Jennings, Louisiana
| Jennings, Louisiana | |
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 The front facade of the W. H. Tupper General Merchandise Museum, circa 2008
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| Motto: "Cradle of Louisiana Oil" | |
| Country | United States |
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| State | Louisiana |
| Parish | Jefferson Davis |
| Elevation | 26 ft (7.9 m) |
| Coordinates | 30°13′20″N 92°39′25″W / 30.22222°N 92.65694°WCoordinates: 30°13′20″N 92°39′25″W / 30.22222°N 92.65694°W |
| Area | 10.3 sq mi (26.7 km2) |
| - land | 10.2 sq mi (26 km2) |
| - water | 0.04 sq mi (0 km2), 0.39% |
| Population | 10,383 (2000) |
| Founded | May 2, 1888 |
| Timezone | CST (UTC-6) |
| - summer (DST) | CDT (UTC-5) |
| ZIP code | 70546 |
| Area code | 337 |
  Location of Jennings in Louisiana
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 Location of Louisiana in the United States
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| Website: City of Jennings, Louisiana | |
Jennings is a city in and the parish seat of Jefferson Davis Parish, Louisiana, United States, near Lake Charles. The population was 10,383 at the 2010 census, a small decline from the 2000 tabulation. The city is 68 percent white.
Jennings is the principal city of the Jennings Micropolitan Statistical Area, which includes all of Jefferson Davis Parish. It is also part of the larger Lake Charles-Jennings Combined Statistical Area. It is also part of the large, 22-parish Acadiana region of the state, with a large Francophone population, many descended from early Acadian settlers.
Jennings McComb, for whom the town was named, was a contractor of the Southern Pacific Railroad. He built the Jennings depot on a divide peculiar to southwest Louisiana. This became the center of new development based on the railroad. The first settler was recorded as A. D. McFarlain, who came in 1881 from St. Mary Parish and opened a store. McFarlain also became the first rice grower, postmaster, brick maker, and builder in the community. Prospering with Jennings’ growth, McFarlain was considered one of the town’s prominent businessmen and civic leaders.
The Jennings area attracted numerous wheat farmers from Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska and other Midwestern states. The new settlers of southwest Louisiana were referred to as "Yankees" by the natives, who were of Acadian French and African-American descent. They had settled along the waterways in the parish, which they had relied on for transportation before the railroad. They fished in the bayous. The Cajuns gave appreciable aid to the settlers in homesteading and homemaking. The people grew rice, cotton, sweet potatoes and corn.
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