HERBERT HUNT Mame Warren, Interviewer Warren: This is Mame Warren. Today is February 9th, 1997. I'm in Dallas, Texas, with Herbert Hunt. I want to know how a Texas boy found his way to Washington and Lee. Hunt: I had been attending the Hill School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, and had reached what was known as the sixth form, or senior year, and they were starting to give the SATs, or whatever the tests were at that time, so I contacted my mother to discuss whether I should be taking them, whether I would need them, if I was going to go to school in Texas, and that most of the people up there taking them were on their way to Yale or Princeton or one of those schools. And her reply back to me was, "You don't need to take them. You've already been entered in Washington and Lee," or W&L, as she called it. Frankly, I'd never heard of the school, but I said, "What is it and where is it?" And she told me it was in Lexington, Virginia. The bottom line, she was on the board of Mary Baldwin College at that time and was interested in seeing me go up there to a smaller school. So that's how I ended up there, never knowing until just before the end of my senior year that-well, it was earlier, mid senior year in high school, that's where I would be headed. Warren: So you were sent to Washington and Lee. Hunt: I was very fortunate. My mother was very straight-laced, and I felt like the rabbit that had been thrown in the briar patch went I got to W&L. 1 Warren: [Laughter] Oh, do tell what you mean by that. Hunt: Well, I'm sure my mother had no idea how much social life there was at W&L. Warren: Well, tell me what the briar patch was. Tell me about that aspect of it. Hunt: Well, basically the social life. Of course, Mother serving on the board of Mary Baldwin College, why, she knew how strict the rules were there, so she assumed-I think she assumed that's what I was going to be getting at W&L. She had no idea that you were turned loose to do whatever you want as long as you conducted yourself as a gentleman. Warren: And that code of the gentleman really seems to have been very pervasive. What did that mean to you? How was that presented to you, and what did that mean to you? Hunt: Well, we wore a coat and ties, which you had to have on to attend class. Really about the only rules that you had were that you did have to attend classes faithfully, and, other than that, your time was yours with what you wanted to do with it. Warren: Can you remember when you first arrived in Lexington, what your impressions were? Hunt: Yes. It was a very pretty school, very pretty campus, not an awful lot different from being away at prep school for three years. I think you're probably too young to focus in on that time, but you've got to keep in mind that the whole country was going through a real change. In other words, we'd been through World War II, and during World War II, the only way to get around was by train, essentially. The Hill School is in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, so I was used to getting on trains, and before that I'd been to Culver Military Academy for summer school, summer camps. So, you know, I'd been riding trains since I was ten years old, where you get on a train, and a day and a half, two days later, you'd be at the other end. 2 But following World War II, why, this all was starting to change. In other words, we were going into the airplane age, and, as I recall, I flew into Washington, D.C., I guess, to start with and got down from there. But the campus, as I say, was, you know, a small campus and very much like the prep school I'd just come from. Warren: You arrived at a particularly interesting time in a lot of different ways. One of the things that was happening was there were a lot of veterans there. Hunt: Yeah. Warren: Can you talk about that? Hunt: Well, it was a very different atmosphere from what I'm sure had taken place before the war, and it pretty well phased out while I was there at W&L. The Beta fraternity house had been what then would have been called a colored barracks, and the house had just been gotten back a short time before, a year or two before I got there, and so was old and beat up but remodeled, and I don't imagine it's changed much even today. At school, why, obviously here were boys coming from high schools in their, oh, eighteens, nineteens, twenties, depending on how smart you were, how long it took you to get through high school, along with lots of veterans who were back on G.I. Bill, etc. In fact, there were many fraternity brothers that were well over thirty years of age that were back to either finish up in law school or finish their undergraduate work. And so it was quite a mixture. I remember when Hell Week came around after pledging, I finally got to the point of Hell Week, and one of the things was there was a demand that all the pledges had to come down and march around the house with a half grapefruit in their hand. Of course, the house is on a hill there, as you know, and so it was down one side and across the front, and then climb back up the hill and around. Well, there also was about three or four inches of snow on the ground. 