The history of our company begins with the history of the man who was the inspiration of it´s foundation: James Frank Hinkle, “Daddy Hinkle.”

Daddy Hinkle´s father was born in 1860 in Missouri at the beginning of the Civil War. By the time J. Frank was born 26 years later in 1886, the family had moved to Arkansas. Later, they would travel through Paris, Texas, and finally they would reach the Oklahoma Territory around the turn of the century. In 1901, J. Frank’s mother died after giving birth to twins. After his mother´s death he was sent back to Arkansas to live with his oldest sister, Lucy.

James received a spotty education at best. He learned to read and write and had some knowledge of math, but a life of moving from town to town following his father´s water-well drilling wagon with a mother who was giving birth every two years did not give him much in the way of a fixed home nor a steady diet of formal education.*