| Jean McGlothlin Doerge | |
|---|---|
| State Representative Jean Doerge greets friends at a Minden High School alumni gathering. | |
| Louisiana State Representative from District 10 (Webster Parish) | |
| In office 1998 – January 9, 2012 |
|
| Preceded by | Everett Gail Doerge |
| Succeeded by | Harlie Eugene "Gene" Reynolds |
| Personal details | |
| Born | June 4, 1937 Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse(s) | Everett Doerge (married 1957-1998, his death) |
| Children | One daughter, Sherie Doerge Lester |
| Occupation | Retired educator |
| Religion | United Methodist |
Jean McGlothlin Doerge (born June 4, 1937) is a retired school teacher and a departing Democratic member of the Louisiana House of Representatives from Minden, who has represented District 10 (Webster Parish) since the death in 1998 of her husband, Everett Doerge. In 2007, her colleagues named her to the House Appropriations Committee, a key panel that approves state spending. Doerge (pronounced DURR GHEE) is also a member of the Hurricane Katrina Memorial Commission and the Legislative Democratic Caucus.
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She was born to Thomas McGlothlin (1903–1966) and the former Cora Vercher (1904–1975) in tiny Galbraith in Natchitoches Parish in central Louisiana. She was the middle child in a family of seven daughters. She graduated from Cloutierville High School in Natchitoches Parish. Thereafter, she attended Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, where she met Everett Doerge, a native of Minden. They married in August 1957, and both graduated in 1958. Later, she received her master's degree from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge and thirty additional hours of credits in professional education from Louisiana Tech University in Ruston.
Doerge first taught at Minden High School when it was ranked among the ten best schools in the state. For several years, the Doerges moved around, having been teachers for two years in Arp in Smith County. Texas. When Everett went to Northwestern as an assistant coach, Jean worked in an office in Natchitoches. Later, she resumed teaching in the town of Cotton Valley in Webster Parish.
In March 1965, the Doerges adopted their daughter, Sherie, now a Minden High School teacher who is married to Kevin Lester. Sherie and Kevin have two sons. In 1966, Mrs. Doerge returned to Minden High School and worked in the business education department until 1992, when both she and her husband retired.
Everett Doerge then ran for the Louisiana House, winning by only seventy-one votes over the Republican incumbent Eugene S. Eason of Springhill in northern Webster Parish.
Doerge was a big reelection winner in 1995, when he defeated two Republican women. He died near the end of his second term. Jean, widowed at the age of sixty-one, ran in the special election to succeed him and was an easy winner. She polled 3,048 votes (67 percent) to defeat the Democrat-turned-Republican Mack Garrett, who obtained 1,481 ballots (33 percent). She was subsequently elected without opposition to full terms in both 1999 and 2003. Doerge is the third woman to succeed her husband in the Webster Parish state House seat. Lizzie P. Thompson and Mary Smith Gleason were both named to the seat by Governor Earl Kemp Long in 1951 and 1959, respectively, when their husbands, C.W. Thompson and E.D. Gleason, died in office. Unlike Doerge, Thompson and Gleason did not seek to hold the seat for a term of their own.
In 2001, Mrs. Doerge worked to establish a special district to authorize the creation of a fire and emergency training service district, only the second created in Louisiana. She helped various residents in the Dubberly community in south Webster Parish obtain water service when their wells went dry. She also helped to secure a grant for the Cotton Valley water system.
She has worked to obtain services for Springhill. In 2002, she helped the Springhill Medical Center obtain placement in the Rural Hospital Coalition, a move which enabled the facility to obtain additional funds. She pushed for the designation of a tourism center in Springhill, with appropriate directional signs to the new facility. She also worked for a jogging trail in Frank Anthony Park and for the funding to renovate the Spring Theater.
She pushed for funding to relocate the Northwest Technical College (formerly the Northwest Vocational Technical School) in Minden into a new building.
Doerge pulled strings to obtain special surgery in St. Louis, Missouri, for a cerebral palsy patient, 5-year-old Jeremy Logan Curtis. Had she not acted, the child would have been a permanent invalid. The surgery was successful, and the child was thereafter able to walk and play and faces a bright future.
Doerge's alma mater, NSU, inducted her into the College of Business Hall of Distinction. Her name is engraved on a plaque located in the foyer of Russell Hall. The Louisiana Police Jury [equivalent of county commission in other states] Association presented her with the "Friends of the Parishes" award.
Doerge is a breast cancer survivor. In an interview with Juanita Agan of the Minden Press-Herald, the Methodist Doerge attributed her recovery to the will and love of God and His answer to her prayers for strength and endurance, the care of her physicians, the love of her family, and the concern of friends. Late in 2004, she was declared cancer-free.
Doerge easily retained her seat in the nonpartisan blanket primary held on October 20, 2007. She received 6,681 votes (57 percent) to 4,133 (35 percent) for the conservative Republican Ronnie Lavelle Broughton (born 1942) of Minden, the then president of the Webster Parish School Board. An African American candidate, Terrell Mendenhall of Cullen, polled 915 ballots (8 percent). Broughton had committed to the victorious Republican gubernatorial candidate Bobby Jindal, but Doerge had proclaimed her neutrality in the governor's race in which her former legislative colleague Foster Campbell was also a candidate.
In his campaign, Broughton questioned why Louisiana Highway 371 remains a two-lane road. He had promised if elected to "bring transportation dollars home to our area." Broughton also proclaimed himself a pro-life candidate: "Life starts at conception, marriage is between a man and woman, and the Second Amendment should be protected and held sacred."
Doerge was term-limited in 2011. In the primary election held on October 22, three Republicans, Ronnie Broughton making a second bid for the seat, businessman and former banker Gerald Holland of Springhill, and educator and businesswoman Jeri de Pingre of Minden, and a Democrat, Harlie Eugene "Gene" Reynolds of Dubberly, sought to succeed Doerge.[1]
U.S. Senator David Vitter's campaign organization, the Louisiana Committee for a Republican Majority, has urged primary voters to support either Broughton or Holland but omitted de Pingre from the recommended choices.[2]Area Democrats, including Doerge, endorsed Reynolds, who like Doerge is a former educator.
Reynolds led the four-candidate field with 3,725 votes (39 percent), and de Pingre trailed with 2,498 votes (26.1 percent). Both candidates backed by Senator Vitter finished out of the running. Gerald Holland received 2,131 votes (22.3 percent), and Ronnie Broughton, Doerge's opponent from 2007, trailed with 1,205 votes (12.6 percent).[1]
In the general election held on November 19, 2011, Reynolds defeated Republican de Pingre, 4,232 votes (54.7 percent) to 3,508 votes (45.3 percent).[3]He hence succeeds Doerge on January 9, 2012.
http://www.nwlanews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=49&Itemid=70
http://house.louisiana.gov/H_Reps/members.asp?ID=10
http://www.sos.louisiana.gov:8090/cgibin/?rqstyp=elcpr&rqsdta=06209860
http://www.vote-smart.org/bio.php?can_id=BZZ83331
http://www.zoominfo.com/Search/PersonDetail.aspx?PersonID=44014827
http://ssdi.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ssdi.cgi
http://www.jeandoerge.com/acommplishments.html
Minden Press-Herald, June 1, 2007
http://www400.sos.louisiana.gov:8090/cgibin/?rqstyp=elcpr&rqsdta=10200760
| Louisiana House of Representatives | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Everett Doerge |
Louisiana State Representative from District 10 (Webster Parish; in 2012, Webster Parish and one precinct in Bossier Parish)
Jean McGlothlin Doerge |
Succeeded by Harlie Eugene "Gene" Reynolds |
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