Kings of Texas

by Don Graham

King Ranch, carved from the scrub and mesquite of the South Texas coastal plains and comprising more acreage than the state of Rhode Island, is the largest and most famous cattle ranch in American history. From cattle empire to oil empire to multilayered, media-shy corporation beset by legal battles and power struggles, King Ranch embodies the oldest dream of American wealth - the possession of land and the perpetuation of a dynasty. You'll meet the man who started it all - Richard King, the orphaned son of Irish immigrants who founded a dynasty in the middle of "heartbreak country," and who believed firmly in the dictum of his friend, Robert E. Lee - Buy land and never sell.