by Preston Taylor

Virginia DuPuy was born in 1935 to Mr. and Mrs. Samual L. Hood in Waco, Texas.  She graduated from Waco High, and after her marriage to Leslie Carr DuPuy in the fall of 1951, Virginia became a mother to two sons and eventually a grandmother to five grandchildren.  She studied theater and received both her Bachelor of Arts in 1957 and her Master of Arts degree in 1961 from Baylor University.  Widely successful in both the art community and business world, she is a highly recognized member of many committees and a recipient of many local business awards.  Virginia DuPuy served as mayor of Waco from 2005 to 2010 where she was vital in many revitalization projects and greatly bolstered the city’s economy through expansion of industry.  Even today at the age of eighty-three, Virginia remains an influential member of the Waco community.

Virginia on the day of her wedding to Leslie DuPuy:  November 11, 1951.  Picture from an article in The Waco News-Tribune on November 13th.

While she was a graduate student at the University, Virginia DuPuy began her career as the business manager for Baylor’s Theater Department in 1960. Throughout the next decade, she was kept busy coordinating different productions for the school as well as raising her and Les’ two sons:  Carr and Cary.  Then, with some encouragement from her long-time mentor Paul Baker, Virginia opened her own art studio in the early 70’s.  She created unique soft sculptures known as batiks and successfully designed and managed a competitive marketing strategy to sell them.  In addition to her responsibilities with her art studio, in 1975, her success gained her a position as the drama director for the Junior League of Waco.  Through this organization, Virginia was able to sponsor children throughout the Waco area who suffered from poverty and its afflictions.  Then, in 1976, she became a coordinator for various exhibits held at The Art Center, her first project being a showing of “An Art Affair” by popular local artists.  She remained as such intermittently until 1981.  Through The Art Center, she was able to teach “Intermediate Art Classes” for kids ages 5-13. Virginia began displaying her own work in 1981 at a showing entitled “Fabric Abstractions” at Baylor’s University Art Gallery until her final personal exhibit in 1983.  Afterwards, she moved on to assisting her husband with his business, where again she applied her passion and vigor to the betterment of the company.

Virginia outside of her art studio in Waco, Texas, circa 1975.

Established in 1954 by Leslie DuPuy at 212 S 17th St., in downtown Waco, DuPuy Oxygen & Supply provides welding supplies and industrial and medical gases to industries in Waco and the greater Central Texas area.  Currently located at 120 S. W. Loop 340 in Bellmead, Dupuy Oxygen has been an influential business in the Waco community for over seventy years.  The company offers acetylene, nitrogen, air, nitrous oxide, argon, oxygen, carbon dioxide, propane, helium, hydrogen, and gas mixture products to industrial welders and novices alike.  On January 2, 1967, Leslie DuPuy and his business partner Samuel A. Wilson changed Dupuy Oxygen and Supply from a private firm to an incorporation.  With customer satisfaction as the number one priority, the business prospered greatly, and DuPuy Oxygen & Supply was able to expand to three separate distribution centers in Central Texas by the 1970’s.  DuPuy Oxygen became a great proponent of industry in Waco and its neighboring cities. When, in 1969, his company moved to its current location on Loop 340, DuPuy and other leaders helped encourage the expansion of the Industrial Park to include many new businesses, employing hundreds of workers from the community.  The economic impact on the nearby Richland Mall and surrounding retail centers was astronomical, and helped to regain much of the commerce lost due to the 1953 tornado.

   

Leslie himself was a highly successful member of the business community.  He was a Action Council Member of the NFIB, Director of the Northwest Waco Rotary Club, Director of the Waco Chamber of Commerce, Yacht Club Director of Ridgewood Country Club, Director of the Waco-Madison Cooper Airport, and Mission Pilot for the Civil Air Patrol.  Then in 1983, Les was appointed to the board of the TSTI Development Foundation for his leadership in the growth of industry in the Waco community.  Les remained an important member of the Waco community, both in business and out, until his passing on May 23, 2018.

Dupuy Oxygen and Supply storefront in September 1990.  To this day the company remains a family run business, with responsibilities having been passed down to Les’ sons Carr and Cary.  Picture from Waco Citizen article on 28 September 1990.

