Dud Lastrapes

Who is Dud Lastrapes?

William Dudley "Dud" Lastrapes, Jr., is a Lafayette businessman who from 1980 to 1992 was the first Republican since Reconstruction to have served as mayor of his city, the fourth largest in Louisiana.

Prior to his three-term mayoralty tenure, Lastrapes was a member of the Lafayette Parish School Board from 1972 to 1980. After his mayoral service, Lastrapes served a term as chairman of the Louisiana Republican Party from 1992 to1994. In 1997, Lastrapes was appointed to the Louisiana Gaming Control Board by then Republican Governor Murphy J. "Mike" Foster, Jr. He served until 2008 and was ineligible to have been reappointed.

Lastrapes was originally a Democrat, but he switched his registration to Republican in 1959, when he was not quite thirty years of age. At the time, the state Republican Party had fewer than nine thousand registered members. Hence very few living Louisiana Republicans have been members of the party longer than Lastrapes.