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Not only does it keep drivers who cut across Juban’s and The Caterie to get to Acadian Thruway on their toes, this fence may be the most contested piece of rusty chain link metal in Baton Rouge. It is a monument to the long-running dispute between two well-known families and businesses: Claitor’s Law Books and Juban’s Restaurant.

Back in 1970, Bob Claitor, Ray Juban and the Kroger Company signed a reciprocal agreement to develop their adjoining Perkins Road properties as a shopping center. According to the dissent written for R. G. Claitor’s Realty vs. Ray A. Juban, Juban built the fence in 1978 after Claitor purchased the contiguous property that now houses The Happy Note running perpendicular to Juban’s Restaurant.

Claitor claimed he purchased the new property only after Juban promised him the new development could operate under the same cross-parking agreement as his property on the west side of the shopping center and it would have access to the driveway on the edge of the Juban property. Juban denied the claim and, in the absence of a written contract, the Supreme Court of Louisiana in 1980 upheld his right to maintain a fence on the edge of his property and to prevent customers of Claitor’s new development from parking in his lot.

“The next move, if any, is their’s to make,” says Bob Claitor. “We don’t agree with the decision, but we’re complying with the law.”