INSTITUTE OF TEXAN CULTURES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM
I NTERVIEW WITH: 0. Scott Petty
INTERVIEWER: Esther MacMillan
DATE: March 23, 1984
PLACE: Office, 711 Navarro, Suite 235, San Antonio,
Texas 78205
M: Mr. Petty, I would like to start out by asking you a little
bit about your mother and father? Where you went to school in
San Antonio. As a child growing up. Tell me a little bit about
that.
P: O.K. I was born in the little town of Olive in Hardin
County, Texas. The town was named after my uncle S.C. Olive. I
believe he lived in Waco . I was named after him. So to begin
w i t h, my f i r s t n arne i s 0 l i ve •
M: I notice you use only the initial. (laughter) I don't blame
you.
P: I am a charter member and an honorary member of the Society
of Exploration Geophysici s ts.
M: Are you?
P: I u se d to get a letter every year from the Ladies Auxiliary,
insisting I should join them. I would write them back, "I'm a
boy, not a girl." Next year the same thing.
M: When were you born Mr. Petty?
P: Apr i l 1 5 , 1 8 9 5.
M: Were you born in San Antonio?
P : No , I wa s b o r n i n t h e l i t t l e t own o f 0 l i v e •
M: That's right. You just got th rough saying that.
PETTY 2
P: Olive was 28 mi les no r thwest of Kountze, the n eare s t large
t own , i t ' s no l on g e r i n e r i s t en c e . It was a saw mill town.
M: It isn't in existence any mo r e?
P: No. It was quite a big outfit. It started out Olive &
Sternenberg . And then • •• Mr. J. A. Sternenberg was quite a
character . He cou l d out-cuss anybody I eve r knew. So then they
decided they needed to incorporate it. And it became the Olive
Sternenberg Lumber Company . And in 1912, they thought they had
cut out all the timber the r e was; there wasn't any more timber to
cut. So they closed the mill and divided up • • • we l l , they owned
the land jointly. As a matter of fact, there's more timber being
cut there now than there was then. The reforesting.
M: Second growth.
P: Second growth . They weren't reforesting back in those days.
They just cut it and that was it. Then they came in later on and
started reforest i ng it and so it's a terrific industry now.
M: How come your f ami ly was the r e? Wasn't you r father a lawyer?
P: No. He was b o rn in Bastrop. I don't know just when he moved
there. I remember him te l ling about his fi r st ice cream soda . ••
where they go two straws and sh a red it •• • , the first he'd ever
seen. And he went to work for a relative and he was mist r eated
so he ran off and walked, I think about 20, 30 miles back to his
home in Bastrop.
M: Did he go to Olive?
P: No . Olive is a long ways away ..• He was on a farm. But he
wound up at Olive. How he got there I don't know, but he started
in, I think as an office boy. Let's see , I guess he came
through ..• I don't know how he got there but anyway, he started
working for Olive-Sternenberg & Company. And the, when they took
in full partners, they continued to operate and he worked up to
where he was . •• well, he finally came out to be president.
M: He did!
PETTY 3
P: The Sternenbergs, one by one, passed away. And then in 1912,
as I sa i d, they cut down a l l the t i m be r so they shut her down .
It was a little town .•. I think around 400 people, something like
that, all employees of the mill. In 1901, we were all sick with
ma l a r i a . My two brothers: Van, who was born in Orange, was
about 7 years older than I was, and Dabney was born in Olive. We
were always sick from malaria.
M: Oh? Is that swampy country?
P: Swampy country and the mosquitos were terrible. So my
mother, in 1901, told my father that she thought we should move
to a better climate. So he scouted the situation and decided
that San Antonio was a nice place to be because the climate was
right, they had good schools, and it was close the University at
Austin. So we moved here and we stayed at a rooming house for a
while. And then, he bought a home at Number 10, Tenth Street.
It's the home now that is occupied by the Veterans of Foreign
Wars.
M: Is that the beautiful house that is in the book? That is the
most beautiful house! Still there. Oh, goody. So many of these
handsome houses are (gone). He bought this house already built?
P: Yes and no, it was a completely different looking house. It
d i d n ' t l o o k l i k e t h a t a t a l l • I t d i d n ' t h a v e t he co l umn s no r t he
big gable. He remodelled it. Atlee B. Ayres was the architect.
M: Was he? And that is now used by the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
It's a beautiful house.
P: It is. When we divided up the estate, my dad asked that
nothing be changed for 20 years. Just leave the estate alone,
w h i c h we d i d . An d f i n a l l y , we d e c i d e d t h a t we s h o u l d d i v i de i t
up and let the three brothers and my mother have the money. So
Dabney took that as his part of the estate. I wanted to have
the ••• my dad had a 16,000 acre ranch in Webb County and I had my
eye on that. That was worth more than a fo"rth of it, my mother
PETTY
and two b r o t he r s , s o I put mon ey to e qua l i t up .
the home.
M: You got the ranch • • •
P: I got the ranch.
M: Still got it?
4
So Dabney took
P: Oh yes, I su r e have . He paid for that ranch ••• 16,000
acres .• . don't know what it's worth now . . . about $600 an acre,
I'm sure • . . He traded a city lot. •. do you remember where the
Majestic Theater used to be? Not the Majestic, the Texas
Theater . . .
M: Sure. The one that had all the fuss recently .
P : He owned that lot.
M: On the r i ve r •
P: And he traded that lot for 16,000 acres!
M: My word!
P: I think the reason was, Mr . Oppenheimer owned the ranch and
in those days, Pancho Villa was riding wild and coming ac r oss the
border and raiding the places. They hadn't been able to keep any
cattle down there in a long time, so Mr . Oppenheimer was just
sitting there with a ranch on his hands.
M: Is it right on the bo r der, the 16,000 acres, the Mexican
border?
P: It's four miles from the border.
M: Four mile s was nothing for those guys, was it?
P: No.
M: Are you running cattle on it now?
P: Yes .
M: You love it, don't you? I can tell by the way your eyes
light up. You love that ranch.
P: We bought the adjoining 9,000 some odd acres, which Mr. N. H.
Brown owned. My father leas e d his ranch to him, 15 cents an
acre .•. and he went into the ... sto c k ed it with s teers ... and the
bottom fell out of the s teer market. He lo s t e verything he had.
PETTY 5
And he had a beautiful home out here on •.• I'm dig r essing too
far, but I'll jus t finish this up •.• north of San Antonio . It
was a palatial sort of place. He had a beautiful bath tub with
gold plated fixtures ..• took everything he had . So he says, "By
g o l l y , I ' m g o i n g t o g e t s om e t h i n g o u t o f t h i s , " s o he we n t o u t
and uncoupled the bath tub one night, hauled it down to his
r a n c h • An d h e h a d t h i s l i t t l e wo o d en s h a c k , 2 5 m i l e s f r om t own ,
and he had that bath tub. (laughter)
M: What ranch did he take it to?
P: The Dos Hermanos ranch down in Webb County.
M: Dos Hermanos ... two brothers?
P: It was named for the two hill s well known there . It was a
land mark ... he had this little wooden house there, so ...
M: Funny . Your fa the r go t t he h o us e .
P : Go t t he house • I ' v e j us t go t t o t e l l yo u one t h i n g be c a us e
it's s o funny . My father and I used to go down there hunting.
We'd go to Mr. Brown's house and say hello to him; then we'd go
on down and camp on the ranch. One day we went down there, it
was almost dark, and drove up to the hous e and there was a lot of
cars parked th e re and we went in and Mr . Brown says, "Come in •••
we're having a trial here." I thought, 'What goes on here?' It
seems that Pancho somebody (I'm not sure his name was Pancho) .
M: Not Villa?
P: No, not Villa ... another Pancho . He was a bootlegger that
supplied ' em with whisky. And he had ridden a ticky horse
th r ough the pasture and tied him at the gate; walked up so nobody
would know it. And in those days, that was a capital offense. A
great big r ed- h eaded fellow f rom the adjoining ranch was the
p r o s e cut o r . And he sa i d , "We l l • n ow w h a t do yo u t h i n k we o ugh t
t o do a b o u t i t ? " He s a i d , "We h a t e t o k i l l Pancho • He ' s been a
good fellow and he's been bringing us this whisky for years but
there is nothing else to do so who's going to kill him?" So they
named one of 'em . He was to go down that night and wait at the
PETTY 6
g a t e an d w he n Pan c h o c am e t h r o u g h , h e wa s t o shoo t h i m so t he r e
wasn't anybody who would know who d id it. Then th ey were going
to burn the hor se .
M: What's a ticky horse ?
P : Has cattle ticks on him .
M: And that was bad becaus e t he ticks would spread.
P: Thi s was such a funny s tory I just had to tell yo u .
M: It's so typical of early Texa s just ice, i s n 1 t it ?
P : I t i s .
M: Ju s t shoot 'em. I think we shou l d do mor e of t ha t.
(laughter) Le t's go back. Yo u c ame to San An t onio b ecause of
the climate. There were three of yo u; the thr ee brothers had
already been born by the time you moved.
P : Yes.
M: Van, Dabney and 0. Scott.
P: I was six years old.
M: You were six, when you moved . Where did you go to school?
P: Magruder's School for Boys.
M: Never heard of that one.
P : I t ' s w he r e t he R i a t a Cad i l l a c i s now. And r i g h t a round t he
corner, you go a block, wa s th e Mulholland School, which was a
se lect girls' school. Qu i te a famous sc hool in thos e days.
M: You went all through grade :sc hoo l at. . .
P : Went through ther e. There were two room s: Miss Mary
Magruder had the primar y school and then Professor Magruder had
what amounted to high school.
M: Riata Cadillac . You walked to sc hool, didn't you?
P : No • T h a t was a w f u l • Yo u k n ow how k i d s a r e . B u t my m o t he r
i nsi ste d that the y dri ve me to school. We had a carriage. And I
didn't want the boys to s ee me rid e to school in a carr ia ge .
M: ' Caus e that was sissy.
P: That wa s sissy . So I' d get out a block or two ahead and walk.