3 So after about the third round around the house, a couple of the fellows in the pledge class who'd been away in the service said, "This is enough of this," and waved and signaled all us young kids, and we followed them down to the diner and sat down and had breakfast. And it wasn't long before the actives, some of the actives showed up and said, "What are you guys doing?" And the older ex-G.I.s in the pledge class told them we weren't going to have all this stuff, that was the end of that. So that kind of finished up Hell Week for us. Warren: Wow. I never heard that story before. That's great. That's really interesting. So what were the grapefruits about? Why on earth were you carrying grapefruit? Hunt: Just because somebody had dreamed it up among the actives, I'm sure, that we should carry a grapefruit around. Warren: How did you decide to join the Beta House? Hunt: [Laughter] Well, I almost hate to tell this on myself, because it shows how mature I was. I had no idea what the fraternity system was and all of that, and, anyway, had signed up for the rush parties at the table set up in the Quad of what was the freshman dorm then, and had a party. Some other Texas boys were joining the Beta House, and there was all this conversation about, well, we need to stick together and all demand we get into this fraternity or that fraternity, which I didn't particularly care one way or the other. But anyway, the Betas issued me an invitation, and I can remember-I think it was Brian Bell, and I said, well, that sounded like a good idea. "I'd like very much to join your sorority." He said, "No, it's a fraternity." And I said, "Well, what's the difference?" [Laughter] 4 And Brian, being willing to go along with it, he thought a minute and said, "Well, there's not a lot of difference, just one's for girls and one's for boys." So that shows how naive I was when I hit there. Warren: That's great. That's wonderful. That's a great story. So was there something particular about the Betas that made them more attractive? Hunt: Well, we joked about this quite a bit afterwards. They were a congenial group, and one of the main things, the house was extremely close to the campus and to the classrooms, and I thought that was a good deal, where I didn't have to walk too far to get to class when I got up in the morning. Warren: Well, it always looked very attractive to me. I figured if I was joining a fraternity, I'd pick one at Red Square. It made a lot of sense to me. Well, talking about when you arrived, were you aware that you were arriving with Dean Leyburn, that he was arriving at the same time, and what changes he brought to the university? Hunt: No, I wasn't aware that I was arriving with him, but when I got there, why, he was relatively new. Was he the year that I got there? Warren: Yes. He came with you. Hunt: Okay. I do recall that there was a world of conversation about Dean Leyburn and what was taking place at the university in setting it up and this sort of thing. Of course, keep in mind, the university had been disbanded for a period of time in there, or, if not disbanded, had been scaled way back for the Officers Training School, and so it was kind of a start-up situation. Warren: Can you remember what any of that conversation was about him? I know it was a long time ago, but he really did bring tremendous changes, and I'd love to know what the students were saying. Hunt: I really don't remember any of the details, just other than Leyburn was doing this, etc., and I just don't recall at all. 5 Warren: When I've talked to other people from your time period, I didn't know so much about Dean Leyburn at that time, so you're the first person from your class I've talked to in quite a while. So I was hoping maybe. But as a student, I wouldn't have been so aware of that either, but some students are more astute to what's going on on the Hill than others, not most, though. Were there any particular teachers who made a difference for you? Hunt: Yes. When I arrived, I hadn't decided what I was going to major in, and so I took freshman geology, like three hundred other freshman, probably, you know, to get your science credit. My father was in the oil and gas business. The whole family was in the oil and gas business, but I really hadn't thought about taking geology, but anyway, in my second year, I started-well, really at the end of my second year, I started thinking more about what I should major in. Anyway, I came home, I guess it was Christmastime of second year, and my dad asked me how school was going, and I said, "Fine." He said, "Well, have you decided what you're going to take?" So I started naming off courses, and he said, "No. What are you going to graduate in?" So I told him, well, I was thinking about geology, and his comment back to me was-it was in his office-he put his head back down and went on working, and he said, "Well, that will cost us millions." And I said, "Why