Before the advent of easy commuter travel and one-stop retail superstores with acres of parking lots that cater to a family’s every need, there existed the humble general store. Packed with a wide variety of merchandise and service offerings, these stores were often the only place to get certain household goods and hardware without a long horse-and-buggy trip to the next big town, so in the early 1900s they often served as rural community centers. Towards the middle of the twentieth century, more retail options moved into rural areas, while passenger vehicles and interstates made for swift travel between towns and larger cities. After that, general stores didn’t have much of a reason to exist, and most of them shut their doors.  

In 1949, Celia Tupper Buller locked the door of the W. H. Tupper General Merchandise store in the small town of China, Louisiana, and did not unlock it again for twenty years. There was no close-out sale; all the inventory inside, everything from saddles to baby clothes and all manners of food and remedies, became stuck in time. Today, the W. H. Tupper General Merchandise Museum in nearby Jennings enshrines the history and final inventory of the store, which operated from 1912 to 1949, and the way of life that disappeared with it. 

For four decades from 1949 -1989, the entire inventory of China, Louisiana’s W.H. Tupper General Merchandise store remained untouched, frozen in time. Photo by Christie Matherne Hall.

The Tupper Family Store 

Willis Harvey Tupper arrived in China by train from Wisconsin in the late 1800s, along with his wife Mary, his donkeys and horses, and a second-grade education. The Tuppers bought 1,400 acres of farmland there and created a self-sustaining farming operation with their own creamery, timber and sawmill, loom, blacksmith shop, and even electricity. Once the farm was established, the Tuppers typically had five tenant farmers living on their property at any given time to help with labor.  

In 1912, realizing his tenant farmers and other workers in the area needed things that weren’t available in China, Tupper opened the store. Mary Tupper and her two daughters, Celia and Agnes, helped run the store, while Mr. Tupper and the rest of their six children tended to other tasks on the farm. At first, the store only sold items that his tenants and other local farmers needed, such as work tools and bridles. Soon, the wider community of China expressed the need for more inventory, and Tupper expanded the store. Eventually, they sold everything from tobacco plugs and groceries to women’s hats and baby clothes, and took requests for things they didn’t yet carry. W. H. Tupper also served as the community’s Postmaster, so residents of China came to the store for postal services, too. 

“It was kind of a place where they socially congregated as well,” explained museum tour guide Rachel Thomas. “And, you know how nowadays, the gentlemen will go somewhere and they have coffee? This was that type of thing back then.” 

In the French tradition of lagniappe, and also sly marketing, every child that entered the store would get candy from the Tuppers, according to Joe Tupper. “[It was] something that made the experience memorable for them, and ensured them to encourage their parents to visit again,” he said. 

Besides dry goods, clothes, medicines, and the like, Mary Tupper had a fondness for hand-woven baskets made by the women of the Coushatta Tribe in the nearby town of Elton. She developed a trading relationship with the Tribe, and exchanged the store’s food and goods for these useful and decorative baskets, many of which remain on display at the museum today.  

“The Coushatta baskets are the most valuable things in the museum,” Thomas noted. 

Reusable grocery bags from WWII are among the artifacts that were preserved when the W. H. Tupper General Merchandise store closed in 1949. Photo by Christie Matherne Hall.

During the Great Depression, Mr. Tupper created his own currency that people could use to make store purchases. Strapped for cash himself, he also paid his workers with the currency—called “Tupper Bucks.”  

“My grandfather [W. H. Tupper] issued tokens to the men he paid every week, and the tokens could be redeemed in the store and the balance settled in cash,” explained Joe. “This cut back on the amount of cash he had to have available.” 

With this sort of resourcefulness, the Tupper store managed to survive the Great Depression. W. H. Tupper passed away in 1936, and the family continued to operate the store. However, the changes wrought by transportation innovations were a hurdle the store couldn’t jump, and in 1949, Celia Tupper Buller closed the store.   

“People started coming to town to buy their things, so the store had outlived its usefulness,” explained museum tour guide Kayla Gary. 

Among the merchandise displayed at the W. H. Tupper General Merchandise Museum is a scale from the 1940s. Photo by Christie Matherne Hall.

A Slice of Time Preserved for All 

Thomas explained that everything displayed in the museum was an item in the Tupper store inventory at the time it closed. Most of the items are set on wooden shelves and in waist-high glass display cases, original to the Tupper store. Some of the manufacturers of the displayed goods haven’t changed their logos much in seventy years, so many items have recognizable branding. The canned goods, perfume bottles, and medicine containers still have their original contents within. 

In 1986, Joe Tupper inherited the store’s furnishings and inventory, carefully cleaned and packed away by his Aunt Celia. He was inspired by the collection and wanted to share it with the public, so in 1989, he transferred ownership of his inheritance to the city of Jennings.  

“I was overwhelmed that I owned something like this,” he recalled. “I knew in my heart that it needed to be shared with the public and was not something to be hoarded by me, but put [into a] museum so that it could be enjoyed by many.”  

The W. H. Tupper General Merchandise Museum is open to visitors Tuesday through Saturday, or by appointment. The museum welcomes school class trips and offers a scavenger hunt for elementary and junior high school students. To get in touch, call (337) 275-7312. 

Christie Matherne Hall writes about foodways, culture, travel, and natural disasters for 64 Parishes and Country Roads. She is also a podcast producer for the Western Colorado Writers’ Forum and enjoys helping people write their memoirs through the Story Terrace platform.