Then they finally, my uncle was there and he had a mar e named
PETTY 7
Fann y and th e mar e was hitc hed up to what I thought was a tacky
little old go ca rt. Well, I just didn't l ike i t a t a l l . I
figur ed i t was . . . we l l , anyway , I was to drive Fanny t o sc hool.
I got tir ed o f that. .. but an yway Fanny ran away . .. got her foot
ove r the dash board and started k i cki ng and I joined the b i rd
gang; I jump ed off . I saw the old mar e and the cart going down
the road. (laughter)
M: Thi s was after the ca rriage deal? After you c omplained about
that , you drove Fanny . And then Fanny ran away •. .
P : So I stayed ther e until I was, I guess I was about 15 years
old . And there was a lady caught s pinal meningiti s about a block
and a half away from us, right around th e
decid e d I'd take a chance on it, if
corner
I lo s t
on Ave nue B. I
it wouldn't be
anything. I talked my folks into the f act that it was awful
dangerous my being t h a t close to sp inal meningiti s . They sho uld
let me go to the ranch up at Bo e rne , between Boern e and Bandera,
the Petty Ranch . Had about 7,500 acres . Da bney was up the r e
working . He'd talked his folks into letting him work a while
before he went any fu r the r .
M: He was through high sc hool. He was ahead of you.
P: He was four yea r s ahead of me. So he was up t h ere, r aising
chickens and I went up and stayed about a year and a half. One
day , I was herd in g go a t s and my dad c a l l e d me in and s a i d ,
"Olive, are you going to make s ome thing out of y our se lf
you going to herd goat s the re st of your life?" I s aid,
or are
"No. I
want to go to school." He said, "Wh e re do you want to go?" And
I said, "Bo s ton Tech. 11
M: You knew?
p: Yes . I always wanted to be an engineer . From the day I was
born, p racti cal l y. He hit th e desk with his fist so hard that
the p a pers flew up in the air and he s a ys (this maybe ought not
to be in here) "I never thought I'd raise a s on that would go to
school with a nigger. 11
PETTY
M: Why wou ld there be a nigger in Bosto n ?
P: They took negroes up there.
M: That earl y?
8
P : Y e a h . T h a t b l e w t h a t o u t o f t h e wa t e r . So he s a i d , "Wh e r e
do you want to go t hen?" I said, " I want to go to the Unive r sity
of Texas."
M: That s uit ed him , I betcha.
P: That suited him fine. But you had to take an examination.
M:
p:
M:
p:
What year was thi s? You we re born in ' 95.
I was about 16 years old.
That would be 1911.
Yes. I wen t to the ranch in 1911.
M: Y ou probably started school
O.K. t o go to . ..
in '1 2 . But your dad sa id it was
P: The University of Tex a s.
never had an exam in my life.
M: Really? In high school?
So I went to take the e xam ... I
They just let you progress .
P: In the Magruder's School for Boys. He believed in that. I
seemed to be at the top of the class u s ually, pretty intelligent,
apparently. So he just let me go on up. His specialty was
Latin.
M:
P:
Whose specialty?
Professor Magruder's.
M: That doesn 't hurt anybod y . I had a lot of it, too.
P : So anywa y , I went to th e examination they held in the old
Brackenridge High School, where Fox Tech i s now. They put the
ques tions up on the board and I couldn't answer one of them .
M: Real l y?
P: So I just
what do I do ?"
tore up my paper and walked out.
Well, I did a little res e arch
So I says, "Now
to find which
schoo l would take me without an e xamination. Georgia Tec h would
accept you on probation and then the Unive r si ty of Texas would
PETTY 9
let you transfer. So I went to Georgia Tech for a year and then
transferred to the University of Texas in 1913.
M: You did? How come you didn't want to stay at Georgia Tech?
That's supposed to be an awfully good school.
P: It's a wonderful school.
M: But you wanted to be at Texas.
P: I wanted to be at the University.
M: And you had no problem getting into Texas at the time.
P: No. They took my grades.
M: And you graduated as an engineer.
P: Graduated as an engineer. I had real good grades. I had no
physics in high school at all. So you had to have that. We
worked awful hard at Georgia Tech. We s t ud i e d ' t i l l 2 o ' c l o c k
every morning, nearly, and up early. It was a hard school. They
told you to begin with, "Well, now half of you are not c oming
back. We just have room in the sophomore class for half of you,
no matter what your grades."
M: This was the University of Texas?
P: No, this was Georgia Tech. So you had to make good grades to
stay there. I was working so hard I never did anything about
taking that course in Physics. Two weeks before the exam, I
bought the physics book and studied it and made the only A in the
class.
M: Two weeks! Physics!!
P: I just had a mind for physics and things of that sort.
M: You certainly did as your future was to prove. My goodness
gracious. So you graduated from the University of Texas with a
degree in engineering.
Da l las ?
Then you went to work for somebody in
P: Yes, I might tell you this about Austin as it is interesting.
we · boarded on 810 West 22nd Street. I walked to school every
morning. There was a girl sitting in a swing as I'd go by. I
thought, "That's the prettiest girl I ever saw in my life. I've
PETTY 10
got to meet her." So I told Charlie Heimsath ... quite a well
known family here in San Antonio •.• he roomed acros s the hall. I
said, "Charlie, I'll give you" •• • they had just started wearing
sport shirts .•. and there was one with pink st r ipes about half an
inch wide, silk; and he wanted one so bad. And I said, "I'll
give you a pink striped silk sport shirt if you'll get me an
introduction to that girl. 11
M: He knew her?
P : He s a y s , 11 I d o n ' t k n ow w h o s h e i s . " I s a i d , 11 Yo u wan t t h a t
shirt, you better get busy." Time went on ••• finals were coming
and I s t aye d up p r act i cal l y a l l night , in fact , I did stay up a l l
night, cramming.
Charlie rushed
I hadn't shaved. Whisker s all over my face.
in about noon one day and says, "Come on. I want
to introduce you to that girl." I said, "Charlie, I can't. I
haven't shaved; I've got an exam in a little while." "I can't
help it. You told me you wanted to meet her so come on. 11 "O.K."
I was never as embarrassed in my life when we went in ••• He had
met her grandmother someway. Anyway, he took me in and
introduced me to the grandmother; introduced me to the girl.
That was Edwina that I married.
M: No! It wasn't! Isn't that fun. Does she know that she cost
a pink striped shirt? (laughter) I can tell in the book you're
very fond of you wife.
P: She was in high school and I was in college.
M: I bet she thought that was funny, too.
P: She sure did.
M: The thing that interested me in the book ••• I should mention
right now so future researchers will know about this. Mr. Petty
wrote a book called "SEISMIC REFLECTIONS" Recollections of the
Formative Years of the Geophysical Exploration Industry by 0.
Scott Petty, published in 1973 by Geosource, Inc., Houston, Texas.
It is a resource for anybody who wants to get into the real
scientific details of the geophysical world. The thing that
PETTY 11
int e r este d me in t hi s book : The way thi s all s tarted wa s your
broth er, Dabne y, wrote you a lett e r and said, "Hey, thi s i s ... so
and so i s going on and you see what you can do about it"· Before
I had seen that you had gotten an engineering degree , I thought
to myse lf, 'if his broth e r is asking him to do this research, he
mus t be an engi neer.' And s ure enough, you were an engineer. I
hadn't found that out yet in here (book). I have a B.S. degree
but I found this hard going. The first thing I had to look up
wa s how to pronounce seismic because I didn't know if it was
seesmic or s ismic. So I did that first. Then I looked up the
d e finition of geophy s ic s . It i s a very, ve ry comprehensive •••
mo s t s cience s stick in t heir own bord ers but this is what I
found, Mr .
phy s i cs of
Petty , when I looked it up: "Geop hysics is the
the ea rth incl uding meteorology, hydrology,
oceanography, seismology, volcanology, magnetism and radio
activity." What a field you had to cover in geophysics!
P : That 1 s r i g h t •
M: I'm going to ask real dumb questions because this is a very
scientific area that you operate in. I was interested in the
fact that during World War I, the Germans were using seismic
reactions, or whatever you ca ll it. ••
P: Right.
M: To locate Allies' guns on the other side. Could you explain
that a little bit? That , to me, wa s just fascinating.
P: Ye s . They would set up three seismographs in known locations.
Th en they would record the vibrations from the shQ2t of that gun.
Th en, they would triangulate around having gotten the distances
from th e speed of sound through the earth to locate the gun. But
they had a problem . Sei smic waves are elastic waves and travel
at diff e rent s peeds through different formations.
M: Yes.
P : So i f t he f o r m a t i on s c han g e d , t he r e wo u l d be an e r r o r .
M: Oh.
PETTY 12
P: But they tried to figure the formations they were on and
correct for it, and they had a very accurate method.
M : In o t he r wo r d s , they co u l d p i n p o i n t our guns •
P: They could pinpoint it.
M: This infers, then, that Germans had invented the seismograph.
P: Yes, a portable one.
M: They were the inventors thereof.
P: Of a portable seismograph.
M: And they put it to use in a war.
P : Right.
M: And so your brother wrote you about this activity that was
going on and that you should get into. This was starting ... the
Germans were doing this.
P: Yes. They reversed the process . In the war they were trying
to compute the distance. Now they measured the distance and
computed the speed. So then they would tell what the material
was between the shock and the seismograph.
M: By the speed.
P: By the speed. They reversed the process. They just reversed
the process.
M: My goodness gracious. That is so complicated to me. Another
thing, that you had your great success-- locating salt domes.
P: Yes.
M: And the speed of the waves through a salt dome are different
from those going through clay.
P: Right.
M: So that if you found the waves that would indicate a salt
dome, that was fairly certain that you were going to find oil?
P: Not exactly.
M: No. There weren't. ..
P: It was pretty certain.
M : B u t t he r e wa s n ' t . . .
PETTY 13
P: Somewhere around it yo u'd find oil. Maybe on t op. Maybe the
top would be su lphur.
M: Yes.
P: Or it would be around the sides. But there was practically
always -- I don't know of many salt domes that don't have oil
around them somewhe r e .
M: That's what I was ... But it wasn't always just under the salt
dome.
P: No, sometimes on top of it.
M: On top of it. How far underground is a salt dome? When
you . ..
