DuPont, Washington, was built by E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company between 1906 and 1915 for the purpose of housing employees of its dynamite plant, about one mile to the northwest. The site included the location of the Hudson Bay Company's outpost at Fort Nisqually. DuPont was a typical company town, with residences graded according to occupation, a company store, and community facilities. The village streets were named after important people in the company or other plants run by the company, for example, Brandywine, Santa Cruz, Penniman, and Barksdale.

The dynamite plant operated for almost seventy years, from 1909 to 1976. The DuPont Company owned all the houses in the village until 1951, at which point they began selling the houses to the workers, and the residents chose to incorporate the town.