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Guest
Column
“GODFATHER
OF BEAUMONT”
by Fred B. McKinley
Frank Yount and the Yount-Lee Oil Company,
“the Godfather and Financial Gibraltar of Beaumont.” |
| | The
Kyle Block, Downtown Beaumont
Photo by John Troesser, 5-03 |
After
its “Second Spindletop” oil strike of November 14, 1925, the Yount-Lee Oil Company
revitalized the Texas Gulf Coast which had suffered economically when the production
at the original oilfield simply played out. As Yount-Lee prospered and grew, so
did the population of Beaumont and the surrounding areas.The new oil boom produced
more jobs and greater income, an increase in deposits among the five local banks,
and a record in building activities.
In 1927, announcements were made
concerning large Beaumont projects, such as the Jefferson Theatre, the Goodhue
Building, the American National Bank Building, the new city hall and auditorium,
the Jefferson County Courthouse, the St. Therese Hospital, the Edson Hotel, the
LaSalle Hotel, the Y.M.C.A. building, the post office and federal building, a
new Beaumont High School building, and numerous improvements at other schools.
Churches and apartment houses sprang up all over town, and residences were completed
in record numbers. The city also built a new central fire station, a new jail
and police station, and spent thousands on street and park improvements. The building
boom continued well into 1929 when at least eighteen apartment projects and sixteen
commercial buildings were begun.
When the Great Depression hit, however,
even the strong oil economy could not sustain the fantastic growth that Beaumont
had experienced.
Throughout the years, Frank Yount, along with other
officers and major stockholders of the company, give direct aid to several worthwhile
causes, among them raising funds to build a new Masonic Temple, and contributing
to the Beaumont Community Chest. But the most celebrated demonstration of Yount-Lee
community involvement occurred when the City of Beaumont, hard-hit by the Depression
and loss of tax revenue, could not pay approximately two hundred employees of
the General Department, consisting of city officials, clerks, policemen and firemen.
The local banks turned away a desperate Mayor E. A. Fletcher, who went to
see Frank Yount on August 6, 1932. After hearing the mayor’s case, the oilman
agreed to loan the city $60,000 to be repaid when tax revenues for the current
year were received. But these loan proceeds did not last long, however, because
by October 31, 1932, the general fund was depleted once more. Fletcher succeeded
in borrowing another $22,000 from Yount who added the stipulation that paychecks
be distributed prior to Christmas. |
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Beaumont's City Hall and Auditorium, now Julie Rogers Theater for
the Performing Arts
TE Photo, 5-03 |
The City
repaid the total loan of $82,000, plus interest, on February 1, 1933, the day
after Frank Yount celebrated his fifty-third birthday — his last. Without warning,
the multi-millionaire oilman died of a heart attack on November 13, 1933. But
for those who remembered him, Frank Yount and the Yount-Lee Oil Company would
always be known synonymously as “the Godfather and Financial Gibraltar of Beaumont.”
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