Interviewer(s): S. Wiltz. Lafayette, LA

Affiliation: University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Alfred Lambson was born in Lawtell, Louisiana, in 1917. His father was born in Massachusetts and raised in Chicago; his father moved to the area in about 1910 when he got a 40-acre piece of property in a lottery; his father later worked for the Federal Land Bank. After a year at Western Illinois University, he came back to Opelousas in 1936 to be a secretary for his father in order to make money to get married. Through this work he made contacts with land men and, attracted by the work and money, went to work for an independent land broker, Mr. R. L. Whitlow, in 1937 and moved to Lafayette. After Whitlow died in 1940, he went into the brokerage business for himself, where his French language abilities gave him an advantage. During World War Two he entered the service and served three and a half years stateside. While waiting to be discharged, he roughnecked for a month or two on a drilling rig in south Texas. When he came back to Lafayette in 1946, he went to work for another broker and after nine months had made quite a lot of money. He really wanted to drill wells as an independent operator, so made a deal with a consulting firm, Bates and Cornell, that would allow him to learn from them in return for doing their land work free of charge. After doing that, he partnered with his brother-in-law (Sam Bennett), a petroleum engineer, and for 26 years they promoted, drilled, and operated a number of land wells. When the partnership broke up, he continued along in the same line of business by himself.