The 16th annual Louisiana Political Hall of Fame will be held in Winnfield on Saturday, February 2, 2008, at the Winnfield Civic Center at the Winn Parish Fair Grounds on Highway 34.

A class of nine new honorees will be presented during events which include a reception from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Hall of Fame Museum in downtown Winnfield, and the award banquet at the Civic Center beginning at 6 p.m.

U.S. Congressman Richard H. Baker of Baton Rouge heads the list of new Hall of Fame members. Others are Robert L. (Bobby) Freeman, Kip Holden, James Joseph, Donald G. (Don) Kelly, John M. LaPlante, Jr., Bob Odom, Edward G. Randolph, Jr., and Joe R. Salter.

The annual Friends of Earl K. Long Award will be presented to Richard Webster Leche, Jr. and the Friends of Jimmie Davis award will go to Lillie Kent and A.J. Kent.

The Political Hall of Fame has grown up around the national fame of the Winn Parish Long political family, which began with the late Governor and U.S. Senator Huey Long, and later of his brother, Lt. Governor and Governor Earl K. Long. Since Huey Long began the political dynasty in the late 1920s, his son Russell served as U.S. Senator, and various members of the extended Long family have been in elected office at local, state, and national levels continuously ever since. The most recently elected is State Senator Gerald Long of Natchitoches, a younger brother of long-serving Hall of Famer, former State Representative Jimmy Long of Natchitoches. Gerald, a Winnfield native now living in Natchitoches, won office in the October, 2007 election, and will take his position as State Senator from District 31 in the 2008 Legislature as the only known Republican member of the extended family to be elected in Louisiana.

The Hall of Fame was first held in 1993, with the inductions of the first class including U.S. Representative Hale Boggs, Governors C.C. Claiborne, Jimmie Davis, Edwin Edwards, Earl K. Long, Huey P. Long, John J. McKeithen, U.S. Senator Russell Long, State Legislators Dudley LeBlanc, B.B. (Sixty) Rayburn, New Orleans Mayor Ernest (Dutch) Morial, and political cartoonist P.A. (Pap) Dean.

Inductees since the beginning have included Louisiana office holders at the local, state, and national levels as well as political writers, and others with a variety of political backgrounds.

Tickets for the 2008 event will be on sale at the Hall of Fame Museum in Winnfield.

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