CRIMES
May 13, 2015Body found in Cocodrie identified
May 15, 2015
According to his family, Albert “Sugar” Guidry was the epitome of good work ethic.
Albert passed away on Friday, May 1 at age 87. Exactly one week before that he mowed his lawn.
The doting patriarch of a large family — seven children, 19 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren — he instilled in them that strong work ethic and an appreciation for education.
Albert grew up on his family’s sugarcane and dairy plantation, Terre Haute Plantation in Reserve. Born in 1927, Albert’s formative years were during the WWII-era. He, along with his 11 brothers and sisters worked the land, tending to the livestock and plowing fields.
“Hard work: They were land rich,” said daughter Brenda Riviere. “It was a working plantation, but the children had to work.”
While attending university at Louisiana State University, he would hitchhike home on Fridays to work the farm, then hitchhike back to Baton Rouge to continue his studies in mechanical engineering.
This fact was what motivated eldest granddaughter Jeri Ann Rome Glodowski during trying times in her college years.
After completing his studies, he went on to work for Leon Godchaux Company in Reserve. It was there that he met his wife, Elizabeth Boé Guidry, whom he married in 1953. The couple were together for 50 years until Elizabeth’s death in 2003.
In 1962, he scored a job with South Coast Corporation, the former sugar refining giant that dominated the Louisiana sugar refining market from 1958 to 1979, and managed multiple sugar mills across the state. The job brought him to Houma, where he stayed until his recent passing.
He would spend many hours on the road driving from refinery to refinery, doing essentially what a project manager does today except for multiple projects across the state. Sometimes he would have to drive somewhere over the weekend and would bring a handful of his children.
There, he taught his children to peel sugar cane and chew the fibrous strands for the sweet nectar inside.
“He would bring that home and he would cut it up,” Riviere said. “That was almost like a dessert for us because he wouldn’t let us have desserts too often.”
Albert would take the opportunities afforded by visiting the sugar mills to teach Albert Jr., his oldest son, about the science behind the operation. Albert, Jr. later followed in his father’s footsteps and studied mechanical engineering, as well.
“He explained a lot of what was going on,” Albert, Jr. said. “It was educational.”
Albert took his children’s education seriously. Not only did he enroll all of his children in St. Bernadette School and Vandebilt Catholic High School, but he served on both school boards, even serving as president of Vandebilt’s school board for three years.
He was a loving, but stern parent. The children had to finish their homework before going out to play and he would take the time to explain each concept to them whilst they completed their assignments.
One year, Albert, Jr. made the honor roll at Vandebilt and the school rewarded him with a half-day on that Friday. That Friday, he called his mother to get picked up from school because he’d earned the afternoon off, but she elected Albert to make the final call.
His father came to pick him up, but expressed his concern about rewarding good grades with less school.
“He said, ‘I’ll let you take this off,’ but he said, ‘How can you expect to keep making the honor roll if you’re going to miss a half day of school,’” Albert, Jr. recounted.
Albert was the only breadwinner in the family, said daughter Sheila Guidry Britsch. So sending seven children to private schools, even on an engineer’s salary, was challenging.
He was a frugal man who believed in conserving everything from clock components to electricity.
“My siblings and I very often heard, “Don’t keep the refrigerator door open too long-you’ll let the cold air out” by my father,” Britsch said.
She purchased a new refrigerator a few years ago that had an alarm sound when the door was left open for two minutes or more.
She named the refrigerator “Sugar’s Dream,” something the whole family, even Albert, laughed about.
Albert “Sugar” Guidry with his granddaughter, Jeri Ann Rome Glodowski, on her wedding day. Guidry had a deep appreciation for hard work and education.
