelles Parish. She offered me some lemonade and went into house where she had the 1968 printing of “12 Years As A Slave,” and it was signed by Sue Eakin. “I was mowing grass for an older lady and she was about 90 at that time. “It kind of started when I was about 13,” Redman said. It was that story that fascinated, and began a lifelong passion, for Avoyelles Parish resident Richard Redman. The story of a free African-American man from Glens Falls, New York being kidnapped, sold into slavery and then spending a dozen years held in servitude is remarkable, and quite unique among slave narratives. The big draw, and the most significant, is the house itself because of its association to Northup. Visitors will also learn facts about plantation life, slave life in Louisiana, Oakland Plantation (where LSUA is currently housed) and different artifacts from Eakin’s collection, as well as folk art items from the Alexandria Museum of Art. Inside the single-story wood-frame Creole cottage visitors will learn about Northup’s time as a slave throughout central Louisiana, as well as the efforts of LSUA history professor Sue Eakin who helped save the Epps house. Northup’s story is currently on display at the Epps House: Solomon Northup’s Gateway To Freedom Museum located on the campus of LSU at Alexandria. ![]() I just couldn’t believe that people lived there didn’t know that story.” So I asked him about the story and he said he kind of heard of it but didn’t know it that well. “I had just started dating my husband who was from Avoyelles Parish. “I was at LSU at the time and my Louisiana History professor made us read “12 Years as Slave,” Melancon said. ALEXANDRIA – Meredith Melancon couldn’t believe that more people didn’t know about Solomon Northup’s story.
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