George H. W. Bush

== Business career (1948–1963) ==
[[File:Entire Bush family.jpg|thumb|Bush, top right, standing with his wife and children, mid-1960s]]

After graduating from Yale, Bush moved his young family to [[West Texas]]. Biographer Jon Meacham writes that Bush's relocation to Texas allowed him to move out of the "daily shadow of his Wall Street father and Grandfather Walker, two dominant figures in the financial world," but would still allow Bush to "call on their connections if he needed to raise capital."{{sfn|Meacham|2015|p=78}} His first position in Texas was an [[oil field]] equipment salesman<ref>{{cite news |url=https://articles.latimes.com/2005/oct/11/local/me-bush11 |title=Two Future Presidents Slept Here&nbsp;— latimes |date=October 11, 2005 |access-date=May 17, 2017|newspaper=Los Angeles Times |last1=Chawkins |first1=Steve}}</ref> for [[Dresser Industries]], which was led by family friend Neil Mallon.{{sfn|Meacham|2015|pp=77, 83}} While working for Dresser, Bush lived in various places with his family: [[Odessa, Texas]]; [[Ventura, California|Ventura]], [[Bakersfield, California|Bakersfield]] and [[Compton, California]]; and [[Midland, Texas]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://bush41library.tamu.edu/archives/finding-aids/donated-materials/george-bush#zapata_oil |title=George Bush Collection |publisher=George Bush Presidential Library and Museum |access-date=July 30, 2016}}</ref> In 1952, he volunteered for the successful presidential campaign of [[Republican (United States)|Republican]] candidate [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]. That same year, his father won election to represent Connecticut in the [[United States Senate]] as a member of the Republican Party.{{sfn|Meacham|2015|pp=94–96}}

With support from Mallon and Bush's uncle, [[George Herbert Walker Jr.]], Bush and John Overbey launched the Bush-Overbey Oil Development Company in 1951.{{sfn|Meacham|2015|pp=92–93}} In 1953, he co-founded the [[HRG Group|Zapata Petroleum Corporation]], an oil company that drilled in the [[Permian Basin (North America)|Permian Basin]] in Texas.<ref>{{Cite web |title=National Archives NextGen Catalog |url=https://catalog.archives.gov/id/10555130?organizationNaId=10480871 |access-date=May 14, 2023 |publisher=National Archives}}</ref> In 1954, he was named president of the Zapata Offshore Company, a subsidiary which specialized in [[offshore drilling]].<ref>{{cite news |last=Perin |first=Monica |date=April 25, 1999 |title=Adios, Zapata! |url=https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/stories/1999/04/26/story2.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Houston Business Journal]] |access-date=November 30, 2018}}</ref> Shortly after the subsidiary became independent in 1959, Bush moved the company and his family from Midland to [[Houston]].<ref>Bush, George W. ''41: A Portrait of My Father.'' Crown Publishers, 2014, p. 64.</ref> There, he befriended [[James Baker]], a prominent attorney who later became an important political ally.{{sfn|Meacham|2015|pp=144–146}} Bush remained involved with Zapata until the mid-1960s, when he sold his stock in the company for approximately $1&nbsp;million.{{sfn|Meacham|2015|pp=130–131}}

In 1988, ''[[The Nation]]'' published an article alleging that Bush worked as an operative of the [[Central Intelligence Agency]] (CIA) during the 1960s; Bush denied this claim.<ref>{{cite news |title='63 F.B.I. Memo Ties Bush to Intelligence Agency |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/07/11/us/63-fbi-memo-ties-bush-to-intelligence-agency.html |agency=Associated Press |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=July 11, 1988}}</ref>