President and CEO of Canal Barge Company, H. Merritt Lane III, will reign alongside Texas Christian University student Kelsey Grace French.
NEW ORLEANS — H. Merritt Lane III, the 2026 King of Carnival, has for many years been involved with non-profit groups working to make New Orleans better. His civic and volunteer work has earned him a long list of awards, topped only by his selection as Rex.
“It is so humbling to be included with the people that I know over the generations who have served as Rex,” he said. “I love Mardi Gras and I love riding on floats, so I am hugely excited about riding on the King’s float during Rex.”
Lane will reign alongside Kelsey Grace French. She is a 2023 Isidore Newman School graduate who is majoring in finance at the Neeley School of Business at Texas Christian University. She is the daughter of William Darwin French and the daughter and stepdaughter of Kara Van de Carr and Daryl Glynn Byrd.
Both monarchs’ families have a long history of civic involvement. Education, in particular, is a cause that is dear to Lane’s heart. He chairs the grants committee of Rex’s Pro Bono Publico Foundation, which since its founding in 2006 following Hurricane Katrina has given more than $16 million to local charter schools and educational causes.
“Aside from that direct impact, we also have Rex members that serve on charter boards and we also serve as a demonstration of local commitment to improving public education, which has motivated national funders to be interested in what we’re doing here in New Orleans,” he said.
Among the other non-profits Lane has been involved with are the Bureau of Governmental Research, Idea Village, National World War II Museum, Baptist Community Ministries and the Business Council of New Orleans and the River Region. He has also served as board chair of Isidore Newman School, his alma mater, as well as serving on the boards of the Nature Conservancy of Louisiana and Bricolage Academy.
The New Orleans native and University of Virginia graduate is president and CEO of his family-owned business, Canal Barge Company, one of the largest marine transportation and logistics firms in the country. He has been associated with the company since 1986.
“Canal Barge truly is one of the most diverse companies in the country,” he said. “We move everything from rocks to rockets, literally crushed stone aggregates that go into roads. We move most of the petrochemical and refined products in the country, but we also are NASA’s preferred barge line and we even have a barge that is now going to be a platform for catching satellite rockets.”
Lane’s family has a long history in the Rex Organization. His grandfather, Joseph Merrick Jones reigned as Rex in 1958. His great-great-aunt, Elizabeth “Bessie” Merrick, reigned as Queen of Carnival in 1901. Lane himself was a Rex duke in 1984.
He and his wife Eleanor, known as Elly, have traveled the world, with trips from Antarctica to China and many places in between. They are the parents of three daughters: Isabel, known as “Izzy,” Sarah and Caroline, all of whom are graduates of Newman and the University of Virginia. Caroline was a Rex maid in 2017 and Sarah reigned as Queen of Carnival in 2020.
As this year’s queen, Kelsey French is excited about following in the footsteps of her grandmother, Flora Fenner French, who reigned as Queen of Carnival in 1959. Her grandmother has helped her design elements of the gown she will wear at the Rex ball on Mardi Gras night at the Sheraton Hotel. It is the work of designer Suzanne Perron St. Paul.
“The dress has elements from the (parade) theme this year, which is ‘Rebirth and Renewal,’ so it has butterflies and lilies all over. The lilies are actually the lilies from our farm in Mississippi and the butterflies are 3-D. So they pop out on the dress, which is just beautiful,” French said.
In addition to her grandmother, other family members have been honored as Rex royalty. In particular, the queen’s great-grandfather, Darwin Fenner, was Rex’s captain in the 1950s and 60s and reigned as King of Carnival in 1955. He is well-known and widely-respected for introducing many modern Rex innovations, including introducing the doubloon in 1960, returning the Boeuf Gras to the parade as a float in 1959 and sparking a new era in Rex float design by hiring and encouraging a young float builder named Blaine Kern.
Those are the kind of tidbits that French’s father, Will, would share with an audience in his role as the Rex historian, archivist and commentator on WYES’ broadcast of the Rex Ball and Meeting of the Courts.
The queen’s stepfather, Daryl Byrd, is a longtime supporter of Rex’s Pro Bono Publico Foundation and her grandfather, Dr. Ronald French, was honored as Rex in 2007.
“He stopped the parade to let all of his grandchildren come up on the float. And I was wearing a little bee costume. I loved my bee costume,” she said. “I also loved wearing princess costumes for Mardi Gras.”
The queen interned at an investment bank last summer and has studied abroad in Paris and London, including at the London School of Economics. “I’m hoping to do something finance related this summer too. The experience I had in my internship this past summer really complemented the classes that I take at TCU. Once I graduate it’s my hope to work in the finance industry in New York.”
Her volunteer and nonprofit work includes working with Eden Centers for Hope and Healing, a nonprofit organization founded in 2011 by her mother. It provides emergency shelter, long-term shelter and recovery services to survivors of human trafficking. French has also volunteered at a Fort Worth children’s hospital as part of her sorority, Delta Delta Delta.
In her free time, she enjoys running, having recently completed a half-marathon. She also loves baking and traveling. As a baby, she spent several years in Kingston, Jamaica, where her mother served as a diplomat at the U.S. Embassy.
She said that, as queen this year, she is looking forward to welcoming out-of-town friends to New Orleans for Mardi Gras and showing them a celebration they may not have seen before.
“I think I’m most looking forward to Mardi Gras night and seeing my friends and how excited they are. It’s going to be like a whole new world for them,” she said. “As the Queen of Carnival, my message to the people of New Orleans would be that we live in the most special city with the most special traditions, I hope that everyone is just as excited for Mardi Gras this year as I am.”