In the early 1980’s, when Virginia began work at DuPuy Oxygen & Supply, she became curious about  the way computers could impact their small enterprise.  Well before they reached popularity in the business world, Virginia implemented a computer system that drastically changed the day to day operations of the company.  The introduction removed the need for repetitive paperwork and, in her words, allowed attention to be “better directed to serving customers and clients.”  This innovation pushed DuPuy Oxygen to greater levels of profitability than ever before and ushered in a new era of prosperity, during which she took over as President of Operations from Les, allowing him to retire.  It is during this time that the business was able to expand to seven locations stretching from Austin to DFW, servicing over forty-eight cities and their surrounding areas.

Audio recording of Virginia DuPuy describing her experience as she became involved in running Dupuy Oxygen and Supply.  Captured from the Baylor Institute for Oral Recordings.

Virginia DuPuy inside Dupuy Oxygen and Supply located at 120 S.W. Loop 340, in front of an inventory of welding supplies.  Obtained from the Texas Collection, Baylor University; ACC #2008.075.

Her good work did not go unnoticed in the Waco business community.  Elected to the board of the downtown YMCA on July 7, 1989, she became the president early on June 1, 1990.  Virginia organized the YMCA Sustaining Drive and was essential in the revitalization of the YMCA through partnerships with various local businesses and committees including the Waco hotel/motel industry and the Waco Convention & Visitors Bureau.  Virginia was then nominated for a position as a director of the Waco Chamber of Commerce beginning on the 1st of January 1990 and was influential in countless decisions of industry until she stepped down early in 2005.  She even became a recognized recipient of the Waco’s Pathfinders award that honors trailblazing women who expanded opportunities for themselves and women to come.

Thanks in part to all of her contributions to the community, Virginia easily won the 2005 election in which she ran for mayor.  Virginia pushed many reforms through the municipal government that greatly bettered the greater Waco area.  She emphasized education, improving the local school system.  She was a huge proponent for environmental concerns, drafting bills to begin the cleanup of Lake Waco and the Brazos, revitalizing the riverbank and its businesses.  She began plans for the Visioning Community Project Expo that, if implemented, would lead to massive growth in downtown Waco and benefit thousands of people.  In leaving office, she took the voluntary position of executive director for the Greater Waco Community Education Alliance which allowed her to further influence local education.  Her acts in office earned her even more honors as she received honors for her educational program at Lake Waco Wetlands and for energy conservation in a program she helped create for the Waco Metropolitan Area Regional Sewer System.

Virginia DuPuy from 2008 during her time as mayor of Waco.  Picture from Google.

Virginia DuPuy has lived a long life of service to the Waco community, impacting its residents and culture for almost sixty years.  Incredibly successful in the art field and the business world, her legacy will not be forgotten any time soon.  It is easily said that Virginia DuPuy has positively affected her community through her many roles within it, and has made the city of Waco a better place.

 

 

Sources:

“13 Nov 1951, Page 7 – The Waco News-Tribune at Newspapers.com.” Newspapers.com, newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/48079459/?terms=Leslie%2BCarr%2BDuPuy&pqsid=8y3zC8G46BSiIWp7_BVgbA%3A48000%3A1565861042.

“2008 Novogradac Community Development Foundation Community Development Individual Award Recipients.” Novogradac & Company LLP, 16 Mar. 2016, www.novoco.com/2008-novogradac-community-development-foundation-community-development-individual-award-recipients.

“28 Aug 1981, Page 10 – The Waco Citizen at Newspapers.com.” Newspapers.com, newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/49916848/?terms=Virginia%2BDuPuy&pqsid=8y3zC8G46BSiIWp7_BVgbA%3A220000%3A1644780574.

“28 Sep 1990, Page 31 – The Waco Citizen at Newspapers.com.” Newspapers.com, newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/42818125/?terms=DuPuy%2BOxygen%2B%26%2BSupply&pqsid=8y3zC8G46BSiIWp7_BVgbA%3A151000%3A880732287.

“Leslie Carr DuPuy, Jr. Obituary – Visitation & Funeral Information.” Obituary – Visitation & Funeral Information, 4 May 2018, www.whbfamily.com/obituaries/obituary-listings?obId=3079239.

Wallace, Patricia Ward. A Spirit so Rare: a History of the Women of Waco. Nortex Press, 1984.

