Cleveland morning leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1854-1865, 1864-10-05

own prosperity and the maintenance oil
the Union. They that have won fortunes
from the earth are very suspicious of that
party which proposes either Reputation OF
all our financial obligations or the assump-
ton of the rebel war debt. In a company
of thirty or forty lounging about the rooms
of my hotel, there are not, so far as their
conversation goes, half dozen Mcclellan
men. Of course, oil men are too mueh
taken I'D with leases and companies and
drilling and pumping for the almighty
dollar. TO be very much absorbed in poll
tics until the immediate necessity for voting
is at hand. They will, however, give a
good account of themselves at that time,
and Whoever looks for a Democratic gain
in that region will be amazingly mistaken.
is THE AMOUNT OF OIL DEoREAsRG2
is question which receives various an
swers according to the candor, honesty,
capacity to judge or selfinterest OF the
party Questioned Some men who have
been in the oil regions for three or four
wears stoutly maintain that the production
is decreasing, while others as strongly
assert the contrary. The oil that is pro-
duced finds its way out from OIL Creek by
at least three routes, by the way of Titus
vile and Cory to he Atlantic road, by
the way of the Allegheny river to Frank
lin and thence to Meadville, or down the
river to Pittsburg. We do not know that
any record is kept by which to estimate
the quantity, but no one can see the heavl-
ly ladened trains on the Atlantic and
Great Western Road or the boats that
20 down TO Pittsburg without feeling that
It is enormous. Indeed it is well estab ablish-
ed that the oil trade with Europe and
South America has almost taken the place
of the cotton trade. Already the price Of
petroleum is quoted with as much interest
ia Europe, as Is gold in the United States.
It has largely destroyed the whaling busi-
ness, and promises, if once the oil regions
of the country are fully developed to be a
mine of as inexhastible wealth as are the
gold mines of Nevada. Do
THE WEALTH OF THE OIL REGION
is almost fabulous. A few years ago the
strip of land which borders on Oil Creek
and its little tributaries, and upon (which
are now to be found thousands of wells;
was as cheap and as desolate as any on the
footstooL A man who has since realized
over a million dollars from his farm, at one
kAult tuOcdNOA6u W IOLIJDlh hAObuGA man "
take it for fifteen hundred dollars in ac-
eordance with previous contract There
was nothing to invite the traveller into the
wilds of the surrounding country unless it
were the hope of wild game. The land on
which are now found the oil wells might
have originally been purchased for few
hundred thousands, could not now be
bought for less than hundred Millions
Men few years ago poor, are now l0rdly
aristocrats. Ignorant farmers, unable 20
write their names, own hundreds of thous-
ands A boy of less than twenty one
spends all of his income, estimated at over
thousand day, in gambling and dissipa-
ton in New York and Philadelphia. 1t is
said that Morrissey got $4,000 of his mon-
ey by gambling, and a prostitute $4,000
more.
A great many men of humble means
that have come here and "stuek to it.
through every kind of misfortune, have
at length succeeded and become suddenly
rich. Thousands, however, fail before a
hundred succeed. An oil man lives in the
hope of q flowing we'll. He don't know
why he can't strike well of fYe hundred
barrels as easily as somebody else. He
dreams of it by day and night. He fore
goes the comforts of civilization, and lives
feverish, dissatisfied and hopeful life for
years, in the hope that some day his good
luck will come along. Luck rules the
hour There is no such thing as the appli-
cation of science in the location of well.
1t is all guess-work. You may, by few
inches, miss flowing well. You may get
one and in few days be tapped by
some envious neighbor. Indeed, to tap
other folks well is part of the game. 1t is
an oily joke, as well as oily justice. You
may have pumping well of eighty bar
rels and see your fortune made. A neigh
Dor pulls up his Iipes, lets the water into
your well, and you run nothing but water
afterwards. .r--,
Such az some of the thousand vexstions
and trials an oil man must undergo. The
prize to be won, however, is too great to
discourage him. The bubble of flowing
well glitters before his eye. He sees in
imagination three thousand dollars day
rolling into his pockets, and he revives his
dropping courage and presses on. tits the
patient, pluclIy, never-let-go men who sue
papd