Word: rays
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...surprises began a month after H.L. Hunt's death at age 85. When his will was opened, Ray turned out to be executor with full administrative powers over the estate-possibly because H.L. had doted on Ray as the only son of his second marriage. Discord soon developed between Ray and his three older halfbrothers, Bunker, Herbert and Lamar.* If not eccentrics in H.L.'s mold, they are at least wheeler-dealers. Bunker, in particular, has grabbed headlines with gaudy speculations in silver and soybeans. To resolve the conflict, Ray agreed in mid-1975 to split the empire...
...partly because the old man would let no one else make decisions-and made increasingly few himself. Though figures are hard to come by, because the Hunt companies are privately owned, the Hunt family fortune was once estimated at $2 billion. The best estimate of the net worth of Ray's half of the empire today is "in excess of $300 million...
...Ray quickly corralled a herd of talented young executives from other Dallas-based corporations and moved them into key management slots. After a year-long study of company operations, he reorganized his holdings into three profit centers: real estate (a downtown redevelopment project in Dallas and 2,000 acres of industrial parkland near the Dallas-Fort Worth airport); agriculture (400,000 acres of ranch land in Montana, Texas and Wyoming); and oil, the heart of the empire...
Like H.L., Ray intends to concentrate on exploration. As he explained to TIME Correspondent George Taber, "We have a unique niche to fill. We're big enough to look for oil anywhere, but small enough to act fast. We don't have to go through five layers of executives to find a vice president on vacation in the Bahamas to get a decision." One example: when a partner in a North Sea drilling operation off Scotland last year decided to sell out, Hunt Oil purchased his 15% interest. "In the space of one week we bought...
...luck, perhaps, but not his views. H.L. ignored Dallas civic projects. Ray is investing $210 million in the Reunion redevelopment project, not far from the city's least loved landmark, the Texas School Book Depository. The project includes a 30-story Hyatt Regency Hotel to be opened next summer, a 50-story tower with revolving restaurant now half complete, and an office building to be started later. In 1973 Ray also put up $400,000 to launch a Dallas city magazine, D. Its first issue featured an article severely criticizing his father for doing nothing to boost Dallas...