Whitaker, Bill. “Bill Whitaker: Waco Mayor Virginia DuPuy Not Riding off into Sunset When Term Ends.” WacoTrib.com, Waco Tribune-Herald, 9 May 2010, www.wacotrib.com/opinion/columns/bill_whitaker/bill-whitaker-waco-mayor-virginia-dupuy-not-riding-off-into/article_149e8b6d-a546-51a2-96cd-6c047d394fb3.html.

Preston Taylor

It’s is common knowledge that it costs a lot of money to run a successful election campaign.  This enormous tab is often picked up by large corporations, the wealthy elite, and interest groups who are simply looking for a in with the new people in power.  It may not come as a surprise to you then, that while the common man may cast the votes, their voice is lost behind the roar of the investors in the business sector.  In this podcast by Planet Money entitled “The Seattle Experiment,” analysts Sarah Cliff and Kenny Malone investigate a new way to distribute campaign funds that puts power back into the hands of the people.  Ordinarily, campaign funds are given in large sums by corporations who seek an advantage by means of political influence.  They give money to politicians who are aligned with their views, which greatly helps them to get elected.  In the city of Seattle, drastic changes are coming to the way influence is distributed when it comes to elections.  In 2015, Wayne Barnett and the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission created a system in which individuals were responsible for donating money to candidates of their choice.  They announced its plan in the only way cities seem to know how:  a public service announcement.

“The city of Seattle is giving eligible Seattle residents one-hundred dollar in democracy vouchers that you can use to support participating candidates in the upcoming election…”

By slightly raising property taxes, Burnett and his team were able to ensure that each and every citizen who was eligible to vote had a opportunity to impact their candidate’s chance to win the election.

The voucher program was largely successful in achieving two of its main goals.  It drastically changed who had the ability to run for office and it sent candidates out into the community more than was previously necessary.  Before, most often, the winner of elections was the powerful incumbent due to their strong financial backing.  This most recent election, however, a young, minority, woman won her election the very first time she ran for public office.  The choice was a better reflection of the common man due to her ability to advertise as incumbents do.  Voters were able to choose the candidate who most accurately represented their view as opposed to only hearing about one name on the ballet.  Politicians were also forced to focus more on individual voters.  Candidates actually went door to door, to ask citizens for their democracy vouchers and hear directly from them what they wanted done in their city.

This podcast was pretty obviously discussing the effects of campaign donations as it relates to business, state, and society.  Now a days, it isn’t uncommon for businesses to spend millions of dollars in lobbying for political gain.  The benefits of such expenditures can be immeasurable, and corporations often overshadow the other members of society that would stand to gain from political influence were they given the chance.  This article by the Notre Dame School of Law entitled “What is this ‘Lobbying’ That We are All so Worried About?,” economists analyze the impacts of powerful lobbyists on politicians and their agendas and further explains how influential they can be.Modern politics is such a web between business donations, politicians, and citizens seeking a voice, that is often difficult to distinguish between the three.  In Seattle, the ties between business and state have begun to lessen, while those between the voter and the representative grow stronger.

 

Preston Taylor

In a recent article of the well-read “Washington Post,” Antonia Noori Farzan explains how the famous department store Sears circumvented Jim Crow laws during the early 1900’s by the use of mail-order catalogues.  Entitled “Sears’s ‘radical’ past: How mail-order catalogues subverted the racial hierarchy of Jim Crow,“ this shows an interesting connection a well known business has with society and the laws that governed it almost a hundred years ago.

(Image from Amazon)

This article caught my eye because I enjoy analyzations of the ways companies interact with the communities in which they do business.  Since the main function of any entrepreneurial venture is to make money for those who start it, I feel that often times, businesses get a reputation of being greedy, and not benefiting anyone but themselves, as seen in this article by Harvard Business School.  This predisposition towards a distrust of big businesses is something that can be justified in certain circumstances, but more often then not, companies help society more than they hurt.  I enjoyed this article because it was a prime example of a business having a positive impact on its customers and the people that it served.  With this in mind, the article seems to closely follow the relationships between Business, State, and Society that we have been analyzing in class.