P: I imagine s omewhere, it depends on where you are, probably
20,000 feet, or something like that.
M: Good heavens.
P: The weight of the salt layer down there somewhere, and the
weight of the earth was so heavy, that it would plasticise the
salt and it would come up through a defect or a crack of some
sort. Sometimes it would go out and spill over and sometimes it
would be 500 feet from the surface and sometimes it would be
3, 000 feet from the surface, depending on how far up the salt
dome.
M:
p:
What did that indicate?
It was plastic. In other words, salt became plastic at ~hat
pressure.
M: Plastic! Did it? I never knew it. That's interesting.
P : Under all that pressure, it becomes plastic and ris es up.
That's what made the salt dome.
M: That's what made the dome.
P: Yes.
M: As they call it a dome. For goodness sake. When you started
out with your brother, you were using very crude instruments and
yet you were successful, weren't you? Using very crude
instruments at the beginning .
PETTY
P: No , they weren't crude.
M: Were n ' t they crude ?
P: They were so far ahead of the Germans .
M: Oh, were they?
14
p: That's why we kept it a secret. We didn't want anybody to
know. My brother was in the oil business and he had a company,
the Olive Petroleum Company . And he had two partners, Charles G.
Hooks, who was a very well known oil man from Kountze, and Dr.
Alf Roark, who was a doctor in Saratoga. Van had this oil
company and we figured that our instruments were so much better
than the German's -- so much more sensitive •..
M: Oh .
P: That we could do secret shooting. And we didn't want anybody
to know that we had a better seismog rap h . So we kept it a deep,
dark sec r et.
M : Sur e , I c an s e e why yo u wo u l d •
P: Now, •••
M: You wouldn't even call them primitive instruments then in the
beginning would you?
P: Oh no. They were the finest. ..
M: You started right out with sophisticated equipment.
P: In fact a sim ilar detector is on the Moon and Mars and has
been accepted as the standa rd seisomete r for space research.
M: Tell me, what is on Mars and the Moon?
P: To be correct about it, it is an electrostatic tran s ducer.
It is a little jigger that you set on the ground and in it are
two little polished stainless steel plates about the size of
silver dol Lars very close tog e ther. One of them s it s in the
frame which sits on the ground . The other one is f a s t ene d to the
frame by a coil spring and st a ys p r actically stationary as the
earth vibrates because it' s got that inertia . So when a wave
comes along, it rais es the bottom one and varies the distance
between the plates .
PETTY 1 5
M: For Pete's sake.
P: And there's a current, an electric current, that varies as a
straight line, with the distanc e between the plates. So it's
very sensitive.
M: My word. And did you invent that?
P: No, that's another story . When I was finishing at the
University of Texas and then went to the War in France and got
back •••
M:
p:
You were in the War?
Yes. World War I. I went over early in the game and I was
with the Americans when they took over the first sec tor on their
own ••• they'd been sandwiched in .• •
M: On their what?
P: Their first sector.
M: On the what?
P: On the front . Our troops had been sandwiched in with the
F r ench and/or the English.
M: How do I spel l that ?
P : T h e y ' d b e e n s a n d w i c h e d i n b e t we e n t h em , t he y wo u l d n ' t l e t ,
they didn't have enough confidence in our troops to let them have
a section of the front, where the fighting was, but they just had
them working with our troops that had been the r e longer .
M: You mean our troops?
P: Yeah, our troops hadn't had enough experience ••• so they
wouldn't let them take over a sect ion and fight their own
batt l e s.
M: Oh, I see. I didn't know that.
P: Yes, they'd mix them up . They'd put some with the Englishmen
and some with the Frenchmen or somebody e lse, and .• .
M: You were in one of those groups?
P: So I got over early with the first group that was going up to
take over a sector of their own .
M: But how do you spell that? Ohn?
PETTY 16
P: A sector of their own. 0 W N
M: Of their own. I see what you mean. So you got in by
yourself. I mean you were in • ••
P: Yes.
M: You came back.
P: Yeah.
P: And, one funny thing, I'll tell you, as I was (laughter) up
t o t he Fro n t , I wa s w i t h t he F i r s t D i v i s i o n ( t h i s t i e c l a s p i s a
shoulder patch of the First Division, it's quite an outfit) ...
M: First Division!
P: As I was getting up to where I was ordered to report. •. I was
walking for some reason, I don't know why, I guess it was the
only way to get there. . • anyway, there was a fell ow who let his
gun go off in camp. There was a lot of excitement. I asked
about it. The poor fellow was from New York; he'd never had a
rifle in his hand before; didn't know how to load one.
M: No training?
P: And he was going to the front lines to fight. About that
time, someone came running out with a crow bar t\h6 a great big
steel railroad rail bent in a triangle about six feet on a side,
hanging in a tree. He started beating the rail. And I says,
"What's that?" And a fellow close to me says, "That's a gas
alarm. Put on your gas mask. 11 I said, "I haven't got a gas
mask." He says, "Here, I'll give you one of mine." They all
c a r r i e d two , o n e En g l i s h m a n a n d o n e F r e n c h m a n • T h e y we r e j u s t
raw recruits up there.
M: Did you see a lot of fighting?
P: No • No t rea l l y. I neve r was in the fro n t l i n e s ex c e p t on c e
in a dugout. They put me in charge of an engineer camp, they
called it. It had two big magazines of explosive shells and
dynamite and lots of supplies that are used up daily. And then
mainly, the duck board, that they put in the bottom of the
trenches to walk on to keep the feet off the ground. They put me
•
PETTY 1 7
in charge of that because my feet had been frost bitten and I
couldn't walk very well.
M: Good n e s s •
P: It happened in England. When I got to France they examined
me and said, "You can't stay over here, you gotta go home." And
I said, "Why?" "Your feet have been frost bitten." And I said,
"I don't want to go home, I just got here." And the doctor said,
"Well, you gotta go home." I said, "Is that an order? Have I
got to do that? Or not?" "No, but you may not be able to walk
again the rest of your life."
M: Good Heavens.
P: I said, "Well, I'll take my chances on it."
M: You did!
P: So.
M: A lot of people would have jumped at the chance to go home.
How long were you over in Europe? During World War I?
P: I was over there three and a half months. And the first job
they gave me, they knew I couldn't walk •.•
M: What were you doing? Limping? How did you ••• ?
P: My feet and legs hurt something terrible. We had to report
to the First Division Headquarters at Longres. It was on a hill,
a half mile high, I mean a half mile up a steep grade. They had
a cog train going up. We had ridden two days and a night on a
freight train in a chaircar on an iron floor with no heat.
M: Is that how you froze your feet?
P : No , I go t t hem fro s t b i t t en i n Eng l and •
M: They were already frozen.
P: When we landed in England they had a train waiting to take us
to a rest camp near Ramsey. We rode all night, arriving early in
the morning. It was very cold. They had a tent to usLto sleep
in and gave us hay to sleep on. Johnny Eahart, Phil Tartt, Bill
Bright and another fellow and I took a long walk through the
English woods visiting a beautiful frozen lake. In the afternoon
PETTY 18
we visited Ramsey and drank tea and that night Johnny and I took
a four mile hike in the moonlight with s now on the ground. It
was most enjoyable as we co uld hear church bell s r inging in all
directions. Altogether we walked about 20 miles that day. We
were real cold all night a s we had only two blankets, one to
sleep on and one to cover with. I woke early, jump ed up and fell
flat on my face. My feet had been frost bitten and they hurt
s ome thing awful if I stood up.
M: Goodness.
P: So I had a pretty rough time.
M: I bet you did.
p : And so that's how that happened. The fi rst job they gave me
was to be in charge of the engineer train. That's a long wagon
train hauling ammunition and engineering equipment up to the
front. And it was, I gues s , a quarter of a mile long and the
roads we re frozen with about an inch and a half or two inches of
ice on top. They had men walking in the ditches with ropes tied
onto the wagons to keep them in the middle of the road.
M : What were these pull ed with ... tanks?
P: Huh ?
M: How were they pulled? What was the •.•
P: They were pulled by horse s or mules.
M: Really.
P: Yes.
M : In Wo r l d Wa r I • R e a l l y .
P: So they put me in charge of the enginee r train because they
knew I couldn't walk and they gave me a horse to ride, and the
h o r s e h a d f a l l en down t he day be f o r e and broke . . . he be l on g e d to
the dentist . .. the hor se fell th e day befor e fhe brok e the
dentist's l eg .
M: Oh no.
P: I neve r did like a hor se.
M: (laughter)
PETTY 20
P: So l had to get off of that hor s e and put my ga s ma s k on and
then run around and put a ga s mask on the horse, and when the gas
wa s gone, I had to get back on again .
M: You had to do it all over .. .
P: (laughte r) Boy, it was wild , it was somethin'.
M: How come you were there only three and one half months?
P: Well.
M: Did you get invalided home?
P: It was a funny thing. l went to First Officer's Training
Camp, May the 8 th, 1917, and at that time the Unive r sity would
give you your degree if you were going to graduate and would
volunteer . War was declar ed April the 8th, I b e lieve it was.
No, let's see ... well, anyway, if you would volunteer for
training camp, they would give you your diploma in absentia if
you had a "C" a ve rag e .
M: Without waiting.
P: Yeah . So . ..
END OF TAPE I
SIDE ONE, 45 MINUTES
PETTY 1 9
P: My brothers used to ••• we had this big home at #10 -lOth
Street on the river. There was a big bluff there and we had a
little old mustang pony. I never did want to ride him, but they
insisted so I got on, and then my brother slapped him on the hip
and made a "hurrah" and the horse took off, and it liked to have
s c a r e d me t o de a t h • bu t I hung on •
M: Did ya?
P: I never had any use for horseback riding.
M: I had the same experience. I feel for you. I know! I know
how you feel. But you had this •.. I didn't know they used mules
i n t he f i r s t Wo r l d Wa r t o p u l l • • •
P: They used horses. Horses, I guess they were. I'm sure they
were horses. They had this dentist's horse shod with sharp
spikes after the accident.
M: For the ice?