do you say that?" He said, "Well, you know the geologist always wants to go deeper or wants to drill a well just to prove a point, a geologic point rather than a commercial point." So anyway, with that, I kind of decided, well, I'd go ahead and do it. [Laughter] Warren: So you were a geology major? Hunt: Yes. Warren: I don't know that I've talked to any other geology majors. Hunt: Well, there weren't very many of us. 6 Warren: And I know it was a popular course, but- Hunt: For the freshmen, for your freshman credit. Freshman geology is probably the easiest of the science credits to get your one year of science, and that's why so many took it, but after your freshman year, why, I guess the largest geology class I had was six students. Warren: Really? Hunt: Most of them-well, I had many classes where it was just myself and the professor. Warren: Tell me about that. Hunt: Well, I think the year I graduated, there were, I don't remember, either five or six of us that graduated in geology. There weren't very many. And at that time maybe there was twenty-plus majoring in geology. So, obviously, you know, after you got past the freshman year and maybe some people were interested enough to take sophomore year, why, then it was only for those that were majoring in geology. And you still had all the different courses you had to take, so it literally just got down to where it was Marcellus Stowe, "Mars" Stowe, as we called him, Dr. Stowe, and just one, two, three students. Many of my courses were, you know, where I would get some guidance from him on what I was going to do, and then it was almost a class by appointment. You'd have an appointment to go by and see him. So it gave me lots of special attention, and there was no showing up not having done the work. Literally you knew it was just going to be you and the professor. There wasn't any way not to raise your hand. Warren: So what does it mean? Did you go out in the field in Rockbridge County? Hunt: Yeah, we had some field courses, and then also we had a project. I did a paper on the heavy mineral sediments, heayy minerals, of the James River, and it was published in the Virginia geological, state geological society's-oh, they publish papers annually, and it was one of the published papers that year. And in that case, 7 why, we went around gathering samples up and down the tributaries to the James River, the upper James River, and then taking them back to the lab and coming up with what minerals were in those samples. So then you could look back and figure what you might encounter up those particular rivers, which, of course, is the way that gold exploration was done in the early days. In other words, you'd hunt for a sample of gold and then start backtracking up the rivers that brought it down to hunt for the area to look for a gold deposit. Of course, I wasn't looking for gold. I was just doing an academic paper. And did a lot of spelunking, a lot of in the caves and that sort of thing, which I enjoyed. Warren: Rockbridge County just sort of cries out for that kind of exploration, doesn't it? Hunt: Well, there's lots of caves, yeah. Warren: I've never done that, but I have young friends who do it, and they keep saying, "Well, yeah, we'll take you sometime." But I haven't actually gotten down in there yet. Hunt: Well, you ought to go do it. It's fun. Warren: Well, I would like to. I would like to. So did you go and explore around lots of places in Rockbridge County? Hunt: Oh, yeah, pretty well all over the county. A lot of them are within walking distance of the campus itself, but some of them, you know, you drive out and around the area. Warren: Would you go out with Dr. Stowe, or is it something you'd do by yourself? Hunt: There were some classes that were taught by him in the field, but the mineral study I mentioned was done on your own, where you'd go out and gather the samples, and there you'd find a sandy spot and dig down deep enough so that you'd get something that wasn't contaminated last week, and grab samples. And you wouldn't take just one sample. You would clear off an area and take a composite 8 sample, a little bit from many different spots, and put it together, and then that's what you'd take back and analyze. Warren: So I've got to ask you the follow-up question. Did this wind up costing your father millions? Hunt: Well, you know, you always have to ask who was responsible for the dry hole. No, I-you still have to, if you're going to be successful in the oil and gas business, you have to keep your feet on the ground. So I hope I've managed to do that through the years. Warren: Now, what about other classes? As a geology major, I'm sure you had to fill other requirements. Were there other teachers in other departments that you remember? Hunt: You know, I've forgotten his name, but I'll bet you I can go back here and figure it out. I took calculus my freshman year to get rid of my math requirement for a science degree. We got to, oh, about the middle of second semester, and I just could not comprehend infinity. I couldn't