The very title itself mentions a particular law, a people group, and a corporation and how they interacted with each other during this time period.  The article describes how, from the end of slavery in the south to the end of the Jim Crow laws in 1964 and even beyond, African Americans in the south were widely discriminated against when it came to purchasing supplies from their local stores.  Thanks to these laws, it was legal for the white store owners of the small general stores that African Americans were forced to shop at to use extremely prejudice techniques when dealing with their black customers.  Typically, shopkeepers would refuse to give honest and fair credit, only offer them inferior goods, and gouge prices so African Americans had a difficult affair any time they needed supplies.  This changed drastically when Sears’ mail order catalogs began to circulate.  Instead of facing the unjust general store environment, African Americans simply had to write in their orders on a piece of paper to receive them in the mail a couple weeks later.  Made possible by a particular government regulation, the Rural Free Delivery Act, the mail service was opened to rural areas throughout the south, areas highly populated by African Americans.  This is a great example of the government helping businesses in the late 19th century expand, as it would increasingly do until the Gilded Age.  The catalog business helped black culture to broaden and expanding the minor freedom it gave from Jim Crow laws.

Julius Rosenwald, who had become a part owner of the company after Alvah Roebuck sold his share of the business in 1895, became a well-known philanthropist to the black community. He donated $4.3 million — the equivalent of more than $75 million today — to open nearly 5,000 “Rosenwald schools” in the rural South between 1912 and 1932, when he died.

Antonia Farzan goes of to explain other ways that Sears company and its executives helped African Americans free themselves from the oppression of the Jim Crow Laws.  This article provides more information about Julius and his schools, as well as the ways they benefitted the black community.

In all, the capitalistic nature of the Sears corporation had, opposite to one’s initial assumption, a positive impact on the communities within which it served.  Sears bypassed Jim Crow to expand their business, helping thousands of African Americans in the process.  Rural blacks gained access to needed goods and, as the article says best, their dignity.

Preston Taylor

In an episode of the popular podcast “Planet Money,” Kenny Malone and Karen Duffin investigate the effects of Jimmy Carter’s plan for the government to buy dairy products during his presidential term.  Entitled “Big Government Cheese,”  this explains the downside of a specific government subsidy and the impacts it may have down the road.

(Image from Twitter)

I was interested in this particular podcast because I love observing the impact when government interferes in the economy.  It seems to me that often enough, the end result is worse off than before the original meddling.  With this in mind, this topic immediately seems to follow the business, state, and society Big Idea that we have been focusing on.  According to the podcast, this whole idea started as a far-fetched campaign promise to increase income for dairy farmers.  In truth this is a fairly common occurrence as government subsidies are given to those who grow corn and many other agricultural products to increase production of certain goods.  The problem with this particular subsidy is milk products cannot easily be stored in a silo for long periods of time as corn can.  The solution was to turn it into cheese, which can be kept for a longer time than regular milk.  So the government began buying large quantities of cheese which they stored in underground caves that served as natural refrigerators.  They then processed the cheese into two and five pound blocks, wrapped in simple brown paper, and redistributed them to schools, the military, and food banks at no cost to consumers.

DUFFIN: This is a basic supply-and-demand problem. The government was demanding an unnatural amount of milk and so farmers were supplying an unnatural amount of milk.

Any time you have a greater production of a good than the popular demand for that good, as occurs with government subsidies, there are multiple problems that arise.  A surplus of cheese was created, essentially meaning that there was more cheese available than people were willing to buy.  If the government attempted to sell the cheese to ordinary consumers the price would drop below profitable rates for the farmers who were supposed to benefit from the subsidy in the first place.  Thus the government gave the cheese away to a consumer group that would not have the resources to buy cheese in the first place:  the homeless and impoverished in many urban centers.

The government now needed to wean the production of dairy down back to its normal rate, so instead of simply purchasing cheese, they implemented a policy of direct subsidization where the government directly paid dairy farmers to NOT produce milk.  They also created ad campaigns like the famous “Got Milk?” to try and increase consumer demand, and slowly return the supply and demand curve to its normal, equilibrium state.

This is just one example of government subsidies creating conflict in the free market.  The creation of surpluses rarely ends in a societal benefit and this article about fossil fuels serves as another instance where government interference in business creates problems for the average consumer.  When it comes to topics of business, state, and society, it is my opinion that the market works best when left to fluctuate according to its natural processes.  And the idea of making cheese purchases to bolster the economy is as far fetched as it truly sounds.