P: For the ice and I guess they had a ••• But anyway, it was
quite a big horse and I was a little bitty guy, my pack weighed
over a hundred pounds besides my rifle and pistol. The horse was
so big, I couldn't get on him. I couldn't even reach the
stirrups. So I'd have to get somebody to boost me up to get my
foot in the stirrup and hand me my rifle when I got in the
saddle.
M: Oh yeah. And you didn't like a horse to begin with.
(laughter)
P: No. Then we'd ride along and about every five, ten or
fifteen minutes a man would come riding by on a horse and throw
out a gas grenade. And they were for real.
M: Why?
P: To make us get used to the real thing before we got up to the
front.
M: For Heavens sake.
PETTY 21
TAPE I, SIDE 2
M: So, you got your ••.
P: I got my commission.
M: How soon did they send you overseas?
P: Here's how it happened. Immediately after we got our
commissions,we were sent to Camp Travis near Fort Sam Houston to
form the 90th Division. Soon as we got there draftees began to
arrive and we started in to train them to be a good fighting
force. None of us knew how long that would take but we figured
at least six months. All of the officers were anxious to get to
France as quickly as possible. One of the most eager was my old
friend, Mack Hodges. We were buddies in school together,
volunteered together, etc. He would say to me every few days,
"Scotty, I've written everybody that has any influence to tr y to
get me over there ahead of time." He says, "You're going to be
staying here ••• you won't be over there ••• you'll have to go with
t h i s o u t f i t • Yo u won 1 t be t h e r e f o r s i x m o n t h s • " An d I ' d s a y ,
"Well, I'll take my chances." One day, Mack and a fellow named
Coulter that I was bunking with came rushing into my room, stuck
out their hands and said, "Congratulations, Scotty." Both of
them. I said, "For what?" They said, "Read your orders." And
my orders were to report to Hoboken, New Jersey for extended
field service in France. So I got to go over early, that was in
November, 1917. The department's plans were to send about twelve
officers from each division to France to get first hand
experience in the front lines to see what it was all about.
M: You were sort of pioneers, weren't you?
P: Yes, we were. And then to go to an engineer school at
Gondrecourt.
M: Where?
p : G-0-N-D-R-E-C-0-U-R-T. They had a very fine military
engineering school there.
PETTY 22
M: Where was that? France?
P : In F r an c e . And t hen a f t e r we go t t h a t t r a i n i n g , t hey p l anne d
to send us back to the U.S. We didn't know this. Send us back
and send each officer to a different divi s ion to lecture to the
men about what it was like over there, so t hat they would have
the experience of somebody who had actually been in the fighting.
M: Oh really. Gee, that was a good assignment, wasn't it?
P : I t s u r e wa s .
M: Wow. That's how you were only over there for three and a
half months.
P: 'Course we didn't know this when we were at that engineering
s chao l.
M: Did you have to know French? Did you hav e to speak French to
take the course?
P: No, I picked up enough to get by.
M: Did you •••
P: But they had English teachers there. And rumor had it that
if you made good grades, you were going to be kept there as an
instructor. So, I'd been making "A"s up to that time •••
(laughter) but I made the worse grades after that •••
M: You did?
P : Y e a h , I d i d n 1 t wan t t o s t a y t he r e as an i n s t r u c t o r • I wan t e d
to get out in the fightin'.
M: You did.
P : At t he end o f s c h o o Z we go t or de r s to go i mm e d i a t e l y to
Brest. •• that's a port. •• and come back to the States . Four of
us decided we weren't about to go back to the State s without
seeing Paris .
M: (laughter) I don't blame you.
P: So we caught this train to Paris and just a s we got to the
depot there, the Gar e d'Este, ther e was a big explosion.
Ever y body wa s running up and looking at the hole. They thought
it was a bomb. So the next morning, the paper came out ••• an
PETTY 23
extra . • • and said that the Germans bombed Pari s from the air and
gave a story on the "dog-fight" they had •.• "Th ey' d sho t the
plane down that did it" and a l l tha t so rt of thing. They made it
a l l up • I t wa s n ' t an a i r r a i d . I t w a s a n e x p l o s i v e s h e l l f r o m
"Big Bertha", the long range gun .• •
M: "Big Be r t ha ".
P: • •• that could shoot 70 miles.
M: Yeah, I remember reading about that ••• Good night.
P: So, anyway, (laughter) that wa s be s ide the point. But I was
amuse d about them publi s hing this "extra" telling about the
"dog-fight". They made it all up.
M: Made it all up. They're sti ll do i ng it, aren't they ?
P : (laughter) We s p en t some of our time hiding from the
M • P • 1 s • • • i f t h e y c a u g h t u s t he r e • • • t h e y c h e c k u s • . • We s p en t
the day there .
M: In Paris?
P: In Paris.
M: Just the day.
P: Oh y eah, we had to go on to Bre s t.
M: But you did see Paris.
P : Sure did.
M: So you did see Paris •• • before it fell to the Germans .
P: We had a big time.
M: That wa s good. Well, after you got back, did you have to .••
then did they use you as an instructor?
P : Yes , they did.
M: You had to do that. Uh-huh. To acquaint the troops with
w h a t i t was l i k e a t t he f ron t •
P: I lectured to diff e r ent o rganizations. And then they sent
me, thi s is a real cute sto r y, I just have to tell yo u th i s .
They sent me to Camp Humphreys in Virginia.
M: Yes .
PETTY 24
P: They were gonna establish a target range and they picked the
biggest forest of black walnut trees, which are extremely
valuable. They were going to cut them all down and establish
this target range. Just the way the Army does things. But to
get there they would have to teach them how to build a bridge by
cutting down trees and using the logs.
M: Oh, dear.
P: Anyway, I was at a farm house and awfully nice people. I
can't remember their names right now, but it was a nice two story
farm house. They had a canteen, so to speak, where soldiers
could buy candy and tobacco and cigarettes, such as that. And
there were two pretty ••• one awfully pretty girl there and one
not so pretty.
M: (laughter)
P: Anyway, they were girls. And one of them was a beauty. I
was crazy about her. Corresponded with her for years.
M: Really. This was before you saw Edwina?
P : Th a t 1 s a f t e r t h a t , b u t I n e v e r we n t w i t h a g i r l i n my l i f e
that I didn't tell them ahead of time that, "Let's have dates
together, but I'm going to marry Edwina Harris."
M: Oh, you were already committed.
P: (laughter) Not engaged. We were at this little canteen,
a f t e r d i nne r , I 1 d he l p w i L h t he can t e en a r o u n d t he p lace wh i l e
t he o t he r s we r e gone and so f o r t h ; no t h in 1 e l s e to do • And t he r e
was a Major there. And there was a couch there and two chairs
and I guess it had been their living room probably. Anyway, this
Major would come in and he'd lay on his back on the floor and
take off the girls' shoes and tickle their feet so he could look
up under their dresses.
M: Good Heavens.
P: And they hated him like poison.
M: Take off girls' shoes?
P: And then look up their dresses.
PETTY 25
M: How awful.
P: That's what I thought. And they just hated the guy's guts.
M: Well, of course.
P: So every chance they got, they'd come over and sit by me, if
somebody came in to buy something and (laughter) this Major said
to me one day, "Petty, you've been in my hair for over a month
and by God , I 'm go i n g to g e t r i d o f yo u. "
M: My goodness.
P: And he said, "How would you like to go to S iberia?" That was
the worst place he could think of. And I sez, "I 'd love i t . 11
"And why?" he says. And I says, "Well, I always wanted to go to
Siberia, and I never got to go there, and I think it would be
ducky . " "By God, you're going," he says, "I've got a man in
Washington that's got a lot of influence and he'll send anybody
anywhere I ask him to."
M: Was he a Major?
P: He was a Major. He had some connection in Wash i ngton . So he
says, "You'll get your orders to sta r t fo r Siberia day after
tomorrow. "
M: Wa s he kidding?
P : No , he was s e r i o u s • So two days l a t e r I go t my o r de r s t o
proceed to Camp Devens, Massachusettes.
M: Devon?
P: D E V E N S. To train troops and take them to Siberia.
M: He really meant it . (laughter)
P: Oh, he did. (laughter)
M: I don't believe it. Oh! What happened? Did you do it?
P: Well, I was there training troops, Yes . They put me in
charge as an Acting Captain and I had 250 railroad engineers .
They were building railroads in Siberia and they figured the
engineers would have to fight. There was one thing that happened
I'll never fo r get. The r e's a piece of music call ed the "Wabash
Cannonball" and I love it to this day, and if you have 250
PETTY 26
railroad enginee rs marching, singing at the top of their voices
the "Wabash Cannonball", it's quite an experience.
M: I ' l l be t .
P: And I sti ll love that piece.
M: I be t you do .
It's one of my favorite pieces.
P: Before we got to go the Armistice was signed on November 11th
and Peace was declared.
M: They really would have sent you to Siberia.
P: Oh, yes. And I really wanted to go.
M: Did you r~lly want to go?
(laughter)
P: Oh, I was crazy to go to that place. Anything for excitement.
Always liked excitement.
M: Well, su re, you were young.
P: Yeah.
M: Footloose.
P : And I ' d be e n t o F r a n c e a n d I ' d had my e x p e r i en c e i n t he Wa r
there.
M: Sure.
P : An d t h e n e x t p l a c e I wan t e d t o go wa s S i be r i a • I d i d n ' t g e t
to go then.
M: Just because he was angry. I don't like that very well.
(laughter)
P: (laughter) I thought you'd enjoy that story .
M: That's wonderful.
P: I've used up all our time here, but that's •..
M: I wrote down some ques tion s when I was reading this book
(Seismic Reflections). Does a gas ... When you have a gas seep,
does that indicate the presence of oil?
P: It sure does.
M: It do es .
P: Yes, unless it's methane gas, which doesn't.
M: Methane doesn 't .
PETTY 27
p: No. It burns with a differ ent flame. So yo u can tell the
difference.
M: Because, at one point you we re in a swamp somewhere, you
found a gas .••
P: My brother found a gas seep. Yeah.
M: And I wondered at the time, does that always happen . And
then, talking about seismic waves, and there are various names of
different kinds of waves, is it anything like an X-Ray?
P: No.
M: Nothing like an X-Ray.
P: If you throw a rock in a pond of water the waves go out.
