From Bienville to Bourbon Street to bounce. 300 moments that make New Orleans unique.

WHAT HAPPENED 1718 ~ 2018 was first elected as sheriff of Jefferson Parish 300 in 1979. TRICENTENNIAL Harry Lee might have easily been dismissed as a caricature: the rotund Chinese sheriff who liked country music and tough talk. But Lee was not to be ignored. He was born to a family of Chinese immigrants who owned a laundry on Carondelet Street in New Orleans. He graduated from State University with a degree in geol- ogy and served in the Air Force. He became a driver and adviser to Rep. , and later, after he finished Loyola Law School, he served as a court magistrate and Lee’s family owned a then chief attorney for Jefferson Gov. and laundry and a restau- Parish before being elected sheriff in 1979. Lee Sheriff Harry Lee were Harry Lee announced that he was rant where he worked friends who often appeared diagnosed with leukemia in April 2007. while attending would serve seven terms as a Democrat, some- together in public, including He died in October of that year. law school. times winning as much as 70 percent of the vote. at this announcement that the NBA Hornets would play His actions, though, were often at odds with his in New Orleans. party affiliation and his relationship with Boggs’ who had been in favor of civil rights. After , Lee blamed a spike in crime on the African-Americans who had moved into Jefferson Parish. He suggested that his deputies should stop and question young black men. He previously made similar comments dur- ing crime sprees in Jefferson Parish, sometimes drawing national attention. He was friends with Gov. Edwin Edwards, and after Edwards said he wouldn’t run for governor, Harry Lee Lee handed out bobble- the sheriff briefly joined the race for governor, but was a law head dolls of himself at student his birthday celebrations he soon pulled out of the race saying, “Why would at Loyola he called the Chinese I want to be governor when I can be king?” Lee University. Cajun fais do-do, also befriended President and singer A papier-mâché head of Harry Lee, used on Lee’s personal Mardi Gras float, made an ap- as well as from his pearance at his funeral. Mardi Gras float. Willie Nelson. He died in 2007.