Oscar Wyatt
| Oscar Wyatt | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Oscar Sherman Wyatt, Jr. July 11, 1924 Beaumont, Texas |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Texas A & M, 1949 degree in Mechanical Engineering |
| Occupation | businessman |
| Known for | Founder of Coastal Corporation |
| Net worth | over $100 million |
| Spouse(s) | Lynn Wyatt (née Sakowitz) (m.1963–present) |
| Children | 4 sons |
| Website | www |
| Notes | |
Oscar Sherman Wyatt, Jr. (born July 11, 1924) is an American businessman and self made millionaire. He was the founder of Coastal Corporation and a decorated bomber pilot in World War II. In 2007 the U.S. federal court in Manhattan tried him for illegally sending payments to Iraq under the Oil for Food program.
In 1924 Oscar Wyatt was born into poverty in Beaumont, Texas, left by an alcoholic father and raised by a single mother in Navasota, Texas. At age 16 he began earning money by flying planes, working as a crop duster for a nearby farm. A strong student, Wyatt was accepted to attend Texas A & M University but, in the midst of World War II, he left after a year of school in 1942 to enlist in the Army Air Corps as a pilot. Serving as a combat aviator in the South Pacific, Wyatt was wounded twice during battle and was decorated by age 21. After the war he returned to Texas A & M to complete his studies and earn a degree in Mechanical Engineering. To make money during college he sold drill bits to small oil companies from the trunk of his Ford Coupe, and worked for Kerr-McGee and Reed Roller Bits before becoming a partner in Wymore Oil Company.
A 2007 Texas Monthly magazine article called Wyatt the real "JR Ewing" of the Oil Business and described Oscar and his wife Lynn Sakowitz, a fixture of Houston social, fashion together as the beauty and the beast." Known as a shrewd businessman, Wyatt was both beloved and hated, litigious and charitable. A personal friend of Iraq's Saddam Hussien and business partner to Libya's Muammar Qaddafi, Wyatt urged President Bush (41) not to go to war with Iraq over Kuwait and later negotiated with Saddam to secure the release of western hostages being held in Baghdad. Wyatt entered the refining industry in the early 1960s, And he began to attend Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) meetings in Vienna, Austria. The U.S. refineries were optimized for high sulfur ("sour") crude oil, so Wyatt began to buy Iraqi oil in 1972. Wyatt retired as the Coastal Corporations chairman in 1997 yet continued to serve as Executive Committee chairman until Coastal's sale to the El Paso Natural Gas Company in January 2001.
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Wikipedia