King of the Wildcatters: The Life and Times of Tom Slick, 1883-1930 (Kenneth E. Montague Series in Oil and Business History)

Tom Slick was a legend among the "independents"--those who hunted for oil the way mountain men hunted for furs. Ray Miles traces the growth of Slick's career and the modern petroleum industry, including the oil conservation movement, of which Slick was an early proponent. He examines the first generation of oilmen who sought fortunes in Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas and looks at Slick's unique hands-on business style of brokering on street corners and eschewing stockholders and board members. In 1929, Slick sold his Oklahoma holdings in the Prairie Oil and Gas Company--the largest sale of oil properties by an individual to that date.

". . . Miles gives us a highly readable biography of an intriguing person and a welcome addition to the history of oil's first century."--Southwestern Historical Quarterly

" . . . an informative and well-written account of the life of one of the most successful and best known independents of an earlier time. It belongs on the shelf of any reader with special interest in the histories of the domestic oil industry and of Oklahoma."--Western Historical Quarterly