Michael R. Adamson is the author of A Better Way to Build: A History of the Pankow Companies. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, he is an independent scholar whose essays on business and urban history and US foreign economic policy have appeared in many peer-reviewed journals and scholarly collections.

• List of FiguresList of TablesAcknowledgmentsList of AbbreviationsIntroduction: The Role of the Independent Oil Operator1. Developing the Ventura Avenue Field2. Local Elites, Outside Companies, and Ventura’s Oil Boom3. Making Portland a Wonderful City4. False Start: Ralph Lloyd’s East Side Dream Falls Short5. The Lloyd Corporation Becomes an Independent Operator6. Depression-Era Commercial Real Estate Development and Management7. Public Capital and the Development of Portland’s East Side8. The Suburbanization of Urban Space: The Lloyd CenterConclusionCollectionsNotesIndex

This meticulously researched biography makes a valuable contribution to American business history by showing how Ralph Lloyd navigated a changing energy and real estate environment. It explores the interactions between oil field development and urban development, both on the scene in Ventura as a boom town and away from the scene in Los Angeles and Portland as opportunities for investment."" - Carl Abbott, author of How Cities Won the West: Four Centuries of Urban Change in Western North America""A tour de force. Adamson's command of business history and the depth of his research are stunning. This is, hands down, the most meticulous study of an independent oilman I have ever read."" - Diana Hinton, author of Shale Boom: The Barnett Shale Play and Fort Worth