For much of its history, the economy of New Orleans was built on cotton and slavery. The former industry was largely brokered out of this building, where the city's Cotton Exchange was founded in 1871. In its heyday, thousands of cotton contracts were traded at this site, but, in time, Dallas replaced New Orleans as the nation's most important cotton-trading center. The building here, dating from the 1920s, is the third Cotton Exchange to occupy this site.
Today, the building hosts a bank, offices and parts of a hotel.