Dave L. Pearce Politician

David L. Pearce, known as Dave L. Pearce (September 8, 1905 – May 28, 1984), was a Democrat who served as the Louisiana Commissioner of Agriculture and Forestry from 1952 to 1956 and again from 1960 to 1976. Allied with anti-Long elements in the state, Pearce was unseated in the Democratic primary after a single term in 1956 by the Longite entomologist Sidney McCrory of Ascension Parish. However, Pearce unseated McCrory to regain the post in 1960 and then lost it again in Louisiana's first-ever nonpartisan blanket primary in 1975 to a fellow Democrat, Gil Dozier. He also failed in a 1979 campaign to reclaim the office.