The firm was started in 1946 by Texas A&M University professors William Wayne Caudill and John Miles Rowlett (1914–1978), first in Austin, Texas and soon after were located in College Station, Texas. The partners were joined in 1948 by Wallie Eugene Scott, Jr. (1921–1989), who was Caudill's student. William Merriweather Peña, another student of Caudill's was hired in 1948. He was the first employee and in 1949, he was made a partner. He expressed that it would be best to keep the company name with the first three partners names rather than extending it with each new partner. In 1954, Thomas A. Bullock, Sr. (1922-2007) became a partner.