The History of Early
Pennsylvania Oil
Edwin Drake, (inventor and oil industry pioneer) was hired by the
Seneca Oil Company to investigate suspected oil deposits in Titusville,
Pennsylvania.
Oil in the area was causing problems for salt well drillers because
of the contamination
factor to their product. The oil company chose Drake, a retired
railway man partly because he had free use of the rail which meant he could
travel the area at no expense to them. They
tacked a phony “Colonel” title in front of his name to give him some respect
and authority and sent him prospecting.
Native Americans had long been aware of crude oil and used it as “black
medicine” for
sprains and cuts. They also found it effective in driving away
flies. They called it
“antonotons” meaning “Oh, how much there is!” Even early settlers tried to make use of
crude but quickly learned it would not work in their oil lamps. Because it
burned with
a black smoke and smelled horribly, it was basically not fit for anything.
Eventually, someone discovered a way to process out the impurities
making it usable in oil lamps and for other more genteel uses. Nothing like a
good bottle of (snake oil) for what ails you. The ability to process the crude oil
caused an “ah ha” moment for James Townsend, the President of Seneca Oil, and
he decided it was time to get that crude out of the ground. His plans were to
extract, process, sell and get rich!
Edwin Drake settled on Oil Creek as a drilling site and decided to
drill in the manner of the salt well drillers. He purchased a steam engine in
Erie, Pennsylvania, to power the drill and began digging on an island. It took quite some time for the drillers to
get through the many layers of gravel.
At 16 feet, the sides of the hole began to collapse and those helping
him began to despair, but not Drake. It was at this point he devised the idea
of a drive pipe. This cast iron pipe consisted of 10-foot-long joints that were
driven down into the ground. At 32 feet they struck, bedrock. Drilling tools
were lowered through the pipe and steam was used to drill through the bedrock. The
going was slow at a rate of just three feet per day.
All the difficulty associated with the process resulted in the
well being dubbed "Drake's Folly."
Crowds gathered to jeer at the apparently unproductive operation which
was also going broke. Seneca Oil had abandoned Drake, leaving him to rely on
friends to back the enterprise.
On August 27, the drill bit had reached a total depth of 69.5 feet,
hit a crevice and the crew packed up for the day. The next morning Drake’s driller, Billy
Smith, looked into the hole in preparation for another day’s work. He was
surprised and delighted to see crude oil rising up in the hole.
Drake was summoned and the oil was brought to the surface with a
hand operated pitcher pump from a local kitchen and collected in a bath tub.
Previous methods for collecting oil had been limited. Ground collection
of oil consisted of gathering it from natural occurrences, such as oil seeps or
shallow holes dug into the ground.
Alternative methods of digging large shafts into the ground also failed,
as collapse from water seepage almost always occurred. Drake is now famous for pioneering a new
method for producing oil from the ground by using pipe to prevent borehole collapse.
The principle behind this idea is still employed today by many companies
drilling for
hydrocarbons.
Unfortunately, Drake failed to patent his drilling invention. Subsequently, after losing all his money in
oil speculation, the state of Pennsylvania voted an annuity of $1,500 to the “crazy
man” who founded their oil industry.
Edwin Drake died in 1880, impoverished after pioneering an
industry that made others fabulously wealthy.
LK Beshears
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