comprehend something that you couldn't put your arm around or couldn't pick up or couldn't ever reach. And it happened, why, the math prof, an older fellow at the time, I don't know whether he was an advisor to our fraternity. I don't think he was, but he was down at the fraternity house one afternoon, and a group of us were having a beer. That was kind of the practice, that the profs would visit the fraternity houses. It was that close an atmosphere. And he said to me, he said-or I said to him, I said, "Not doing very well, am I?" And he said, "No, you're not." I said, "Well, I'm probably not going to make it, am I?" And he said, "Not in calculus." And he sat there a minute, and he said, "What are you majoring in?" 9 And I said, "Well, I'm majoring in geology, probably. I don't know yet, but I'm thinking about that." Now this was freshman year. And he said, "Well, what degree have you signed up for?" I said, "A science degree." He said, "Well, if you're not going to be in physics, then-" I said, "Well, I'm not going to be in physics." He said, "Well, you're not going to need that much math." He said, "What math did you have in high school?" I said, "Well, in prep school, trig was the last thing I took." He said, "Well, I'll tell you what I'll do." He said, "I'll give you all my back exams, and I'll let you take the final exam in trig, and if you can get at least-" Let's see how he put it. He said, "If you get at least a C in it, I'll pass you and get you your math credit instead of the calculus, since that's not a requirement." And I said, "Okay." So I got hold of his textbook for trig, and it turned out to be the same one I'd had the year before in prep school, so I went to work boning up, and I did pass all his tests and take his final and make it. So I got my year's math credit, and I don't want any more calculus. [Laughter] Warren: I'll bet. [Laughter] Well, you know, that's one of the things that so impresses me, is this idea have how personal the relationships seem to be between the faculty and the students at Washington and Lee. You say that the professors came and socialized with you at the fraternity houses a lot? Hunt: Some of them did. Some of them did. The older fellows didn't do it as much as, you know, the medium-aged and younger guys. But take, for example, Dr. Stowe. When API would come around, the American Petroleum Institute, he would take his students who were going to graduate, he'd offer them and take them with him to go to the APG convention. So I went with him, and I believe there was-I guess there was one other went with me, and we went to the convention 10 with him, at which he said, "Don't bother to go attend the papers or listen to the technical stuff." He said, "You need to get out and meet people and sample what's going on technically, but you need to meet people so that you can get a job when you graduate." And so, you know, you had that contact, that they'd actually take you out, and you'd do that sort of thing. Well, at W&L, why, you know, we had a trip one weekend that we took off and visited an area down in southwestern Virginia, where a well was being drilled by Chevron, as I recall, and they were drilling what was known as a fenster. In other words, they were drilling into an overthrust or a very complicated area in kind of a hole in the geology, and they did drill a dry hole. But we spent two days traveling around that part of the state, and there were five or six of us that were on the trip with him. We also went into a couple of mines with him, one underground, one above ground. So, you know, there was all of that kind of traveling together and that sort of thing. Warren: Wow. That's very interesting. I haven't talked to geology people before. That's really great. Let's shift gears now. One of the things that we mentioned at lunch and that I saw in the yearbook, you played some football. Hunt: Played at it. Warren: Well, tell me about that. Hunt: Well, W&L was trying to put together, as best I could tell, trying to put together a football team, a good football team for the two hundredth bicentennial year coming up, so they had a large number of scholarships out. In fact, I think on the whole team, there were only-at one point, there were three of us, and I think ultimately before I gave it up, I guess there were probably two of us that were not on scholarships. So the bottom line is, there was no freshman team and varsity team. There was just one team. 11 And so what would happen, we would play a freshman schedule, but the tail end of the team, each weekend would be cut off and would be sent to play the Staunton Military Academy or whatever. Let's see, we played a school over in Norfolk, etc. The bottom of the team would spend the week scrimmaging the varsity, and then, come weekend, the bottom part would go play the lesser schedule. And so it might be anywhere from eighteen of us to thirteen or fourteen that would be sent to play the prep school or the other school's-what can I call it, not lesser team, but they're- Warren: Like junior