The Age of Oil brought a new way of life to Texas, the United States, and the world. Among new technology and industry, oil brought social change. Social change comes in both good and bad. Most of the social changes that come from oil were good. Some of the if not the most impactful social changes to Texas occurred because of money, and there are three main changes I’d like to discuss. Oil was the main contributor to advancing education in Texas. In 1858, Texas universities got a 2,000,000 acre land grant from Texas legislature. Nearly 38 years later in 1923 oil was found on the university's land. With oil comes money, and with this money the university erected a multitude of new buildings that are still in use today. In 2008 the oil fields had produced $4.4 billion. With the discovery of oil and the expansion of the school’s. College education in Texas was finally available to nearly everyone in in the state. With more educated citizens ordinary people could now become doctors, nurses, or lawyers. This helped expand the economy or Texas greatly. As the oil business continued to expand throughout Texas, there were still people left out.
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The African and Mexican Americans of Texas weren’t permitted to work on oil fields as wildcatters. Instead they did Unskilled work such as cleaning, laundry, and cooking. However, it wasn’t all bad. Though the work may be unskilled African and Mexican Americans could still make decent money. For example, Ford automobiles took off with the discovery of oil because it was now easy to make roads and gas was cheap allowing many more people to own cars. This brought option of working for Ford in which you got the same pay as whites however, significantly harder work. But, there was still another option. You could do what Willsie Lee McKinney did, she was an African American and worked as a maid in Midland. What caused her to come here was the fact that she could make $1 an hour. This helped her earn enough money to go to school. Because of oil people generally had more money and with their husbands gone the women of the house might need more help and could pay more. On top of advancing the lives of people and economy of the state oil also helped small communities. One example of this is Wink Texas. In 1938, 12 years after the discovery of oil the high school football team had an undefeated season. The main reason for this was big oil companies sponsoring the school. With the help of sponsors the Wink football team had the nicest equipment and getting good players. They usually got good players by giving their dad’s jobs. However, more so than the football team the main social change of Wink Texas was population. The population of this small community jumped from 3,500 to 6,000 in 2 years. Despite the massive change so suddenly, the community still had a strong sense of togetherness. This population growth also expanded the economy of Wink and brought it many prosperous years. There is one social change I think isn’t as important as the rest. This change is the divorce rates. The divorce rates skyrocketed from 8.4 in 1929 to 19.9 in 1930 in MIdland Texas. This was caused by
The African and Mexican Americans of Texas weren’t permitted to work on oil fields as wildcatters. Instead they did Unskilled work such as cleaning, laundry, and cooking. However, it wasn’t all bad. Though the work may be unskilled African and Mexican Americans could still make decent money. For example, Ford automobiles took off with the discovery of oil because it was now easy to make roads and gas was cheap allowing many more people to own cars. This brought option of working for Ford in which you got the same pay as whites however, significantly harder work. But, there was still another option. You could do what Willsie Lee McKinney did, she was an African American and worked as a maid in Midland. What caused her to come here was the fact that she could make $1 an hour. This helped her earn enough money to go to school. Because of oil people generally had more money and with their husbands gone the women of the house might need more help and could pay more. On top of advancing the lives of people and economy of the state oil also helped small communities. One example of this is Wink Texas. In 1938, 12 years after the discovery of oil the high school football team had an undefeated season. The main reason for this was big oil companies sponsoring the school. With the help of sponsors the Wink football team had the nicest equipment and getting good players. They usually got good players by giving their dad’s jobs. However, more so than the football team the main social change of Wink Texas was population. The population of this small community jumped from 3,500 to 6,000 in 2 years. Despite the massive change so suddenly, the community still had a strong sense of togetherness. This population growth also expanded the economy of Wink and brought it many prosperous years. There is one social change I think isn’t as important as the rest. This change is the divorce rates. The divorce rates skyrocketed from 8.4 in 1929 to 19.9 in 1930 in MIdland Texas. This was caused by