Burnham Enersen was a lawyer for the McCutchen Law Firm, focusing on California water law and oil and gas leases. Born in rural Minnesota in 1905, Enerson majored in economics at Carleton College and earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1930. He moved to San Francisco, where he would practice law at McCutchen until after his official retirement in 1973. In this interview, Enersen discusses his Norwegian family background, California water rights and acreage limitation issues, World War II taxes, and corporate oil and gas leasing.