The French colonizer and administrator Jean Baptiste le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville (1680-1768), founded New Orleans in 1718. Largely through his leadership the French colony of Louisiana survived and eventually prospered.

Jean Baptiste de Bienville was born of an aristocratic family on Feb. 23, 1680, in Ville Marie, later called Montreal, Canada. In 1697, as a midshipman in the French navy, he served under the command of his elder brother Pierre le Moyne, Sieur d'Iberville, on an expedition to the Hudson Bay region. In the following year he traveled with his brother to rediscover the mouth of the Mississippi River and to colonize the area.

D'lberville founded the colony of Louisiana at Biloxi in 1699, and Bienville remained as second in command to Governor Villantray. Bienville explored the lower Mississippi River in 1699 and the Red River in 1700, learning the Native Americans' languages in the process. On Villantray's death in 1701, Bienville became governor of...