H. L. Hunt
Haroldson Lafayette Hunt, Jr. ( born February 17, 1889 in Illinois; † November 29, 1974 in Dallas ) was an American oil billionaire.
Career
The most as " H.L. Hunt " designated businessman was born as the youngest of eight children. He began as a casual laborer and poker player, founded a cotton plantation in Arkansas and acquired with a poker profit in Texas low an oil field, which turned out to be extremely profitable. Finally, he became the first oil billionaire in history and was temporarily the richest Americans.
Because of its machinations and intricate family relationships, the family Hunts regarded as one of the models for the TV series Dallas.
Political commitment
The conservative Southerners Hunt was a member of the religious right and feared in the 50s a communist uprising. Therefore he founded the "Facts Forum ", the political radio and television programs and corresponding propaganda produced to support the campaign of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Hunt funded right-wing and right-wing groups, including the Southern Baptist Convention, the Ku Klux Klan and the ultra-right John Birch Society. He used friendship with Edwin Walker, the self-confessed fascist Franco and consultant General Charles Willoughby and the other Texas oil billionaire Clint Murchison, according to the historian Anthony Summers et al George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi party financed.
Hunt initially supported Republican presidential candidates like Eisenhower and Douglas MacArthur, then the democratic Texan Lyndon B. Johnson. After the Cuban Revolution Hunt financed the Cuban Revolutionary Council, one supported by the CIA and the American Mafia organization paramilitary Cuban exile.
Hunt criticized President Kennedy as too soft against communism; his son, Nelson Bunker Hunt printed in 1963 a pamphlet, Kennedy attacked aggressively before his visit to Dallas. He assisted in the election campaign in 1964, right Barry Goldwater and organized a campaign for a " Constitution for rising nations ," which was promoted inter alia, in the Dominican Republic.
Family
Hunt was married three times and had 14 children. Among the most famous sons include Lamar Hunt, who made a name for itself in sports sponsorship, Nelson Bunker Hunt and William Herbert Hunt, who became known due to the silver speculation in the 1970s and Ray Hunt Ley, the current Chairman of Hunt Oil. The sons reported in 1986 bankruptcy, after they had lost the gigantic fortune through leveraged silver shops and the decline in oil prices.