When they hit the other bank they come back showing the shape of
that bank and if there is a big rock there or a point they come
back shaped like that.
M: It does? I've never noticed that.
P: Yes .
M: It's as simple as that .
P: And that is what they call a "Rayleigh" wave.
M: Rayleigh. You haven't got an index in this book, have you?
No . but somewhe r e you talk about al l the different kinds of
waves.
P : Yes , t he r e are a l l k i n d s o f waves •
M: In here that puzzled me a good bit . Another thing that I
wanted to ask •• •
P: Before we go any further, let me tell you this . We invented
a method of finding salt domes without knowing the distance or
anything else . Dabney and I knew that these waves follow the
surface. The y don't dip down in, they just follow the surface .
Other waves just go straight down and so forth . So we figured
out if ther e was a salt dome sticking up and these waves were
going along the surface, the dome would interrupt them.
M: Oh, sure.
PETTY 28
P: So we did fan shooting . We'd put a shot here and shoot a lot
of difference lines from the same point and if all of those
"Rayleigh" patterns were alike there was nothing there, but if
some were deformed there must have been something there to deform
them.
M : I n o t h e r wo r d s , t he c en t e r on e s a r e go i n g t o be t he one s t h a t
show.
P: The lines that cross over a dome will be deformed.
M: It's going to pinpoint the dome.
P: Yeah. Uh-huh .
M: I see.
P: We didn't need any measurements of any kind.
M: Just •..
p : We just wanted the lines the same length. In fact, that
wasn't even necessary.
never made a mistake.
So we all went about our work and we
M: You didn't.
P: No, not on salt domes.
that cross the dome. You can
the dome exactly.
They always interrupted the patterns
then shoot cross lines and locate
M: You said at one point that you were experimenting on that
when you were in that very dangerous place to find out about
sulphur. How did you come out with that? Could you measure
through a sulphur dome? Did the sulphur dome work like the salt
dome?
P: Neither one of them worked like we thought they were working.
M: Didn't they?
P: No . The Germans were using a new method of mining sulphur by
pumping steam down into the sulphur which would melt it and then
liquid sulphur would flow back to the surface through another
pipe close by. Up until that time sulphur was mined by sending
men down to dig it out. The men couldn't leave the plant; they
couldn't talk to anybody. They couldn't tip anybody what they
PETTY 29
were doing. [ t was a gua rded secret. So they had this road
which was a m i l e long> I think from the main highway up to this
/
mine . And they had gu ards; they guarded that road . The gua rd
would patrol i t a l l night long . We wat c hed him in th e day time .
Got to see him and sneaked up early in the evening and then again
after dark. He wa s in a v e ry powerful car with no top and on the
left hand side he had a s cabbard wi th a rifle; and on his r ight
hand side, he had a sc abbard with a s hot gun and he had two big
p i s t o l s on h i m . He d r o v e t he road e v e r y hour . He rna de one t r i p
at two o'clock in the morning so we decided we would sta rt our
work right after that . Anybody that the y caught between the main
road and that sulphur min e , they killed 'em .. .
M: Just like that ! Was that in Germany?
P : No . No , t h i s wa s r i g h t he r e i n H o s k i n s M o u n d i n T e x a s , w h e n
we we re surveying the p l ace .
M: Oh, that 's why it was so dangerous. I didn't understand
that.
P : The night before we planned to do our work we prac ticed in
the dark near camp, ca r efully rehearsing every movement and
t i m i n g t h e m • We wo r e b l a c k c l o t h i n g , b l a c k g l o v e s and p u t a
black hood over our fla s h l ight. We ran that old Model T Ford so
s low you could barely hear it. We drove a quarter of a mil e by
speedometer and then we turned it around and we parke d it in the
middle of the r oad. We figured they couldn't hear that Mo del T.
Then we got out and dug an auger hole 20 feet deep and put a half
a pound of d ynamit e in it. I think we should have . .. maybe it
was one pound. Shouldn't make any noise at all, that deep. We
didn't think it would.
M: How deep did you go down.
P: Twenty feet. Before that, though, in the daytime we had
st art ed at the cross roads and we figured we'd have to have a
hide out, if we were going to do this . So we d r ove about 200
ya rd s down the road to some good bushes. And we were careful to
PETTY 30
turn out, we put a little stick in the road we could recognize,
looked innocent enough. And we turned out back of these bushes
where the guard couldn't see us if he went by. So then we went
back that night and we made that shot, and in s tantly all the
flood lights in that place came on and the guard within, I guess,
not over 10 seconds, turned his headlights on and started out in
his big, powerful car. So we grabbed these instruments and threw
1 em i n t he c a r . I j ump e d i n the f ron t sea t • I t had be en r a i n i n g
and it was muddy. This was a gravel road; just a narrow thing;
and if you got off you were stuck. We had to run fast so I kept
the throttle wide open on that Model T. I never drove a Model T
faster in my life. We figured out we could beat the guard to the
cross road. But, boy, he was gaining on us . Dabney would look
back and would say, "Getting pretty c lose." I cou ldn't look back.
So just before we got to the c ro ss roads, I turned the light s off.
Dabney says, "cut 'em" so he couldn't see which way we turned.
So we turned to the right, ran up to that st ick, turned off back
in tho se bushes.
M: That's the place you had marked.
P: Yeah. And we hid there and cut the motor off. We were
just. •. our hearts we re in our mouths afraid he might catch us.
So he came tearing down and stopped at the cross roads and looked
each way ; couldn't see which way we went. So he took the right
wa y ; t o o k o u r way • He t h o ugh t h e w a s g o i n g t o c a t c h us . So h e
drove about 60 miles per hour, ju s t as fast as he could drive,
for a few miles and gave up. Then came tearing back and he went
the other way two or three miles and gave that up. Then came
back; went on back to the plant.
M: Be t he was mad.
P: We kn ew he'd come back again so we didn't do a thing.
M: You jus t st ayed right there.
PETTY 31
P : H e c am e b a c k a g a i n . D i d t he s am e t h i n g a g a i n . Wen t o n b a c k .
And th en when he was back there , we cranked up our c ar in the
dark.
M: Was thi s a crank car?
P: No, it had a self starter. And we r an very s low so he
couldn 1 t hear us . Got on back, and when the road made a big turn
and we got fa r enough so he couldn 1 t see us, we really stepped on
i t .
M: Where were you going back to?
P: Back to the camp.
M : Where was that? What part of Teras?
P: That was in Brazoria County. I t was the same camp that we
had been using a little hous e to stay in the r e .
M: Was it worth all the scare and the agony? Did you find out
what you wanted to find out ?
P: We thought we did and we were wrong .
M: You ' ve had q u ite a life!
you've done? You should.
Do you feel r eal good about wh a t
P: I do. Yes. 1 1m ashamed of what I did at that sulphur mine .
Because with a wife at home, I shouldn 1 t have done that.
M:
p:
You mean it was dangerous .
Yeah. It was real dangerous.
M: It rea l l y was. But you were young.
P: We were ten second s ahead of that guy; twenty seconds at
most.
M: You've been ve ry successful. You have a very inventive mind.
I should say on the tape that in the back of this book, there is
a li s t of all your invention s ; United States Patent Office.
amazing what you have done .
P: Just two inventions in the book, chosen from among many .
It Is
M : We l l , t hey 1 r e a l l d o w n i n h e r e .
Vibrations"
"In s trument for Detecting
PETTY 32
P: That's one we never used . Didn't have to. After this other
one here. This one here is the one that has found more oil
fields than any other instrument ever invented.
M: Really? "Seismic Apparatus and Method. Original filed March
14, 1940 1'. It's on page 57 in case anybody can understand that.
I can't . (looking at drawing). But it's a remarkable story of a
very remarkable man. I want to ask you now, since you have . ..
somewhere along in your life you have found a philosophy which
deals with helping people.
P: That 's right.
M: Not only pe r sonal things like this prayer "blitz" for Pat
Maguire but, for instance, you underwrote the publishing of the
book Pleasant Hill which is a lovely book . And that produced a
whole show at the Institute of Texan Cultures.
I cut an article out recently from the RECORDER TIMES that
says you helped to underwrite THE PEOPLES ARCHITECTURE, Texas
Courthouses, Jails and Municipal Buildings . That's a subject
that interests me greatly .
P: They're going to present me an award today.
M: Are you going to get one of those today? (Conservation
Society)
P: I was supposed to but I told them I couldn't make it; I
wanted to talk to you .
M: But they'll give you the award anyway.
P: I told them just ke ep the award and I'll pick it up later.
M: How nice of you to do this!
Then there's something also I wanted to ask you about before
we go into this philosophy of yours. I clipped this out the
first part of this month and it s ay s , "Scienti s ts u s ing
earthquake waves to chart the earth's interior, in much th e s ame
manner as the brain is scanned by computer-assisted tomography,
have identified deep patterns that go a long way toward
PETTY 33
explaining the dynamic s of continental drift, earthquakes and
volcanic eruptions. 11 Did you r ead that?
P: Yes.
M: Do you know about that? I sn't that fascinating?
P: It is.
M: You try to imagine what it looks like? 'Course you know
pretty much what it looks like down there because you have had so
many experiences.
P: Yeah. Now there are two methods of working. One is your
refraction method, which goe s down deep and comes back up a long
ways away.
M: Oh, I wanted to a s k you about that. .. the difference between
refraction and reflection.
P: The reflection method is just like looking in a mirror. You
shoot a shot here and the waves go down and every time they hit a
change in density of the formations, they send a little wave
back.
M: Oh, it does.
P: Yes.
M: It sends more than one wave then.
P : Yes, as they go through each layer, it sends another wave
back.
M : I t s ends a wa v e b a c k •
P: And they can go down, just as deep as they want to go,
depending how much dynamite you us e.
M: Th a t ' s r e f l e c t i on s ?
P: That's reflections.
M: And it keeps on sending back?
P: Yes.
M: The refraction, what doe s that do now? How does tha t go?
P: That goes down deep and some of i t is reflected back up.
M: But that sends onl y on e . That gives you only one wave e h ?
