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March 14, 2022
Today in Texas History
By Bandera Spirits of Texas
On this day in 1874, Haymon Krupp, merchant and oil wildcatter, was born in Kozno, Lithuania. In 1890 he immigrated to El Paso, where he worked in a dry-goods store and soon opened his own men's clothing store.
In 1910 he established a large dry-goods house that became widely known throughout the Southwest. He pioneered what is now El Paso's outdoor clothing industry with one of the first clothing factories in the Southwest. He became renowned for giving thousands of dollars' worth of coal to the poor in El Paso and West Texas.
In the 1920s he donated funds to build B'nai Zion Temple in El Paso. Krupp entered the oil business when he joined Frank Pickrell, also of El Paso, to buy a lease option to drill for oil on University of Texas lands in the Permian Basin.
In 1919 Krupp and Pickrell organized the Texon Oil and Land Company, with Krupp as president and Pickrell as vice president. They capitalized Texon by purchasing three producing wells in Burkburnett and selling 685 certificates of interest in New York.
On May 28, 1923, their first well, the Santa Rita No. 1, came in on their leased university-owned lands in West Texas. Krupp died on Feb. 21, 1949.
In 1910 he established a large dry-goods house that became widely known throughout the Southwest. He pioneered what is now El Paso's outdoor clothing industry with one of the first clothing factories in the Southwest. He became renowned for giving thousands of dollars' worth of coal to the poor in El Paso and West Texas.
In the 1920s he donated funds to build B'nai Zion Temple in El Paso. Krupp entered the oil business when he joined Frank Pickrell, also of El Paso, to buy a lease option to drill for oil on University of Texas lands in the Permian Basin.
In 1919 Krupp and Pickrell organized the Texon Oil and Land Company, with Krupp as president and Pickrell as vice president. They capitalized Texon by purchasing three producing wells in Burkburnett and selling 685 certificates of interest in New York.
On May 28, 1923, their first well, the Santa Rita No. 1, came in on their leased university-owned lands in West Texas. Krupp died on Feb. 21, 1949.