Rupert P. Ricker Among those early oil speculators was Rupert P. Ricker, a local lawyer who bought mineral leasing rights on 431,360 acres of the land. But Ricker was unable to raise the money needed to drill, so he sold the rights to his old army friend, Frank Pickrell, and Haymon Krupp, both of whom where El Paso businessmen. 1919
Another 1 Million Acres Another million acres was set aside in 1883. But while two million acres is a lot of land, few people at the time actually thought it was all that valuable. The best anyone could hope for was that the land could one day be sold and the proceeds used to create an endowment. 1883
1917
J.A. Udden Then, in 1917, a University of Texas geology professor named J.A. Udden publicized his belief that there was oil under the lands. Speculators paid attention, resulting in more than 5,000 applications for permits to drill for oil and gas in the eastern Permian Basin granted over the next two years.
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