PETTY 34
P: Yes, that gives you ... they've got ... they vibrate in
different directions. One goes longitudinally and at the same
time they've got a complex pattern there. They've got a lot of
waves and all sorts of waves.
M: In other words, it's very complex.
P : Yeah , they a r e co mp l ex •
M: Sounds to me that the reflection is the simpler one.
P: You betcha! We tried that in those days, as I say in there
we almost blew ourselves up.
M: (laughter) You are a survivor. Aren't you. (laughter)
P: ( laughter)
M: You really are. Tell me, do you want to talk a little bit
about your religious feelings, your philosophy?
P: Sure.
M: You have, for
believe in something.
i t is ?
instance,
What is
your face has a serenity. You
it? Do you want to tell me what
P: Well, I just want to help people through prayer.
M: With prayer. Through prayer.
P: Yeah.
M: Are you influenced •••
P: And that's all I've done for the last three months, at least.
I spend all my time ••• I used to call them "Pra)'er Blitz" ••• I
had never heard of Prayer Chain letters before.
M: Oh, really.
P: Been trying to get people out of their problems. Right now,
this person Betty Glinn who I was going to take out to lunch
today has a stepfather, I guess it is, here in the hospital, Gus
Dittmar, and I want to start another prayer chain letter for him
through Post 10 of the American Legion. That's the Businessmen's
Post.
M: Post 10?
PETTY 35
p : Post Number 10. Th e Businessmen's Post of the American
Legion .
M: Yeah, I got that, but you put the prayer ...
P: I put on a prayer chain.
M: Where?
P : Sent a letter to each member.
M: Of that Post. I see what you mean.
P: And they all wrote back and thanked me and they all said they
were praying for Gus. None of them said anything about keeping
the prayer chain going, just that they would pray themselves.
Well, that's only 250 people. In a prayer chain, tho s e 250
should ask some friends to pray for Gus and ask tho se friends to
a s k their friends to pray and in no time at all you have
theoretically a half a million people praying. They didn't do
t h a t • And I t o l d h e r "Yo u s e e , Be t t y , Gus won ' t g e t o u t o f t h i s
because they did not do what I asked them to do. So I'm going to
ask them to do that now."
M : To do i t o v e r • We l l , a r e yo u • • • ?
P : We l l , I gave t he Po s t $ 1 5 0 0 •
M: You pay them?
P: Yeah.
M: The Po s t. The people out there to do it.
P: I gave that to the Po s t to do something with it, whatever
they want to do with it; because it is quite a courtes y to let me
write them all and so forth.
M: Yes, it certainly is. Are you influenced by Ernest Holmes?
"Power of Positive Thinking"? Not Ernest Holmes, he i s the
"S c ien ce of Mind". Who wrote the "Power of Positive Thinking"?
What's his name?
P : I know, Norman Vicent Peale.
M: Are you influen ced by that:
P : I'm interested in it.
M: I noticed you use "Guideposts" and that's his publi cation.
PETTY 36
P: Yeah, that's right. Oh, I take "Guideposts" all the time.
M: Well, did "Guideposts" influence you. into this way of
thinking? Do you think? Or did you. have •..
P: Yes, I'll tell you what happened. I was allergic to most
foods.
M: Oh.
P: I couldn' t eat anything but ... for eight days ..• all I cou ld
eat. .. I had a very terrifying experience and practically
everything that I ate during that time I got allergic to.
M: Strange.
P: So I prayed for seven months for God to relieve me of that
allergy. For eight days, the last eight days all I had to eat
was half a cup of oatmeal, cream of wheat, rice, and grits, and
some dates, three times a day.
M: And some dates? Did you say dates?
P: Yeah, I wasn't allergic to those things. But I knew if I
kept on eating them I'd become allergic to them and I'd be blown
up. So I says to the Man Upstairs one night, just before I went
to bed, I says, "Lord, I've been praying to you for seven months
to cure my allergy, would you tell me why?" And I went to bed.
M: Oh.
P: Next morning when I got up Martha, our maid, brought us up
our breakfast. We've got two easy chairs in our bedroom with a
coffee table between them with magazine s on it, and among other
things a pretty little yellow green dish, and a four inch p lastic
cube, with our grandchildren's pictures on it, you know how they
have those plastic cubes.
M: Yes.
P: When we got up fo r breakfast that morning, th e dish was
setting right in front of me, where she would usually set the
food and on that dish was this plastic cube. They weren't there
the night before, and on top of the plas ti c cu.be, neatly
balanced, was the June, 1980 issue of "Guideposts".
PETTY 37
M: Was what?
P: Was that issue of "Guideposts".
M: Oh!
P: June, 1980, l et me see, I've got one up here.
END OF TAPE 1
SIDE 2 (B) A.{~YI'\\YI\,(~e. 5
PETTY
BEGINNING OF TAPE II
SIDE 1 (A)
P: This one in front of me.
M: The "Guidepost" of what year was it?
P : Th i s one he r e .
M : June , 1 9 8 0 •
P: And on top
balanced, on top
All right.
of the plastic cube was one of those,
of it, right in front of me.
M: And it wasn't there before?
P: No . So •••
M: My goodness!
38
neatly
P : Ed w i n a a s ked w h a t t h a t was and I sa i d , 11 I t was the an s we r to
a prayer I said last night. The prayer I made last night. " So
it told me there what to do. If you want a miracle ••. if you
tell people the miracle is going to happen befor e it happens,
then it will happen. And I says to myself, "Wel l, if it worked
for Cheryl , it will work for me." So I told Scott and his fam i ly
and Edwina "I'm going to take you all to the Argyle and we're
going to all have dinner together. 11 But the Argyle was closed
for two weeks, so we set tl ed for Arthur's out on Main Avenue. I
ordered first an< Old Fashioned, which was my favorite drink and
then I ordered Seafood Gumbo and th e~ I ordered Fried Oysters .
And Scott said, "Daddy, you can't have that." And I said, "Why?"
"You'll be in the hospital in the morning."
M: Oh!
P: And, I says, "No I wouldn't." And he says, "You just can't
do it, I'm not going to let them bring it to you." And I said,
"O.K. I'll take the Gumbo ." And then for dessert I wanted some
ice c r eam with Kahlua poured over it. "Oh no, I could not have
ice cream . " I was supposed to be allergic to everything with
milk. I sa id, "S cott , that's not going to hurt me . " Well, he
sa i d , "Yo u j us t can ' t do t h a t . " And I says , "A l l r i g h t , I won ' t . "
PETTY 39
And, of course. just as soon as I got home I had myself a big
bowl of ice cream with Kahlua. (laughter)
M: Good for you!
P: (laughter) And from then on I could eat anything I wanted
without having allergies, even things I had been allergic to for
over thirty years.
M: From then on.
P: From then on. Except, I was allergic to alcohol. For this
reason: during my prayers, I always ask the Good Lord not to let
me have any accidents, serious accidents. If I'm not going to
have any serious accidents, then I shouldn't be driving after
d r i n k i n g a l co h o l . And s o t h a t ' s ex p l a i n a b l e .
M: Really. And you really are allergic to alcohol.
P: Oh, yes. I can't touch a drink.
M: That's no problem to give up, is it?
P: Oh no.
M: That's an amazing story. That's a reall y amazing story.
P : But, I've had lots of things happen. For example ••.
M: Isn't that wonderful.
P: About two months ago, I went to my denti st , Dr. Frank Douglas
(KNOCK ON THE DOOR)
P: Come in.
G : He r e we go •
Thank you.
It has the "Guidepost" in it also.
P: This is something that will interest you . You can see that
later.
M: Thank you, that's lovely.
P: For example , I went .•. well, I don't knowhowmanymiracles
I've had.
M: Have you really?
P : One a f t e r an o t he r . a f t e r an o t he r .
M: Isn't that wonderful.
PETTY 40
P: I went to Dr. Douglas, and there was something I wanted to
ask him and I forgot, when he got through with my teeth, and I
was halfway down the hall, I said, "Oh, I know, I forgot to ask
the doctor to do this." So I went back there and I said, "Dr.
Douglas, I wish you'd measure my lips."
M: Oh. ( laughter)
P : (laughter) "I wish you'd measure my lips." (laughter) Ha.
"Well, I wish you'd measure my lips." And he says, "What do you
want me to measure your lips for?" And I says, "Well, I'm going
to ask the Man Upstairs • . . I have never been able to close my
mouth completely ••• my teeth were a little bit protruding, and at
night my mouth gets so dry. I keep this little bottle of corn
oil (Mazola) and when I wake up I take a little sip of that."
M: Real l y?
P: And I said, "I'm tired of that business , so I asked the Man
Upstairs to make my lips grow longer and cover my teeth." And he
had never heard of that before.
M: I bet he thought you were crazy. (laughter)
P: (laughter) This nurse there thought I had lost my mind, I
g u e s s • "We l l , I ' l l do i t f o r you • 11 So he v e r y c a r e f u l l y
measured my upper lip from my nose to between my lips and then he
measured from there to the bottom of my chin.
M: He did it all. (laughter)
P: So, I went back to see him about a month later and he
remea sured them and they had grown 13 millimeters, a little over
a quarter of an inch longer.
M: You're kidding. A miracle!
P : B u t b e f o r e we we r e done , I s a i d , "L o o k , M r s . K un k e l , I c a l l e d
back and I said, 'You haven't given me the whol e deal."'. I was
interested in knowing whether my upper lip was growin' down or my
lower lip was growin' up, or what wa s going on. Curiosity. So
h e g a v e i t t o me , an d a t t h a t t i me t he y had g r own o v e r a q u a r t e r
PETTY 41
of an inch . • • there wa s a little more of the lower lip than the
upper lip.
M: But between them they had •••
p: One-quarter of an inch, plus. So I have all kinds of lips
now.
M: You sure can shut them up. And you had gone all your life
not being able to close your lips.
P : Yeah.
M: That's astonishing, isn't it.
P: It is.
M: And that sort of thing is happening to you all the time?
P: All the time. Yeah.
M : I s n ' t i t won de r f u l ?
P: I was a ...
M: It gives you a great sense of ease and peace, doesn't it?
