Mardi Gras Parade

Barry & Blaine Kern

It was a short public feud, less than 1 month.  There’s so much money for the Kerns at stake, some of the major krewe captains, notably Owen ‘Pip’ Brennan (Bacchus Captain) and Ed Muniz (Endymion Captain) got the Kerns to sit down by inviting the father and son to a meeting without telling each other.  It was a classic usage of the Take Away Sale- If  you don’t kiss and make up, we’ll take away Bacchus and other key krewes.

Blaine Kern

This is a hollow threat, there’s no other float builder around to take up the slack if the Kerns don’t build the major krewes.  Carnival is less than 6 months away, and that’s go time in the float building business.  Only Blaine Kern Artists have the size to build Bacchus, Rex, Endymion, Muses, Alla, Orpheus, and many more parades at once.

It’s very ironic that a Brennan was called to settle this family feud, since the Brennans have a large family and have been feuding in and out of the newspapers for decades

The family survived a rift that left the children of the late Owen Sr. about as disposed toward their aunts and uncles — Adelaide, John, Ella, Dick and Dottie — and their 11 children as the Hatfields were disposed toward the McCoys. Since 1974, when the feud split the business, Owen’s children — Pip, Jimmy and Ted — have run the family’s original restaurant, Brennan’s, on Royal Street.

At the same time, Ella, Dick, Adelaide, Dottie and John took over Commander’s Palace in the Garden District and built it into one of the 10 top grossing restaurants in the United States. Adelaide, who did not have children, died in 1983. Ella, Dick, Dottie and John continued to run Commander’s and built five other restaurants — Mr. B’s, Palace Cafe and Ristorante Bacco in New Orleans, Brennan’s and Third Coast in Houston.