He enrolled at the University of Southern California, then at University of California, Berkeley before graduating in 1914 from Magdalen College, Oxford with degrees in economics and political science. He spent his summers between studies working on his father's oil fields in Oklahoma. Running his own oil company in Tulsa, he made his first million by 1916. However, in 1917, he announced that he was retiring to become a Los Angeles-based playboy. Although he eventually returned to business, Getty had lost his father's respect. Just before George Franklin Getty died in 1930, he believed that Jean Paul would destroy the family company, and told him so.