P : It does • Next I was d i z z y. So d i z z y for four or f i v e yea r s •
I ' d go f i s h i n g down a t t he ranch and i f I s too d c l o s e t o t he
wa t e r I ' d fa l l in •
M: Mercy.
P: So I'd have to get way back and I didn't like that having to
get way back to cast.
M: No.
P: So finally, I went to Sam Capers, an Episcopal preacher. I'm
a Baptist, but I go to that church.
M: (laughter) I read that before.
P: (laughter) And I said, "Sam, I'm dizzy all the time, just
like I'm drunk. I wish you 1 d do something about it." He said,
"Sure we'll pray for you." So he held my hand and prayed and
Eleanor says, "Scotty, have you been to your doctor?" I says,
"No , I haven ' t • " "We l l , " she says , " You ' r e supposed to t r y
medicine and everything befor e you ask for healing of that sort."
M: Who said this?
P: Eleanor, his wife.
PETTY 42
M: Mrs. Capers.
P: "Well," I says, "I guess you're right Eleanor . "
M: You hadn't been to the doctor?
P: I hadn't been to the doctor. So I called my Dr. Bondurant
and he said, "Sure, I'll give you something. rr So he sent me out
some Benedryl, and that makes you sleepy.
M: That's a tranquilizer.
P : T r an q u i l i z e r . And I says • • • I t o o k t h a t and I wa s s l e e p y • • •
so I says, rrooc, that don't do me any good. That makes me too
sleepy." "Well,rr he says, rri'll send something else." He sent
something else.
M: Ah. Gee.
P : rr I t i s n ' t do i n g a n y go o d • u "We l l , I ' l l send s om e t h i n g a l s o ,
and if that doesn't do any good, that's all there is to it.rr So
t h a t d i d n ' t do any go o d • So , he says , "The r e ' s no t h i n g I can do
for you.rr So, he says, "Why don't you go see a doctor?" "Maybe
there is something he can do." I says, "That's a good idea. rr
So , I says "Who do I go s e e ? We l l , he s a i d , 1 I ' l l f i n d o u t ' • "
So he told me to go to Dr. Sam Neeley.
M: This is your regular doctor telling you to go to another
doctor?
P: Yeah. So he asked me a lot of questions and he had me take a
brain scan, and then he had another kind of a scan where they
attached 32 little electrodes to your head and she used real
glue, and I like to have never gotten that glue off of my head.
M: Yeah.
P : An d I s a y s , "Wh a t a r e yo u us i n g ? I t s me l l s l i k e a c e t one • '1
She says, "It is." My goodness, I couldn't comb my hair, it was
all glued together. So I washed my whole head in acetone for
about 20 minutes to get it out. Well anyway, I went back a
s e con d t i me and he says , 11M r . P e t t y , t he r e 1 s no t h in g we can do
for you."
M: Oh.
PETTY 43
P: My hearing was injured. I was coach of the Rifle Team that
we had at the University of Texas, 1913-14-15 and 16, and I used
to shoot that Government Automatic Pistol. It makes an awful
blast. And my ears would hurt so I couldn't sleep all night.
I'd just be awake in pain. So that's what ruined my hearing.
That's where I got the injured hearing. That's why I've got this
darn hearing aid.
M: It did.
P: He says, "The blast that ruined your hearing, also ruined
your sense of balance, there's a little jigger on there and it
destroys it."
M: I've heard of that.
P: And it doesn't show up until you get older, maybe 60 years
o l d. We l l , I was 8 8 or 8 9 t hen • "And t he r e i s no t h i n g you can
do a b o u t i t , you ' l l h a v e to l i v e w i t h i t the res t of your l i f e . "
And I sa i d to my s e l f , "I ' m no t go i n g t o do t h a t • 11 So I made a
d a t e w i t h Sam C a p e r s . I c o u l d n ' t s e e h i m f o r two o r t h r e e d a y s
and I said, "Sam, I'm coming back to you and I want you to say
that prayer for my dizzines s . Because this is dangerous, I've
been accused of being drunk once." Now when I was coming back
from the ranch, a cop pulled me over. My son had been d riving in
for an hour and a half and I said, " Scott, l et me take the wheel."
So I was driving at the whe~l like a drunk person and pretty soon
here the cop came with his light s a blinking. "You're drunk."
And I says, "No , I'm not drunk." And Scott says, "No Cop, Daddy
was ••• we had a Mexican meal down here ••• and he just got in and
he hadn't gotten adjusted yet. He's all right." Smelled my
breath. No I didn't have any breath on . Didn't know about the
dope .
M: Go o d n i g h t .
P: "So, all right." "I'm going to follow you half-mile or so . "
He didn't tell me that, but hi s lights were right in back of me
and I never drove any more careful than I drove in my whol e lif e .
PETTY 44
M: ( laught e r) I bet you did.
P : So t he n I'd b e o n Mc Cullough , people always to oting me
because I'm wobbling. So I'd hav e be e n pi c k e d up fo r drunk
d riving, es pecially af te r the new law came in . So I called Dr.
Nee l ey and I said, "Doc." His secretary answered the phon e . She
s a ys , "What do you want, Mr . P e tty?" And I says, "I want an
examination by Dr. Neeley." "What kind of an examination ? " "For
dizziness," I said. "We ll , Mr. Petty, you we r e ju s t h e r e less
than a week ago . Why ar e you going to see him again?" "Just
' c a u s e I wan t to . " "Wh a t make s you want to ? " "We l l , " I says ,
"I a sked the Man Up s tairs to cur e my dizzine ss ." And she just
lau g h ed and said, "We ll, good luc k!" So I went up to s e e Dr.
Neeley and he checked me and I was ju s t a s s ob e r as a church
mo u se . So that's on e .
M: And it was all gon e .
P: All gone.
M : How long did that take? Was that quick too?
P : Yeah. Uh-huh.
M: Did you do the praying or did Sam Capers?
P : Sam Capers did the praying. I'm allergic. I had dead nerves
in my throat. Had 'em for years. Almost choked to death twice.
It' s a miracle I didn't. The food would go just so far and
w o u l d n ' t g o a n y f u r t h e r , n o t h i n g t o b r i n g i t d own . I h a d a
t e rrible cough and I couldn't s ay anymore than two or three words
u n t i l I ' d s t a r t c o ugh i n g a n d I c o u l d n ' t t a l k an d t h en t h a t wen t
away and I ' d s t a r t t o t a l k a g a i n , t he same t h i n g , I c o u I d n 1 t t a l k •
I onc e had nodules on my vocal cords and I was on voice rest for
two months. And I was running the whole company and I'd be up at
f our o 'clock in the morning telling the crew wh e r e to go and go
shoo t, lat e at night getti ng t he r e port s ba c k, a n d I wo r e on e of
these tel ephone thin gs that pe o pl e do and I wa s on the phone all
da y . I had to go on voice r es t for two months .
M: Voi ce r es t ?
PETTY 45
P: Yes , vo i c e res t • I didn't say a word. l wrote everything.
M: Real l y!
P: And then they decided .•• they thought they might be malignant
and I wen t to Ph i l ad e l ph i a and saw 0 r • C l e r f • And h e s a i d , "No ,
they're all gone . " Anyway, I thought "Well , I got my vocal
cords." So I went to a doctor here in town and I says, "Doc , I
think maybe I've got nodules on my vocal cords." He looked and
he says, "No, they're all right ." They'r e loose. They're just
stretched. Like fiddle strings that are loose. So I says,
"We l l • • • " so I c a l l e d B i l l B o n d u r an t b a c k , a n d I s a y s , "B i l l ,
you know anybody that can take a picture of your vocal cords?"
And he says, "Hell, I didn't know anybody could do that." And I
s a y s , "Yeah , t he y can t a k e p i c t u r e s of t hem, and we l l , they t e l l
me I'v e got loose vocal cords. I want a b efo re and after
p i c t u r e . l wan t a ' be f o r e ' a s p ro o f , and then I 'm go in g to a s k
the Man Ups t a i r s to cure them and then I wan t an ' a f t e r ' • " So he
said, "Well, I'll find out who will take a picture." So he
called me right back and told me that Dr. George Gates, out at
the Medical Cente r, (a res earch man), could photograph them . So
I wen t o u t , "Do c , I wan t yo u • • • "
M: Fo r goodness sake.
P: "to photograph my vocal co rd s ." And he says, "Why?" And I
says " ' cause they ' r e l o o s e . " "We l l , " he says , "L e t ' s t a k e a l o o k
a t t hem f i r s t • " So h e p u t me i n a c h a i r and l o o ked down my
throat and he said, "Well , they're tight as fiddle strings . 11 And
I says, "Well, I can't talk •.• like all this coughing." And he
says •• •
M: Had you already prayed?
P: No, I hadn't don e that because I thought the vocal cord s were
s t r e t c he d • "We l l , M r . P e t t y , '' he s a y s , " t he r e ' s no t h i n g I c a n do
about that." He says, "Th ey 're not loose." "They' r e tight. 11
"But, let's find out what the trouble is. " So he began to ask
q u e s t i on s a n d I s a i d , "No , No , No . " So he was k i n d o f g i v en out
PETTY 46
a n d f i n a l l y he s a i d , "0 i d you e v e r h a v e any t r o u b l e s wa l l ow i n g ? "
And I said, "Yes."
M: Sure. You did.
P: I had dead nerves in my throat as long as I can remember.
And he says , "We l l , there ' s no t h in g t h a t can be done a bout t h a t •
And I says, "Yeah, there is too." And he says, "What?" "Well,"
I says, "There's the Man Upstairs." He says, "I'll buy that. You
have an idea. A lot of times it happens ••• people come in
here • •.
M: Really?
P: "But in case it doesn't happen, I'm going to write you a
prescription to the doctor, the X-Ray man, who's the best in his
line and he feeds you barium to see if it stops!
M: For goodness sake.
P : So , I says , "We l l , I know they ' r e dead • " He sa i d , "We l l ,
take this prescription just in case." So I went on home and
called Tom over at the Christ Episcopal Church, who's one of my
favorite ministers.
M: Who was it?
