The Name

The Spanish Lake Basin is one of the most historic spots in America. Beginning 100,000 years ago, river systems built up a high terrace, or ridge, around the basin's geologic "bowl" of soil and water. Some 8,000 years ago, native people camped on this ridge and collected clams from the salty waters of the Gulf of Mexico, which lapped against our prehistoric bluff for thousands of years. Hunters chased mastodons into lush woodlands across bayous and rivers and eventually settled here to enjoy the abundant food and waterway trade routes. By at least 4,000 B.C.E. people were living on the "high land" ridge nearly encircling the present-day Spanish Lake Basin.

By 2,000 B.C.E., native people were paddling their cypress canoes upriver to trade with tribes in other villages and ceremonial centers. From 500 B.C.E. to 1500 C.E., people lived in a large village on the north bank of Bayou Manchac and governed other tribes from this regional seat of political power, just as Baton Rouge governs the state of Louisiana today.

In the basin's swamps and bayous the native people found everything they needed: palmetto leaves to build huts, cypress to make canoes and drums, cane for darts and arrow shafts tipped with gar scales, bows carved out of pecan trees found on higher land nearby. The people shared their knowledge of the land with the early settlers, teaching them to build their wood and mud houses with moss and to make pottery and cooking implements with the sharkey clay of the bayous.

The two earliest explorers from Spain and France, Hernando de Soto and LaSalle, paddled past the lush hidden basin in 1542 and 1682. It wasn't until 1699 that native people showed a French Canadian navigator, Pierre LeMoyne, Sieur d'Iberville, a waterway trade route winding through the wild beauty and magnificent, sprawling oak trees growing along the basin's high ridge.

On March 25, 1699, Iberville camped overnight at the confluence of Alligator Bayou and Bayou Manchac. This was probably the "fish place," or "Anatamaha," noted on early maps, a landing where alligators gathered to feast on the plentiful fish migrating from the basin along Alligator Bayou into Bayou Manchac.

Iberville wrote the following passage in his diary:

"This place where I am is one of the prettiest spots I have seen, fine level ground, beautiful woods, clear and bare of canes..."

The next morning, Iberville and his party of daring Frenchmen paddled down the Bayou Manchac shortcut to the Gulf of Mexico and opened this trade route to eventual settlement by world cultures. Sieur d'Iberville 1699

- A FrancoFete Celebration

The inland Bayou Manchac, meaning "slow-moving stream" and "back door" (in the Choctaw language) led to a series of interconnected waterways all the way to New Orleans at the Gulf of Mexico. The sleepy, slow-moving bayou neatly bypassed the swift, dangerous currents of the Mississippi River.

In the 1700s, Bayou Manchac, plied by boats and small ships carrying vital supplies, enabled the settlement of the entire Lower Mississippi River Basin. Across from the bayou's warehouse landing was a 10-mile carriage road that helped supply the early people and plantations of Baton Rouge and indeed all of the antebellum plantations along the river, north of Iberville's "Red Stick."

The basin cradled these cultures and its waters carried their customs, foods and folkways upriver throughout Louisiana and across the world.

© 2003- 2010 Alligator Bayou Swamp Tours

The Company

Manchac Technologies, L.L.C. opened its doors in 2006 to take advantage of opportunities in the pharmacy automation market through the development and applications of new technology. Manchac has developed a revolutionary, machine vision counting technology and has built a ground-breaking pharmacy automation system, DOSIS®, around this unique counting technology. DOSIS (DOH-sis), based on a Greek word meaning to dispense medication, provides a filled, sealed and labeled blister card through a unit that has a pharmacy-friendly footprint.

The People

Led by Randall Murphy and Monroe Milton, Manchac was founded by veteran pharmacy automation engineers. Our assembled team has significant experience in the design, development, manufacture, service and support of pharmacy automation products. With well over 100 years of collective industry experience, Manchac will continue to leverage the team’s talents and skills to dominate an ever-growing pharmacy market serving long-term-care and assisted living facilities; and, later expand into other automation markets.

The Mission

Manchac Technologies, L.L.C. is focused on helping pharmacies keep up with prescription demands, maintain regulatory compliance, and ensure patient safety by developing DOSIS™, an automated prescription fulfillment platform. DOSIS is an easy to use, pharmacy friendly footprint product that automates the prescription dispensing process by, filling, sealing, and patient labeling into the desired packaging.

Company Management

Monroe Milton - President (Founder)
Randall Murphy - Vice President (Founder)
Michael Carbo - Vice President of Business Development
Brian Broussard - Systems Engineer