Surrounded by a maze of boxes, pictures, plaques, clippings and yellowing ledgers occupying every inch of space in his office, Patrick Schoen, president of Jacob Schoen & Son Funeral Home, carefully worked his way to his desk.
The clutter, he said, was deliberate: He has been sifting through decades of corporate memorabilia to assemble a display showcasing the mortuary’s 150th anniversary. The milestone happened in March, but the exhibit will be on view for an invitation-only celebration Oct. 19 in the funeral home’s Spanish Revival headquarters that dominates the 3800 block of Canal Street.
For Schoen, 64, all those papers and pictures triggered memories, and the stories poured forth.
He recalled taking an order from Frank Sinatra for flowers — red roses — for Louis Prima’s funeral, and he described Richard Simmons’ indignation when the fitness guru saw the floral arrangements that had been ordered for his mother’s funeral. (Simmons relegated them to a men’s restroom.)
A legendary wake for legend
Perhaps the most over-the-top service the funeral home offered was for Mickey Easterling, the flamboyant businesswoman, philanthropist and socialite. When she died in 2014, her daughter told Schoen that her mother didn’t want to be seen lying in a coffin.
Patrick Schoen, director of Jacob Schoen and Son Funeral Home, adjusts a light on Friday, August 30, 2024. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
The solution: Pose her seated on a wrought-iron bench from her backyard — no small feat, because her body had started to stiffen. When the embalmers told Schoen they were not taught how to do that in mortuary-science school, he replied: “I don’t care. This is what we’re going to do.”
Perched on her heavy bench, Easterling’s body went on view on the Saenger Theatre stage, a flute of Veuve Clicquot Champagne in one hand and a cigarette in the other, plus a pin spelling out “#1 BITCH” in diamonds.
“She wanted her 15 minutes of fame, and that was her request,” Schoen said.
Then there was the time, in Schoen’s youth, when he was on overnight duty, sharing a room with a casket containing the body of a man whose funeral had been scheduled for the next day. After leaving the room briefly, Schoen was horrified when he returned and saw the man standing in front of him.
Horrifying, indeed, but it turned out that there was an explanation: Nobody had bothered to tell Schoen that the dead man had an identical twin brother who wanted to spend one last night near his sibling.
An old interior photo of Jacob Schoen and Son Funeral Home in New Orleans. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
The early days of Schoen
The funeral home is the outgrowth of a livery business that two German immigrants, Jacob Schoen and Henry Frantz, founded in the late 19th century.
In addition to ferrying people around the city, Schoen and Frantz started transporting bodies during a yellow-fever epidemic in 1874, Patrick Schoen said.
That year, the two men bought Jacob Klees’ undertaking establishment at 155 N. Peters St. in the French Quarter. In 1885, they expanded the business to 527 Elysian Fields Ave. when they bought Phoenix Stables, the livery and undertaking business of Dr. John Grayer, the coroner.
A portrait, circa 1910, of employees of the Jacob Schoen Funeral Home when it was located at 527 Elysian Fields Ave. in New Orleans. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
Schoen bought out Frantz in 1898 and went into business with his son Philip, giving the company the name it still bears.
Another notable funeral the Schoen home conducted was that of the legendary Sister Stanislaus, a nurse and administrator at Charity Hospital for more than 60 years.
When she died in 1949, the turnout for her funeral Mass at St. Joseph Church was massive. A photograph shows dozens of nurses in their white uniforms and caps on one side of the street; across from them were members of Sister Stanislaus’ religious order, the Daughters of Charity, whose habits were topped by distinctive headdresses resembling wings.
Born into the family business
Patrick Schoen is one of seven children. His brother, Jerry Schoen, works at Lake Lawn Metairie Funeral Home. Cousin Elizabeth Carra Schoen works at Mothe Funeral Homes on the West Bank, representing the sixth generation of the family in the business.
There was never any doubt that Patrick would enter the family enterprise. He loved hanging out at the funeral home, where employees fussed over him. When he was 8, he joined Joe Mitchell, a longtime Schoen employee, in taking flowers from the funeral home to the cemetery.
The graveyards fascinated him. “I wanted to see all the names on the tombs,” he said.
A decisive moment that helped young Patrick decide his vocation came in June 1973, when 32 men perished in a fire at the UpStairs Lounge, a gay bar at Chartres and Iberville streets.
Other funeral homes refused to conduct services for the men because of their sexual orientation, but in an interview in Southern Calls, a magazine of the funeral procession, Schoen said there was no question of Schoen’s stepping up because of its motto: “The highest standard of funeral service to all regardless of financial circumstances.”
Patrick, who was 12 at the time, rode buses to deliver flowers to the men’s graves.
What the original building looked like for Jacob Schoen and Son Funeral Home on Canal Street in New Orleans. The roof line for some of the windows is still the same today. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
At home on Canal Street
For a while, the business expanded. There were other Schoen funeral homes in Jefferson Parish, Slidell and Covington, as well as the Elysian Fields mortuary, but they have all closed, Patrick Schoen said.
The only remaining Schoen funeral home is the imposing structure at 3827 Canal St. It was built as a residence in the 1890s in the Queen Anne style, and in an extensive remodeling, it was converted to a funeral home in the Romanesque style in 1931. Today, although family-operated, Schoen Funeral Home is owned by Carriage Services LLC, a national cemetery and funeral company.
When Patrick Schoen took over in 2014, he supervised a thorough renovation of the property. Two years later, he added a 350-seat chapel that he named for J. Garic Schoen, a cousin who worked in the family business for 70 years.
One more funeral-home story: A few years ago, a man showed up for a funeral, but he kept to himself and didn’t talk to any of the mourners. When a funeral director asked if he wanted any assistance, this was his answer: He had showed up only to make sure that the man he had come to see was dead.