Tootie’s best known for being the prettiest Mardi Gras Indian of all time, of course- the “Chief of Chiefs” who had a fatal heart attack in the middle of a City Council meeting, while trying to bring the police and community together around the unique issues of culture and heritage in New Orleans.

What he’s less well known for is being a master craftsman- a lather, in fact. Tootie explains:

Well, the thing about [master lath work] is you have to work your skills together, which is something that’s kinda hard. Because a lot of times when you put accuracy and speed together, if you have speed, you lose accuracy. . . . When you can use your accuracy, when your speed and accuracy work together, you’re good. You’re a good mechanic. You do plenty good work. Whenever you mention you’re a lather-L-A-T-H-E-R-people always say, “Well, what that is?” You have to explain ‘em. See, we the ones prepare the job for the plasterers. The plasterers put their plaster on the work that we put up. . . . Now a long time ago, when I started-the old houses that you see around the city, there’s wood laths underneath there-and we used to nail the little laths. You had to have a little mortar that you keeping between them. You kept the key and you nail the latch.*

Tootie worked on hundreds of buildings around the city, known for the quality his workmanship and never missing a day on the job. Unfortunately, due to the nature of lathe work, his frames are hidden beneath plaster, making it hard to know at a glance which houses are “his,” but one notable example of his large-scale work is on the front of Le Pavillion, on Poydras Street:

The medallion is set upon a metal frame of Tootie’s design. It needed to be strong enough to keep the adornment from collapsing under its own weight while still being lightweight enough to be applied to the outside of the building. He worked on the interior of the Hotel as well, and is known to have worked on several other large-scale commercial projects, including the detail work in the Hotel Monteleone’s ornate lobby ceiling.

Tootie often said that without the knowledge and experience he’d earned on the job he wouldn’t have been able to construct such intricate suits:

I can see things and do it the way I see it. My trade helped me with my Indian suit [made to wear as Big Chief of the Yellow Pocahontas]. Measuring and centers. That’s how I work. In fact, my Indian suit, everything I done on that suit come from what I learned from building. I have a center line that I work. Every building has a center line that’s put in there that’s a jump start. Everything is worked off of that line. My crown, that’s my center line. My apron, everything center line. . . . Well, tell you the truth, my way of making the suit and getting the points, just designing the suit as a whole, my trade helps me, you see. The only thing is I’m working with cardboard and with my trade I’m working with iron, light iron and wire, metal lath. It’s no different. That’s why I can make a design, break it down, get it square to inches, but I can do the same thing with my trade. See, my trade helped me with making the suits, mending a suit.*

He worked on those suits with his wife in his New Marigny shotgun house, which he’d also spent years working on and customizing:

We’ll be keeping our eyes open for other projects Tootie was involved in around the city.

If you’d like to learn more about Mr. Montana, his life, his work, and his death, the documentary “Tootie’s New Suit” is an excellent place to start:

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*these quotes were used in “More than a Craftsman,” researched and put together by Louisiana Folklife. It’s fascinating information and well worth a visit.