The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1882-06-28
An Embarrassment of Riches.

That there can be sstoo much of q
good thing" the old saying AYERS. The
truth of the statement win not be ques-
toned Just now anywhere among pre-
ducers and dealers In oil. Oil is a good
thing. A producing well is good
thing. A flowing well that costs next to
nothing for running expenses, as 1t runs
itself day in and day out without any
expenditures for fuel or wear and tear
of machinery, is decidedly good thing.
But q flowing well that sends out 1000
to 1,500 barrels q day, deluges the mar
ket, swamps the buyers, and threatens
the oil interest with widespread ruin, is
altogether vastly too much of a good
thing. As with some exceedingly good
people who are so overpowering in their
goodness that they become insufferable
to ordinary mortals, there is a general
disposition to treat 1t as q common ene-
my and throttle it.
The trouble is at Warren County,
Pennsylvania. An industrious borer
was at work out there tapping the earth
for oil. He had bored for some time in
vain, but, beside his dry hole, he had
faith and pluck. Day after day he
drilled through the rock without even a
ssshow" of oil in the boring.
The interested neighbor and the idly
curious wayfarer greeted him daily and
hourly with questions, sarcastic or in
quisitive, as to "how he was getting
along" and show much further he was
going" which were met with answers
growing more defiant In tone as the
hole went deeper and the "show" no
better.
He had scrawled on bit of board the
expressive legend: "On or China, "
which he was about to nail on derrick
as q comprehensive answer to all ques-
tons, when-the experienced reader OF
oil stories knows what to expect-the
borer suddenly dropped into q hole and
was Immediately shot out as If from a
cannon. There was tremendous roar,
q jetting of green, greasy fluid high up
in the air, and the lately despondent
borer leaped six feet in his Joy, cracking
his heels together and turning double
somerset into rapidly widening pool OF
green grease as he realized that at last
he had "struck ile."
The rush of oil from the hole was not
more swift than the rush of oil-men
from the wells round about to see for
themselves the astonishing fact. Swifter
yet was the flight of the affrighted
ssoperators" to the telegraph offices to
spread the news of the big strike and
get rid of their holdings before the only
big bear found its way into the market.
A panic struck the oil exchanges.
Down went the prices as rapidly as the
incautious pedestrian shoots down q
well-greased slide. The owner of the
new well was aghast at the mischief he
had caused; but what did he dop One
hundred, 500, 1000, 1,400 barrels day
streamed out in incessant and ever.
increasing fow-on the oil exchanges u
not at the well-and down went the
prices with still greater rapidity.
Veterans in oil look at each other with
pale faces and shake their heads omin-
ously. They remind each other of the
'sbig strikes" of the Oil Greek days
twenty years and more ago, and of the
disasters thereby caused. There wa,
the old original Funk well of 1861, that
operated $50 barrels day, and kept up
its dow for fifteen months. Then came
the Phillips well, on the Tarr farm, with
Its roaring 1000, and its great rival, the
Empire well, on the McElhinney tract
"a very Jumbo of wells, spouting 5000
barrels q day. What an unmanageable
monster that wasi There was no con.
trolling 1t, nor could its product be
saved. Feeble efforts were made to
plug 1t, or to put in stop-cocks, but
plugs and tubes were blown out as SC
many straws, and the baffied expert.
menters fell back drenched with oil
The tanks were filed to running over in
o trice, and so were the huge reservoirs
made by digging trenches and building
dams. Oil Creek became literally, a;
well as In name, o river of oil. The
price of barrels went up as that of oil
went down, until the latter was but ter
cents barrel, and the former at rates
that threatened to beggar even the pro