varsity or something? Hunt: Their freshman team or JV or what have you, and I can remember one weekend, why, we were playing, and we had a couple fellows hurt, and we were going to be disqualified if we couldn't come up with someone to take the eleventh man's position. So the manager/water boy who was traveling with us, he put on a uniform and played with us that game. [Laughter] Obviously, we took some pretty good drubbings under that, because, you know, we had been running no plays. Whatever we would play would be plays that were given to us for the varsity's opponent each week, was kind of how it worked, and we'd just kind of make up plays as we'd go. Warren: Did you travel much with the football team? Hunt: Not with the varsity. I did make a few games with the varsity. One kind of a funny instance happened on one game. We were going to the game by train, and I know there was lots of commotion, lots of talking, and finally one of the coaches came back to me and asked me if I had a credit card. I said, "Yeah, I've got a credit card." He wanted to know what credit card it was. I said "American Express." And he said, "Would you be willing if we used it to pay for the tickets?" 12 I said, "Yeah, if you want to. It'd be all right with me." I'm sure it was no great sum of money, but the bottom line was, somehow or another, they had gotten off without the tickets for the football team- Warren: Oh, no. Hunt: -and they were afraid that when the conductor came around to get the tickets, which, you know, the tickets were always taken up on the trains at that time, that they would have a problem. But as it turned out, the conductor took their word that this was a school and that they did buy the tickets. So he was willing to forego using my credit card, and they worked it out. Warren: I didn't know there were credit cards back then. Hunt: Yeah, there were some kind of credit cards. Maybe it wasn't American Express. I don't remember, but it was a credit card, and they came around wanting to know if I had one. Warren: You were the hero there for a few minutes, I guess? Hunt: Yeah. Warren: So you were on the team with Walt Michaels, right? Hunt: Yes. Warren: Everybody mentions Walt Michael's name. What was he like? Hunt: Walt was a super guy, very plain vanilla, very quiet, very athletically talented person. Walt is one of the few people that I have seen on one occasion, I guess, and I get a message from him every now and then. As a matter of fact, because my brother's in professional football, owning the Kansas City Chiefs, occasionally he'll see Walt Michaels, etc. But anyway, Walt sent back through somebody an honorary card for the Jets, making me an honorary sideline Jet member, along with a letter saying, "If you're ever up, come down to the sidelines and watch the game with me." 13 Warren: That's great. Those Washington and Lee connections are everywhere, aren't they? Hunt: They help. Warren: I'm very impressed with the networking. So you were around. You weren't on the team, but you were around during the Gator Bowl season. Hunt: I was no longer on the team. I'd quit in my sophomore year. Late in the season it became obvious that I wasn't big enough to be out there, etc., but the Gator Bowl came after that time frame. The Gator Bowl was '50, wasn't it? Warren: I think so. I think so. Well, what was it like on campus? Was it frenzied? Did people go crazy, knowing they were going to a bowl? Hunt: Oh, yeah. Everybody was very excited, and we had a very good team going. One of the big sports was to sit down and figure up how much we would have beat So-and-so had we played So-and-so. And basically, the way they would do it, they would say, "Okay. We played West Virginia, and the score was this. Such-and-such team played West Virginia, but they lost by thirty points. So that makes us thirty points better than that team, but that team beat Army by ten points, so that makes us forty points better than Army." And, you know, he'd get up to where he'd get some pretty astronomical scores like we'd be eighty points better than So-and-so. Warren: That's great. And I take it this was happening in the fraternity houses after a beer or two had been consumed? Hunt: Absolutely. Everybody would sit down and try and figure them out. Warren: So the social life was pretty good, I expect, back then? Hunt: Well, I wasn't the most avid social life fan, if you're talking about dating girls. Warren: Did you have a car? Hunt: Yeah. I did have a car by-I don't remember exactly when it came. I guess it was probably in my sophomore year. Social life, I met my wife through W&L. One 14 of the fraternity bothers got up at lunch one day, clanged on his glass and stood up and said, "I've got some things I have to study for tomorrow. I found I'm going to have a test in so-and-so. I have a date down the road at Hollins College. I've never met her, but I understand she's a super girl, and all the people tell me she has a great personality. Will someone take my place?" And then, of course, a chuckle around the room, and finally I