Everette Lee DeGolyer, Bibliophile
by Paula Bosse
Mr. De with his books (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
One of Dallas’ great bibliophiles and book collectors was Everette Lee DeGolyer, petroleum geologist, Texas oil superstar, and namesake of SMU’s DeGolyer Library. He was also a notable book collector and a favored customer of many Texas rare books dealers. This article appeared in 1946, when there were very few antiquarian bookstores in Dallas. The Aldredge Book Store opened on McKinney Avenue in 1947, and Mr. DeGolyer was a steady customer until his death in 1956. (Click article for larger image.)
Texas Week magazine, Aug. 24, 1946
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Below, the library at the newly-built DeGolyer Estate at White Rock Lake, shelves waiting to be filled.
The fabulous DeGolyer Estate is now part of the Dallas Arboretum.
Photo: Dallas Arboretum
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Sources & Notes
Article from Texas Week magazine; accessible through UNT’s Portal to Texas History, here.
Photo of DeGolyer’s home library (not to be confused with the DeGolyer Library at SMU), is from the Dallas Municipal Archives collection, also found on the Portal to Texas History site, here. More photos of the estate from this collection are here.
The Handbook of Texas entry for Everette DeGolyer is here.
That term “Texiana” used by the unnamed author of the article to describe books of Texas subject matter or interest? For anyone uncertain about whether to use that or “Texana,” use “Texana.” Always! (It rhymes with “Hannah.”)
Most images larger when clicked.
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Copyright © 2016 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
I’d give a dollar to know who wrote this interview with DeGolyer. The masthead of the August 31, 1946 issue of Teas Week lists Raymond Holbrook as editor and follows with a bunch of “contributing editors,” but no indication who the “book editor” might have been.
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My guess is Paul Crume. He wrote several articles for the magazine.
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I saw Crume’s name listed in that masthead, but the gushy style didn’t seem his to me. Maybe the part of the Continental Building that DeGolyer’s offices were in was “lush,” but the floor where my father worked was nice enough but fell a little short of swank. On the other hand, in August 1946 Crume was just out of the navy, where “lush” was few and far between.
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