Two-year-old boy abandoned on Bourbon Street

Tipsters called police in Ponchatoula, Hammond, Covington, and Denham Springs, but none could find the mysterious woman in the blue jean jacket.

One week earlier, Thursday, January 22, 1976, as the sun rose over the French Quarter, Susan, a dancer, her shift over, stepped out of a club in the 500 block of Bourbon Street. As her eyes adjusted to the light and regained focus, she heard a cry and saw a little blond boy, maybe two-years-old, wearing red overalls and an American flag striped shirt standing alone in the street, trying to dislodge used chewing gum from the pavement.

Running to his side, Susan asked, “Are you okay?”

The toddler grinned, showing his dimples as Susan picked him up, and he asked, “Momma?”

Interviewing tourists, police learned a woman wearing a blue jean jacket left the little boy on the sidewalk before climbing into a car with an older man and speeding away. The boy stepped into the street to follow her.

Uncertain what to do, the New Orleans Police Department officers called to the scene drove the child to the Volunteers of America facility at 3801 Pitt Street, where Irene King, a reporter from The Times-Picayune, went to interview him.

Irene found the little boy playing happily on swings, slides, and see-saws unconcerned that no one knew who he was or where he came from. The boy greeted the news crew warmly, especially when Photographer Pat Patterson allowed him to finger the camera lens. Something about the feel of the glass caused the little boy to giggle.

Later, back on the playground, he raced from one thing to the other, obviously knowing much about playgrounds for such a youthful age.

Adrienne Carmena, director of the Volunteers’ nursery, told Irene that “Kenny” answered questions readily, but he was not much for spontaneous conversation.

“Kenny?” Irene asked.

“We are not sure that’s his name,” the director explained, saying Kenny was the nearest they could guess. “What he said had a definite K sound,” she said. “And he responds to Kenny when we call.”

Bright and active, “Kenny” also expressed his likes and dislikes by saying “Yes” sometimes, “No” more often.

Because he resembles a Scandinavian, Director Carmena said, officials at the home contacted a local Norwegian church to see if he understands the Scandinavian language. She said they had a woman speak to him earlier in German and while he listened intently, he did not respond.

“He frequently responds with ‘Ya’,” the director said, “But we don’t know if that is just baby talk or part of his language.”

The little boy showed a tendency to be left-handed, and he was evidently a playground regular, Irene observed, as he knew just where and how to get a drink of water from the fountain.

“We looked for signs of distress or missing someone when he came in, but there were none,” Virginia Panno, the home’s resource director told Irene. She said all indications showed the child came from a loving home.

Police across the state searched for the child’s parents, racing against a deadline. Janie Washington, an intake supervisor with Foster Care Services of the Louisiana Family Service, told them after four months a court action would place the boy in a foster home and make him eligible for adoption.

The National Crime Information Center division of the New Orleans Police Department sent his description nationwide, causing phones to ring at the Family Services division, the Volunteers of America Home, and police stations throughout the state and country.

“But there has been nothing definite or even halfway conclusive,” the intake supervisor told Irene.

Two months later, police in San Diego, California, armed with a tourist photo of the child and his mother in Jackson Square, arrested 36-year-old Patricia Rogers Barr. Investigators recorded their interview with her, and the New Orleans District Attorney played the tape at her trial two weeks later.

On the tape, Barr explained that the reason she abandoned her son was that she had no food. “We had nothing else to give him,” she told police. “I didn’t want to hurt him anymore. I don’t mean physically hurt him. I’d never hurt that baby. I just wanted to make sure the baby was all right.”

Q. “Did you leave your child intentionally?”

A. “At the time I did, yes…”

Q. “Do you feel that this is the best thing for the baby is to be placed in a foster home or put up for adoption?”

A. “I don’t want the baby put for adoption, I don’t.”

Q. “Exactly what do you want to happen to the baby?”

A. “Ah, I’d like for it to be with me again. That’s a hell of a thing to say, but I do. I want my baby. I love my baby. I know it sounds ridiculous.”

Q. “Was he becoming a burden to you and Shenandoah (James Bryant, her traveling companion)?”

A. “No. He was no burden at all. It was just that we needed food for him. We needed diapers for him, and we couldn’t afford to get them. I wanted to go back and get him from the day I left there, but I knew he was in better hands.”

A state witness, Laura Zielonta, contradicted the statement on the recording, saying she traveled with the defendant around the country. Asked if Barr ever complained about her son, she replied, “She complained every other sentence… you could make an album of her complaints.”

Laura Zielonta testified she never saw Patricia Barr change a diaper.

In the taped interview, Barr said she took a long walk with her son and “on the spur-of-the-moment” left him on Bourbon Street.

The New Orleans court found Patricia Rogers Barr guilty of Child Neglect and Cruelty to a Juvenile, a felony. On appeal, the Louisiana Supreme Court reversed the felony two years later.

Police identified the abandoned child called “Kenny” as two-year-old Clinton Russell Barr. I’ve been trying to find him, curious how his life turned out, but today, the fate of the little blond abandoned toddler remains a mystery.