said, "Okay, I'll go." And that was the blind date on which I met my wife, Nancy, who was going by the name of Kitten. Turns out she was from El Paso, Texas, and I think he did say the girl was from El Paso, Texas, so that's one of the reasons I held my hand up, and later married the girl, four years later, after we got out of school, both graduated. Warren: That's a wonderful story. I love blind-date stories that work out. So that meant you spent a lot of time going back and forth between Lexington and Hollins? Hunt: Yeah. But I must confess that my wife went back to El Paso and attended UTEP. Warren: What's that? Hunt: University of Texas in El Paso. And I guess that was after her freshman year, so we really only dated one year in Virginia, and I continued to date girls at Hollins, but I guess my love was already set, so I ended up, usually in the summer, why, I would go out to see her, etc., until we decided to get married. Warren: Well, I do hope you have some memories of road trips, though. Hunt: Oh, I have lots of memories of road trips. Warren: Oh, share a few with me. Hunt: Well, we went down to Hollins one time, and they had a little Caesar down there who was a guard. [Laughter] And he was always giving the boys a very hard time about being on the campus, etc. I was not involved in the group, but I was there the night that they decided, "Well, we're going to fix little Caesar." So they got him and handcuffed him around a tree in the Quadrangle at Hollins, and took his 15 pants and socks and all, stripped him from the waist down, and left him out there in the Quadrangle. Of course, there was quite a bit of flak from Hollins and from the Washington and Lee president, etc., over that particular incident. Fortunately, I was not involved, and I think nobody got hung up by their thumbs over it, but they were warned that it should never happen again. Warren: There are some pretty good pranks that happened. Hunt: Yeah. Warren: Was his name really Little Caesar or is that what you all called him? Hunt: That's what we called him. Warren: So I suspect you were probably pretty popular, having a car, is what I understand. There weren't very many people who had cars. Hunt: Well, there were a lot of cars, but there weren't all that many, and, you know, you could get three to five guys go have a date, and you'd end up with six to ten people in the car when you'd go out, so it was kind of crowded, yeah. A lot of fun. Warren: And what kind of stuff would you do when you went out? Hunt: Oh, we'd do all sorts of things. There was a nightclub in Roanoke, as I recall, that was a colored night club, and we'd often go to it because it had good music. You know, I mean, nothing uncommon, but it would be a group of both, even though we weren't integrated at that time. Oh, we'd do all sorts of things, go have picnics, etc. Warren: Did you used to out to Goshen Pass? Hunt: Oh, yeah. I've swam Goshen Pass many times. In fact, every time there was a good rain, why, we'd try and head to Goshen Pass because there'd be enough water to swim the rapids. Warren: That's one of my favorite things to do. Hunt: Yeah. 16 Warren: Still. Well, somebody I was talking to-I always try to ask around before I go to see anybody, somebody told me I should ask you about having tire tracks on the back of your sports coat one time. Hunt: Tire tracks on the back of my sport coat. Warren: Does that ring any bells? Hunt: Oh, yeah! Yeah. We were on a trip. We were going to-I guess we were going to West Point, and one of the boys, one of the boys in the front seat, a couple of football players, Herb Miller, I believe. I don't remember who all was there, maybe Jack Crawford. Anyway, one of them dropped a cigarette, and it was a Jeep or a Land Rover-type vehicle, and of course, it was a metal floor, but one of them was smoking and dropped their cigarette, and they both started looking for it, and we ran off the highway. And when we did, we hit where there were poles joined together by cables, and a cable wrapped around the back tire, and so when it got out there, well, this cable was pulled taut. It didn't pull out the next pole, but the car turned over on its side. Bottom line, I was thrown out of the car, through the roof of the car, because it was canvas, and it was cold as I can remember. There was snow on the ground. And I did have a tire track across my back. Is that what you were referring to? Warren: I don't know. I don't know. He just said, "Ask him about the tire tracks on his back." Hunt: Who was this? Warren: Dan Wooldridge. Hunt: All right. [Laughter] Anyway, after we got the car pushed over and righted up, why, I had a date waiting on me, and so we said, "Well, is there any sense-" and, you know, the car was going to have to be fixed. I said, "Is there any sense in all of us staying?" 17 And they said, "No, I don't guess so." So I got out and hitchhiked on in and met my date, who was a girl by the name of Betty Butler from here in Dallas. Warren: Well, you can't keep those ladies waiting. I'm going to turn the tape over.