Donald G. Bollinger

Donald George Bollinger (April 19, 1915 – May 13, 2000) was the founding president of Bollinger Shipyards in Lockport, Louisiana, who was from 1986 to 1988 the state chairman of the Louisiana Republican Party. He was affectionately called "the Happy Republican".

Biography

After Bollinger graduated in 1932 amid the Great Depression from Raceland High School, now Central Lafourche High School, his father, George I. Bollinger, taught him and his three brothers, [...], George, and Ralph, the mechanics of shipbuilding. Alex Barker, the senior Bollinger's employer, became a mentor to young Donald. In 1946, Bollinger launched his own business, Bollinger Shipyards, on Bayou Lafourche south of Lockport, along with help from his brothers, who returned from service in World War II.

In 1980, Bollinger joined the administration of Governor David C. Treen, the first Republican in that position since Reconstruction, as the secretary of the Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections, an influential appointee part of the governor's cabinet.

In 1986, he became the state Republican chairman in a divisive campaign that unseated the seven-year incumbent, George Despot, an oilman from Shreveport. In 1986, under Bollinger's tutelage, the Louisiana GOP failed to elect U.S. Representative Henson Moore of Louisiana's 6th congressional district to succeed the retiring Democratic U.S. Senator Russell B. Long. Instead victory went to Long's preferred successor, fellow Democrat John Breaux, who held the seat for another eighteen years before it was finally won by a Republican, David Vitter in 2004. Bollinger stepped down as chairman in 1988 and was succeeded by another veteran of the Treen administration, William "Billy" Nungesser of New Orleans and later Plaquemines Parish. Coincidentally, Nungesser's company, General Marine and Catering, serviced the offshore industry for which Bollinger built the ships.

Bollinger was a member of Lions International, the Holy Savior Catholic Church in Lockport, and the Catholic men's organization, the Knights of Columbus. Pope Paul VI awarded him the Papal Medal. Bollinger remained active in his Gulf Coast marine businesses until his retirement in 1989.

Bollinger was twice married, to Doris Toups Bollinger (1913-1986) and Patricia Boudreaux. He is interred alongside his first wife at Holy Savior Church Cemetery in Lockport.

The Donald G. Bollinger Memorial Student Union at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux in Lafourche Parish is named in Bollinger's honor.

Donald and Doris Bollinger had one son, Donald Thomas Bollinger, known as "Boysie" Bollinger (born c. 1950), the chief operating office of Bollinger Shipyards and a delegate to the 1988 and 2004 Republican National Conventions. However, Boysie Bollinger is also a long-term supporter of Democrat U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu and cut a television commercial in 2014 for her in her bid for a fourth term against the Republican U.S. Representative Bill Cassidy of Louisiana's 6th congressional district, based about Baton Rouge.