Interviewer(s): J. Sell. Houma, LA

Affiliation: University of Arizona

Richard Molaison is another retired oil worker involved in the Houma-Terrebonne Council on Aging. He and his wife, Virginia, were involved in the interview. Virginia, in fact, asked to make a statement about the good treatment she received from the oil companies in maintaining family contact.

The son of a streetcar/bus driver, Richard Molaison dropped out of high school to serve in the Marines, from 1939-45. When he returned, he was given his diploma and attended Tulane University for two years. In 1948 he transferred to Soule School for a business certificate. He began working in the office for the Swanee Fruit and Shipping Company that year, but in 1949 began work in the chart department of United Gas Pipeline Company, when it was creating a regional pipeline system that eventually extended offshore. He worked for United at Montpelier and and Kosciusko, Mississippi. In 1955, he shifted to Union Producing Company, United Gas' sister company, and worked as a lease operator (production) at Lake Quitman, near Houma. He returned to office work in Houma in 1970 and stayed at the Houma office through the Union/United merger with Pennzoil. In 1984 he returned to field production, until retirement in 1986.