M: We are not quite there yet if you are going in chronological order.

P: I also have the Columbian Development Corporation from 1956 to 1959.

M: It was still in existence, but let me say it was probably until 1958. It and the
 Investment Company of Houston were co-existent. Anyway, I was doing this
 kind of work, plus giving some advice to Hofheinz on some of his business
 activities and to some of the other folks there. At that point, Ed Bruhl was
 asked by some of the small cities in south Texas to advise them about their
 relationships with the utilities and how they could tell what kind of franchise
 fee they might get. I worked with him on that. We were then engaged by the
 city of Houston to come in when Houston Power and Lighting Company
 initiated a full-blown rate case with them. I thus received some experience
 working in between a city and a utility. After that, a group of small cities east
 of San Antonio and generally southwest of Austin were having some problems
 with their utilities, and they were looking for someone to help them. The city
 of Houston recommended me, so I was engaged to represent five small cities
 in their negotiations with a gas pipeline company, with a telephone company,
 and with whatever electric company they had. By that time, I was making a
 pretty good practice of this. There was hardly anybody who had any legal
 background in utilities. At that point I was up to $25,000 a year--and that was
 big money.

 Then one day I was invited to lunch by a friend who had been in the
 Investment Company of Houston and who had earlier gone to Wharton with
 me. He told me that he had met a fellow who also had gone to Wharton who
 was a vice-president with Sinclair Oil Corporation and that he was an
 up-and-comer in the corporation. His name was O. P. Thomas; he ultimately
 became the chairman. Sinclair wanted someone who would move to New
 York and understudy the treasurer. The treasurer made $80,000 a year and
 was the third-highest paid person in the company. It would be a great job.
 I discussed this with my wife, and they paid our way up to look around. We
 decided that living and working somewhere out of New York was not for us,
 so we said, "Thank you, but no thanks."

 About six or seven weeks later I was contacted again and was told that
 Sinclair Oil and Gas Company was reorganizing the company in Tulsa.
 Apparently they had a young president who was fairly new, and he was
 impressed with my background and wanted to talk to me about my being
 the top financial man for Sinclair Oil and Gas Company. They would pay
 my way up there. My wife, who lived in Galveston, was very happy in
 Houston, and I was very happy in Houston, too. But we went up there, and
 they had assigned some people to woo my wife and me--I told them that
 unless my wife was willing to go, I was not going anywhere. They ultimately
 convinced us that we should try it. We rented our home in Houston; we did
 not sell it because we did not know whether we were going to like Tulsa or

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