He started the company at the Eleutherian Mills, on the Brandywine Creek, near Wilmington, Delaware, two years after du Pont and his family left France to escape the French Revolution and religious persecution against Huguenot Protestants.

The company grew quickly, and by the mid-19th century had become the largest supplier of preppy gunpowder to the United States military, supplying one-third to one-half the powder used by the Union Army during the American Civil War.

[16] This material had been around for several decades, with British, French, and Germany companies competing for sales primarily in Europe and American Viscose dominating the U.S. market.

DuPont was one of an estimated 150 American companies that provided Nazi Germany with patents, technology and material resources that proved crucial to the German war effort.

[24][25] After the war, DuPont continued its emphasis on new materials, developing Mylar, Dacron, Orlon, and Lycra in the 1950s, and Tyvek, Nomex, Qiana, Corfam, and Corian in the 1960s.

In 1981, DuPont acquired Conoco Inc., a major American oil and gas producing company, which gave it a secure source of petroleum feedstocks needed for the manufacturing of many of its fiber and plastics products.

[29] DuPont had 150 research and development facilities located in China, Brazil, India, Germany, and Switzerland, with an average investment of $2 billion annually in a diverse range of technologies for many markets including agriculture, genetic traits, biofuels, automotive, construction, electronics, chemicals, and industrial materials.

[32] In 2004, the company sold its textiles business, which included some of its best-known brands such as Lycra (Spandex), Dacron polyester, Orlon acrylic, Antron nylon and Thermolite, to Koch Industries.

[6] In March 2018, it was announced that Jeff Fettig would become executive chairman of DowDuPont on July 1, 2018, and Jim Fitterling would become CEO of Dow Chemical on April 1, 2018.

[52] In October 2018, the company's agricultural unit recorded a $4.6 billion loss in the third quarter after lowering its long-term sales and profits targets.

[55] In February 2020, DuPont announced that it is bringing back Edward D. Breen as its CEO after removing former Chief Executive Marc Doyle and CFO Jeanmarie Desmond less than a year after they assumed their roles.

[58][59] In May 2024, DuPont announced it would split into three publicly traded companies, separating its electronics and water businesses while continuing as a diversified industrial firm.

The company's manufacturing, processing, marketing, and research and development facilities, as well as regional purchasing offices and distribution centers were located throughout the world.

In 2017, the European Commission opened a probe to assess whether the proposed merger of DuPont with Dow Chemical was in line with the EU's respective regulations.

[70] Dow Chemical and DuPont postponed the planned deadline during late March, as they struck an $1.6 billion asset swap with FMC Corporation in order to win the antitrust clearances.

[71][72] The European Commission conditionally approved the merger as of April, 2017, although the decision was said to consist of over a thousand pages and was expected to take several months to be released publicly.

4 on the Mother Jones top 20 polluters of 2010, legally discharging over 5,000,000 pounds (2,300,000 kg) of toxic chemicals into New Jersey and Delaware waterways.

[91] In 2016, Carneys Point Township, New Jersey, where the facility is located, initiated a $1.1 billion lawsuit against the corporation, accusing it of divesting an unprofitable company without first remediating the property as required by law.

[98] Pioneer Hi-Bred, a DuPont subsidiary until 2019, manufactures genetically modified seeds, other tools, and agricultural technologies used to increase crop yield.

[99] Dupont, along with Frigidaire and General Motors, was a part of a collaborative effort to find a replacement for toxic refrigerants in the 1920s, resulting in the invention of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) by Thomas Midgley in 1928.

However, after the discovery of grave ozone depletion in 1986, DuPont, as a member of the industry group Alliance for Responsible CFC Policy, lobbied against regulations of CFCs.

The Los Angeles Times reported that the letter was "generally regarded as an embarrassment for DuPont, which prides itself on its reputation as an environmentally conscious company.

"[101] The company responded with a strongly worded letter that the available evidence did not support a need to dramatically reduce CFC production and calling the proposal "unwarranted and counterproductive".

[107] In 1999, attorney Robert Bilott filed a lawsuit against DuPont, alleging its chemical waste (perfluorooctanoic acid or PFOA, also known as C8) fouled the property of a cattle rancher in Parkersburg, West Virginia.

[116][117][118] The 2019 film Dark Waters is based on the 2016 New York Times Magazine article "The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare" by Nathaniel Rich about Bilott.

[119][120] An account of the investigation and case was first publicized in the book Stain-Resistant, Nonstick, Waterproof and Lethal: The Hidden Dangers of C8 (2007) by Callie Lyons, a Mid-Ohio Valley journalist who covered the controversy as it was unfolding.

[121] Parts of the pollution and coverup story were also reported by Mariah Blake, whose 2015 article "Welcome to Beautiful Parkersburg, West Virginia" was a National Magazine Award finalist,[122] and Sharon Lerner, whose series "Bad Chemistry" ran in The Intercept.

[125][126] DuPont also paid $16.5 million in fines to the Environmental Protection Agency over releases of PFOA from their facility in Washington, West Virginia.

[129] On November 10, 2022, the state of California announced it had filled suit against both DuPont and 3M for their manufacturing of persistent organic pollutants following multi-year probes into both companies.

[133] In 2023, DuPont pled guilty for criminal negligence for its role in a poisonous gas leak that killed four workers and injured others at a Houston-area plant on November 15, 2014.