The Hendrick Field was found by random drilling on July 16, 1926, when the Hendrick No. 1 reached dolomitic limestone at 3,006 feet in central Winkler County. Within three years it was producing more than five million barrels a month from 577 wells, and the town of Wink had been platted on the Hendrick Ranch to house the people working it. Over six decades the field produced 260,957,163 barrels — a precise figure that puts it firmly among the largest fields in West Texas history.
Source: Texas Railroad Commission production filings, aggregated across RRC field designations 40406001, 11954600. Reported volumes lag the calendar by several months.
Hendrick was not found by geology. Roy Westbrook, a Fort Worth printer running a lease promotion, hired Pennsylvania lease broker J. W. Grant in March 1925 to assemble Winkler County acreage, and the resulting wildcat — the Hendrick No. 1, operated by Westbrook and Company — hit at 3,006 feet on July 16, 1926. It made 120 barrels a day, and 390 after being deepened to 3,052 feet. Standard Oil of Indiana bought controlling interest in November 1926 for $510,000, and Gulf, Humble and Marland followed.
The boom that followed built a town. By mid-1927 the Wink Townsite Company was selling lots in the Horse Wells pasture of the T. G. Hendrick Ranch, reached over tracks contemporaries described as cattle trails. By September 1927 nineteen wells were making 10,580 barrels a day. Peak came in March 1929: 5,304,360 barrels in a single month from 577 wells, with annual production still above fifteen million barrels in 1931. Hendrick was also the first major Permian field developed largely with rotary rigs.
The field became an early proving ground for Texas conservation regulation. On May 5, 1928 the Railroad Commission imposed voluntary proration capping the field at 150,000 barrels a day — well before the statewide orders that followed the East Texas boom. Water encroachment set in hard, reaching 26.3 barrels of water per barrel of oil by 1931. Stanolind Oil and Gas ran gas injection from June 1946 through January 1959. The discovery well was plugged in 1939 after making 235,000 barrels.
Hendrick produces from the Yates and Tansill formations beneath the salt section on the western edge of the Central Basin Platform, with the discovery pay logged as dolomitic limestone at just over 3,000 feet. The shallow depth and the overlying salt are both consequential: the salt is why the Wink Sinks, the surface collapse features monitored by the Bureau of Economic Geology, are associated with legacy wellbores in this area. Strong water drive is the defining reservoir characteristic, and by 1931 the field was already producing more than 26 barrels of water per barrel of oil.
Hendrick’s pressure support came from gas rather than water. Stanolind Oil and Gas operated a gas injection program from June 1946 to January 1959, which is unusual for a Permian field of this size and vintage — most contemporaries went to waterflood. Given the field’s aggressive natural water drive, adding more water was not the problem operators needed to solve. Modern operations are dominated by fluid handling: with produced water volumes far exceeding oil, disposal capacity and lift costs govern which wells stay on and which get shut in.
Winkler County royalties from the Hendrick boom are almost always inherited and almost always fractional, and the leases behind them frequently date to 1926 or 1927. High water cut means production economics can shift with saltwater disposal costs, so the same interest can look different depending on how a buyer models operating expense. That is exactly the kind of judgment that should be shown to you rather than hidden inside a single number. We buy minerals and royalties in Winkler County and provide free written offers.
County-level well data, production charts, and selling guides for the counties this field spans:
Royalty owners pay no share of operating costs, but operating costs still determine how long wells stay on. When a lease produces twenty-plus barrels of water per barrel of oil, disposal expense is the swing factor in whether marginal wells keep running. A careful valuation looks at the operator’s cost position and disposal capacity, not just at the oil volumes on your check.
They do not change your ownership. The sinks are surface collapse features associated with the salt section and legacy wellbores, and they are a surface and plugging-liability issue rather than a mineral title issue. Royalty owners are not responsible for plugging wells they did not operate. It can, however, affect where an operator is willing to place new surface facilities.
Activity in Winkler County today is largely driven by deeper targets rather than by the shallow Yates and Tansill pay that made the original field. Whether that reaches your tract depends on depths conveyed in your deed and on which leases cover you. It is worth verifying rather than assuming, because deep rights and shallow rights are frequently held by different parties here.