Richland Parish, Louisiana: History
The parish was officially created on September 29, 1868. Rayville, Louisiana, the parish seat, was named for John Ray, a politician from Monroe with large land holdings in present-day Rayville.
Richland Parish is home to the first public parish library in the State of Louisiana, the Rhymes Memorial Library. The library was built in 1925 by the Lambda Kappa Club of Rayville. R.R. Rhymes donated the original building in memory of his wife, Nonnie Roark Rhymes.
In 2024, Louisiana state political leaders cleared regulatory and tax disincentives to attract a data center for Meta called Hyperion to be built upon approximately six square miles in Richland Parish. The legislation was created and passed in secret, with state officials and legislators bound by controversial non-disclosure agreements. The data center is located on mostly abandoned former rice and soybean farms. As temporary workers arrived to build the project, some longtime residents saw rents increase six-fold and were forced to relocate to areas not affected by the influx.