How Did Texas Oil Boom Affect The Economy

The oil boom is real and is definitely happening. This so called “black gold” can turn an ordinary man into a millionaire in mere seconds. It takes hard work and patience, but it pays off when you become rich due to oil prosperity. The oil boom caused one of the biggest social changes in Texas history. Petroleum was first found on a small hill called Spindletop near Beaumont in 1901. The Hamel brothers were the first to find oil in Texas, and became rich almost insantly. Since that day in 1901, the oil boom has brought up towns and helped Texas in so many ways besides the economy. During this radio series, we will talk about the biggest social change oil has had on Texas. The three most important social changes that happened in Texas during

Wink was a small town in Texas that went from a population of 0 in 1925, to 6,000 in 1929 due to the large amounts of oil in the area. This high population helped grow their football team. The oil companies helped fund the team and recruit their players. The oil companies would try to hire the fathers of good prospects, even if the fathers weren’t very good at the job. (Doc D) With the high school having the top prospects, they ended up going 12-0 (12 wins and 0 losses). This brought social change because this team brought the community together. In Texas, before the oil boom, the main jobs were farmers and ranchers. These jobs aren’t in very close proximities, so there wasn’t really a community. In Wink, football brought them together. After they won games, they would go out to eat and have huge parades. This team placed something in the heart of this community, togetherness and American spirit. I believe that this was a huge social change for

In 1858 and 1883, the Texas State Legislature gave the University of Texas a 1 million dollar land grant, so in the end they had 2 million acres. In 1900 the University got the idea to start searching the land for oil. Very soon, they ended up finding a lot of that sweet, sweet black gold. By 1923, the University of Texas was on its way to becoming a very wealthy school. The state legislature decided to give ⅓ of the oil income to Texas A&M University. The universities ended up making 4.4 billion dollars in total. This helped create and grow both of the schools in population and in size. (Doc A) Due to the schools having so much money, they had better teachers. This made more students want to come to the two universities. So this resulted in smarter people going out into the world and getting better jobs that pay more money. This helps grow the Texas economy. The oil caused much higher education, which ended up helping grow the economy.This brought huge social change to