More than 100,000 people will struggle to pay for a funeral this year, a report revealed this week. The average cost of a funeral for a loved one rose by 80 per cent between 2004 and 2013, and is expected to continue to rise.
In 1703 French settlers in Mobile established the first organized Mardi Gras celebration tradition in what was to become the United States. The first informal mystic society, or krewe, was formed in Mobile in 1711, the Boeuf Gras Society. By 1720, Biloxi had been made capital of Louisiana.
Mardi Gras in Mobile is the annual Carnival celebration in Mobile, Alabama. It is the oldest annual Carnival celebration in the United States, started by Frenchman Nicholas Langlois in 1703. This was fifteen years before New Orleans was founded, although today their celebrations are much more widely known.