
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 20, 1990                   TAG: 9006200433
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: BEAUMONT, TEXAS                                LENGTH: Short

CLAIMANTS LOSE FIGHT FOR RICH TEXAS OIL LAND

A federal judge has ruled that thousands of purported heirs to the Spindletop oilfield fortune have no claim to the land or the estimated $200 billion generated since the first gusher blew there in 1901.

U.S. District Judge Howell Cobb's ruling Tuesday was the latest in a series of lawsuits brought by would-be heirs against oil companies that have developed the tract that brought about the Texas oil boom at the turn of the century.

Cobb ruled in favor of Amoco Production Inc., Mobil Oil Corp., Phillips Petroleum Co., Texaco Inc. and Chevron Inc.

The lawsuit was filed by four relatives who claimed kinship to Pelham Humphries and asked for $200 billion. The relatives had sought to have their case declared a class-action suit on behalf of numerous other heirs.

Spindletop, still an active oilfield, caused a boom that moved the oil industry from the North to the Southwest. Its first six wells produced more oil in their first year than had been produced in the United States up to that time.

-Associated Press

by CNB