Background

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

The Cajun/Smackover Connection



Because the booms of Louisiana and Arkansas started at the beginning of the twentieth century, their oil scenes were vividly recorded by the camera.  Therefore, there is a well documented visual history of one of America's greatest oil rushes - a boom which in many ways revolutionized the world's petroleum industry through the development of new drilling techniques opening vast new horizons to further development.
Freebooters stalking Spanish galleons along the coast of Louisiana little realized that beneath their keels was a petroleum prize of greater value than all the gold and silver ever taken out of the New World.
Knowledge of oil’s potential and inept attempts to bring it forth from the earth made the viscous substance more of a nuisance than a boon.  However, when Edwin Drake (whom we wrote about in the June issue) brought in that landmark first commercial oil well in Titusville, PA, the real value of crude became not only apparent but critical.
Pronounced an excellent candidate for refining into kerosene, Louisiana oil would receive a start.  But, with the outbreak of the Civil War and the need to make the state self - sufficient, its importance was kicked up a notch.  Louisiana Governor Henry Allen, requested a report on the state's mineral deposits and oil springs in the Calcasieu region.  When it was determined and reported those petroleum deposits alone could become a major source of oil for the entire Confederacy, excitement ran high.
However, the war came to an end and it was recommended that the Calcasieu region be leased to oil men and all the revenue acquired from doing so be used to retire Louisiana's war debt.  This proved to be no easy task, as Northern businessmen were hesitant to invest in a state that had fought for the Confederacy so development was at a standstill.
Then in 1895, a young mining engineer named Anthony Lucas poked around a bit on the salt dome around Jefferson Island and while he found "show", the shortage of capital caused him to abandon his quest.  Discouraged with Louisiana,  Lucas moved off to Beaumont, Texas.  And, if you have been following these articles you know what happened there.  Lucas hit the Spindletop in 1901 and in doing so rejuvenated the interest of others in his previously abandoned Louisiana test wells. 
In 1901, the Jennings strike hit in a big way in the same general region where Escoubas and Lowell had searched four decades previously and Lucas had gone broke looking.
As we have seen from every story we have told from the old oil patch, the rush and subsequent "boom" was immediate.  Louisiana was pushed into the forefront of the nation's oil-producing areas.  For 45 years, Louisiana never ranked lower than 8th among the oil-producing states and on more than one occasion rose as high as 3rd.
The Louisiana black gold discovery spawned a search for crude in southern Arkansas.  El Dorado, Smackover and Magnolia quickly joined in with their own producing fields.  And even though Arkansas' boom wasn't apparent until the early 20s, it produced enough barrels of petroleum to rank the state 4th in the nation's oil producing states in 1923, 1925 and 1926.
Within 45 years of the start of production at Jennings, the oil area of Louisiana and southern Arkansas would produce billions of dollars' worth of rich crude.  Throughout their boom era, 1901 through 1947, the two areas combined to produce $3,202,912,000 worth of oil coming at a rate of 1,720,600 barrels of oil every twenty four hours.
Then, the boom began to ebb in 1947 only to re-spark a new era with the completion of the first offshore well out of sight of land.  That innovation opened the new frontier of oil exploration for the oil men.
- source...Early Louisiana and Arkansas Oil by Kenny Franks and Paul Lambert

Blogger's Note—research for this article led me to information from 2011 on the Smackover Brown Dense Formation which seems to have some potential to re-energize oil exploration in Southern Arkansas and Northern Louisiana.
The Smackover Formation can be found to the north of the Haynesville Shale play. In the middle of the Smackover you find the thick brown dense formation that has the potential to hold vast amounts of oil.  And, even below the Brown Dense, you have the Lower Smackover Shale which is also of great potential.
Because of the production emanating from Bakken, Eagle Ford, Niobrara, Barnett, Tuscaloosa Marine, Permian and Woodford, several companies are moving rigs into the area with Southwestern Energy emerging as the big player in the field.
According to an August 3, 2012 Southwestern Energy report they currently have several wells “shut-in” for testing.  Read more about the Brown Dense Shale here: