Heirs to Misfortune

9780932807212

0932807216

Blending historical fact with fiction, the authors have combined novel with biography to tell this story of John Pelham Humphries and his claim to land in one of the largest oil fields in Texas.Seventeen years of research are distilled into this fascinating account about Spindletop -- a place and an event that heralded the advent of the Petroleum Age. The book is enhanced with numerous photographs of the people and places that figure prominently in the story. Giving added value mis an excellent collection of document reproductions, which testify to the thoroughness of the research.Nation- and world-wide, over twenty-five thousand people claim kinship to the Humphries line: expecting the mystery to be magically solved, expecting to find a secret escrow account for billions of dollars buried deep in a bank vault somewhere, and expecting to share equally in its distribution. Like the hardy pioneers who gave up everything to seek a pot of gold, a lost city, a silver mine, the Humphries family tirelessly pursues the world's greatest treasure hunt.A delight to read, it is a mystery that proves fact is truly stranger than fiction.