In Ealand v. Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Company, 411 S.W.2d 591, 593 (Tex. App.--Beaumont 1967, no writ), the court explained the purposes and effect of the 1963 amendment to article 8306 section 3: This section was amended in 1963 . . . to provide that the subscriber under the Compensation Act would have no liability to reimburse or hold harmless a third person against whom a judgment had been obtained by an employee, in the absence of a written agreement expressly assuming such liability. It is argued that as much as this was not provided for before 1963, that the law was changed in 1963 and, consequently, at the time this cause of action arose [the injury occurred in 1956] the third party could not recover from the subscriber. We have found no Texas case passing directly upon this point. We hold that the 1963 amendment to article 8306 section 3, did not change the law, and the right of action for indemnity and contribution based upon a written agreement existed before such an amendment.Id. In 1989, the statutory wording changed and for the first time included the "third party" language in this indemnification section. The statute read: If an action for damages is brought by an injured employee . . . against a third party liable to pay damages for the injury . . . and the action results in a judgment against the third party or a settlement by the third party, the employer is not liable to the third party for any reimbursement or damages based on the judgment or settlement unless the employer executed, before the injury or death occurred, a written agreement with the third party to assume the liability. Act of Dec. 3, 1989, 71st Leg., C.S., ch. 1, 4.04, 1989 Tex. Gen. Laws 32, 33 (amended 1993). When the statute was amended and recodified in 1993 as section 417.004 of the labor code, the third-party language remained intact. TEX. LAB. CODE ANN. 417.004.