P: Mr. Tom Tomlin. He's assistant pastor over there. Awfully
nice {ella. So I says (it was just about noon) "Tom, could I run
over and see you for just a few minutes?" It was about 11:30 and
he says, "No, Scott. There's something going on over here, a
wedding or something, and everything's torn up. I'm going home,
about to leave in a few minutes, and I almost have to pass your
place to go, you just wait there. I'll see you there." I says,
"Fine." So he came and says, "What's your problem?" "Well, I've
got these dead nerves in my throat. I want you to ask the Man
Upstairs to cure them." So he was holding my hand and he prayed
for me, and I says, "Well, come on in and have some lunch with
us." "No," he says. His wife, I can't remember her name, was
waiting for him. "I'll go ahead." So I went on in (I never
could swallow a cap sule of any kind, any kind of vitamins because
PETTY 47
they'd all stick in my throat), so I went in and I had my lunch
and I took my vitamin, and •••
M: That quick?
P: Yeah , that's how fast it worked. I haven't had any trouble
since.
M: That fa s t ?
p: Yeah, let me tell you how quick something else was. I I l l
tell you two stories about timing. I was always an introvert. I
was so bashful, I just hated to see people. Edwina would want to
go to the Country Club for dinner and I hated that worse than
poison and as a child I was bashful. So I always hated like
poison to go out to the Country Club or anywhere else for dinner.
One day, I said to the Man Upstairs, "Lord, I'm tired of it, I
wish you'd make me an extrovert."
M: Oh oh. Really! (laughter) That took a lot of nerve.
P: (laughter) I never thought a lot about it. And, a year
later, Edwina was at Northeast Baptist Hospital and I was out
there with her and she ••• the nurse was coming in and she asked
me to leave the room for a few minutes. So I said, "Sure." So I
went out in the hall and I was gone thirty minutes! And I got
back and she said, "Scotty, where in the world have you been?"
And I s a i d , 11 I ' v e be en down t he r e t a l k i n g t o t h e n u r s e s • " "Now
you couldn't talk to the nurses for thirty minutes." And I said,
"No, well I've been visiting all the patients ... I've been in
every room on this floor." I said, "I met the most interesting
g a l a c r o s s t h e h a l I , h e r e , a b o u t o n e d o o r down a n d o n e o f t h e
most interesting people I ever knew. Her husband is interesting
too." I went in and we had quite a I ittle conversation and I
told her what we were talking about and she says, "Scotty, you're
an extrovert!"
M: Just like that. (laughter)
P: And I said, "By golly, I sure am." I just love to talk to
people.
PETTY 48
M: You would have never done that before?
P: Oh , no.
M: You would have been too shy?
P : 0 h , I wo u l d h a v e n e v e r t a l ked t o anybody l i k e t h a t.
M: Then did you get • .• like •.• so, you don't mind socializing?
P: Oh, I just love to talk to everybody now. (laughte r)
M: Isn't that ••. you are a remarkable man .
P: So this is the next chapter: Edwina is a cold natured, or
warm natured, whatever it is. I pile a lot of cover on , we're
sleeping in twin beds, and she just has a sheet on or something
of that so.rt. So one night about 11:00 o'clock, we were going to
bed, and I'd take a bath and Edwina would complain because I
would turn the hot water on and steam the bathroom. "Scotty,
you ' l l ruin the wa l l s • Look a t the wa l l s d r i p p in g down, " she
says. I says, "Well, it's too cool. If I get out of the tub • ••
(I t a k e a t u b b a t h , I ' m s c a r e d I ' l l fa l l down i n t he s h o we r ) i t ' s
too doggone cold, I'd freeze to death." "So," she says , "Well, I
wish you'd do something about it." So I says to the Man
Upstai rs , "Lord, I wish you'd make me the same nature as Edwina."
M: Really! (laughter) He's awful busy with you. (laughter)
P: (laughter) So I said, "I sure would appreciate it." So I
walked on in , I was just about ready to go to bed, got into bed,
pulled the cover up, and I liked to have burned up. I started
kicking that cover off and I'm just like she is now. That's what
I wanted to tell you how quickly it happened. Just as long as it
took me to walk from my bathroom and get into bed .
M: So you' r e a walking miracle.
P: (laughter)
M: By my figure, you 'r e 92 years o l d .
P: I'm 89
M: Eighty nine.
P : We l l , I ' l l be 9 0 on Ap r i l t he 1 5 t h •
M: Well, you were born then, in what? Eighteen ?
PETTY 49
P: Eighteen Ninety-five.
M : I f yo u we r e b o r n i n 1 8 9 5 , t h a t ' s f i v e yea r s t i l l 1 9 0 0 . And
then we're 1984 now, s o that's five and 84.
P: I'll be 90.
M: You're younger! But even so , that's a nice remarkable age.
P: Yes.
M: And you're just as alert and you feel good, don't you?
P: Yes, just fine.
M: And you're doing things for other peopl e .
P: Yeah, all the time, practically.
M: I think that is •..
P: I want to try to get through with that ••• but •••
M: Hum?
P: I don't have time to do anything else .
M: But you don't have to.
P: I'm letting eve r ything else go.
M: But you don't have to do anything else.
P: Now that girl who is helping with that book "Journey to
Pleasant Hill" •••
M: Oh, ye s.
P : Lenna Jenkins. I've got two first cousins, there are a few
0 f us still living: Lenna and Daisy Hunter and myself. And
Daisy ca l led me one day and says, she called me Olive, she says,
"Olive, I hate to tell you but we're going to lose Lenna." And I
s a y s , "Wh a t ' s the m a t t e r ? 11 "We l l , " she says , 11 She ' s in the
h o s p i t a l , s he wa s i n on c e b e f o r e , a n d s h e ' s b a c k a g a i n n ow , a n d
she can neither eat or drink anything, not even water. She says
that if she forc es anything, it comes right up. She says, her
docto r .•• and we've had two doctors ••• and they can't diagnose
it. •• some mysterious thing ." She says s h e 's practically in a
coma and just a skeleton . She says, "I don't think she can la st
another wee k." When the Institute of Texan Cultures had that
reception for the introduction of the book "Journey to Pleasant
PETTY 50
Hill, 11 I invited all the cousins I could find to come over to it.
And I started ahead of time getting all these names. One [ella
called me up from California, and said, "George Petty, I'm a
cousin of yours." And I said, 111 never heard of you. 11 "Yes," he
s a y s , "A f t e r t he Wa r . . • 11
M: For goodness sakes.
P: "I'm one of Dan's boys. I came to California and stayed
here, so," he says, "I've lived here all my life, and I've never
seen any of the Pettys." So I had all 75 of them. I think.
M: Did you really?
P: We invited them all to the thing, and Edwina says, 11Scotty,
if we don't have a ... if they just come to this reception at
seven o'clock, we won't know who they are. Let's get a courtesy
room down a t t he h o t e l ( F o u r S e a s o n s i s w h e r e I i n v i t e d t h em t o
stay). I didn't tell them that I was going to pay their hotel
room, as I knew they wouldn't let me if I told ••• so we hired
Victoria's Indiscretion.
M: Yes.
P: It holds about 100 people or something like that.
M: Victoria's .•.
P: Victoria's Indiscretion, yeah, Victoria's Indiscretion. So I
s a y s , "We l l , we ' l l open a t n i n e o ' c l o c k , c om e down and h a v e
coffee and some doughnuts or sweetrolls or something, and then
we ' l l h a v e so f t d r i n k s un t i l a b o u t e l e v e n - t h i r t y o r t we l v e , an d
then we ' l l have l un c h. We had c a t e red a rea l n i c e lunch. The
wo r k s ! And s o we d i d . So we go t t o me e t e a c h o t he r • I d i d t h i s .
I s a i d t o my s e l f , 11We l l , I go t t a do s om~ h i n ' s o we can p l a c e e a c h
other." So I had place cards and that was •.• four ••• let's
s e e . • • t h e r e wa s Van , Fran k , Don and E l l a . So I us e d a d i f f e r e n t
color pen, in the first place, to distinguish visitors from the
others. I put a "V" for Van in one color, "D" for Don in another
color, 11F 11 for Frank in another color, and "E" for Ella. Anyway,
PETTY 51
so immediately when you saw the name tags, you knew which branch
of the family they were from.
M: I see.
P : So we h a d a b i g t i me v i s i t i n g t h e r e a l l day , t hen we s t aye d
t he r e un t i l s e v en o ' c l o c k t h a t e v e n i n g • No , a b o u t f i v e o ' c l o c k
and then we broke up and we all went over to the Institute of
Texan Cultures. So I had gotten all their names and addresses.
In fact, I've got all the names and addresses of every descendant
of Captain Petty, living and dead, with their telephone numbers,
the ages and everything else. Every time there is a new baby
born, they write and tell me this. So, I've got a record and I'm
going to send each one a bound copy of it. I haven't gotten
around to it yet. Just got them all printed.
M: Yeah.
P: So I wanted to sit down and I wrote to each one. I wrote a
letter to each one and I asked them would they please pray for
Lenna and to ask their friends to pray for her and to ask their
friends to ask their friends to pray for her ad-infinitum.
M: Uh-huh.
P: And in two days they called me back and Daisy says, "Scotty,
Olive, you know the phone's been ringing ever since they got that
letter and everybody's been praying." She says, "She's just
about all right again . " She says s he' s eating and everything
else, and she's gaining weight .
M: Good heavens.
P: And inside of a few months she's as good as new again.
M: My goodness. There are certain sensible doctor s who will
agree to that.
P: Yes, there are. George Gates is one of them.
M: Is he? Some scorn it, but there ar e more and more do c tors
acc epting this as healing help.
END OF TAPE II
SIDE 1.
O. SCO'IT PETrY
Geophysics as a science, is so central to the oil business that its
early beginnings are of prime importance, particularly to us here in Texas.
O.Scott Petty, an inventive genius, was a leader in this field and has many
significant inventions to his credit.
His success in the oil business is secondary only to his accomplishments
as a human being.
Geophysics: 1 to 34
Philosophy: 34 to 51
See ...... Seismic Reflections
Gift of 0. Scott Petty
Institute of Texan Cultures Library 622.159
P512s
Petty, 0. Scott
Seismic reflections ; recollections of the
formative years of the geophysical exploration
industry. Houston, TX 1976