Connecticut western news., 1884-09-03
TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO. ANNIVERSARY OF COL. DRAKE'S DIS-
 COVERY OF PETROLEUM. The First Vein of Oil Struck at TitusviIIe. August 2Stb, 1859, and More Than S4OO,OOO,OOO Invested since.

From letter to the New York Times.]
 Twenty-f years ago was ushered American industry of petroleum pro ducing. Petroleum and its Illuminating properties had been widely known for centuries before on the banks of the Irrawaddy, in British Burmah, in Afghan istan, in Persia, in Turkistan, in Sicily, and elsewhere, but it remained for the United States to produce it and place it among the great articles of the worlds commerce.
 Few industries are so little known, even by Americans, as the petroleum, yet for interesting, one might almost say romantic, surroundings there are none on the face of the globe to compare with it, not even fishery. Moreover, its history is longer, more marvellous, and exciting than anything in the California days of '49 or what followed liar greave's discovery in New South Wales.
 The first oil we'll ever drilled was put down near Titusville just without the city limits. Travellers on the Buffalo, New York and Philadelphia Railroad know the long, woody dell gorge through which the train winds on it's way through the Oil Creek Valley. This gorge, at no point very broad, widens near Titusv1lle into plain in which Titusville lies. At what may be termed the mouth of this gorge the first oil we'll was sunk in 1859 by Colonel Drake, of New Haven, Conn. From the old Indian days petroleum, known as Seneca oil, had existed in the vicinity. Large quantities floating on Oil Creek had been gathered and used for medicinal purposes. From 1854 to 1858 producing operations of a crude nature were carried on by Messrs. Bis sell & Evereth. Trenches were dug into which oil oozed and was afterward pumped into vats. In 1855 these gen. tIemen sold one-third of their property to some New Haven capitalists. The Pennsylvania Rock Oil Company was formed and Col. Drake engaged to sink we'll on the artesian principle. Work was commenced May, 1859, and the first vein of oil was struck Aug. 28-25 years ago-at depth of 693 feet.
 The production of the well at first was ten barrels day, and sold for fifty cents barrel. In September, pumping ap- paratus was applied to the we'll, and 1t yielded for long time between twenty and forty barrels daily. Such IS very rough sketch of the celebrated Drake well, by which the possibility of produc- ing oil direct from the rock was demon strated. But it was, of course, only the beginning. The tools used were, con- pared with those of today, of primi- tive, almost Atlantic type. Wells were then what is called "kicked down" by the feet. The use of steam was an after thought.
 Col. Drake's success reyolutionized things in the little Northwest Pennsyl- vanla hamlet. Like some enchanter he had raised the rough-hewn derrick ln the forest solitude and conquered strange, long pent-up genie from the earth's interior. The birth of a new light-rare enchanter's work, indeed. In short time, on the level lands around Drake's well and along the banks of the shallow, ripping Oil Creek, and on the sides of the neighboring hemlock-clad hills, resounded the rap of the hammer, and the rumble of wagons as derrick after derrick arose. The race for wealth, with the accompanying mad speculation in land, had begun. Titusville was in few years a city of 10000 inhabitants.
 The next step in producing was the drilling of wells down to the third sand, where a much larger production was maintained. In September, 1861, the famous Phillips well on Oil Creek was struck, and did 1000 barrels in the first day. This was followed by the Empire and other wells. In the meantime oil was selling all the way from 10 cents to S2O barrel, though the average price was S4. There is no need to trace the extension of operations, the opening of new fields in Venango, Butler, Clarion, and McKean Counties, in Pennsylvania, and in New York at Richburg. The total production increased rapidly from 82,OOO barrels in 1859 to 9,00O,000 in 1876. Then came the great Bradford field and the following year the production jumped to 13.00O,000. Since then the uaorlu ;oorooco boo hoou aIouf mn 000 barrels. The greatest production was obtained in 1882, when it reached the enormous total of 31 ' 89, ,19O barrels.
 Petroleum was shipped to market at first in barges down the Allegheney River, and by teams and rail- In time the trade outgrew these modes of transit; speedier and, above ali, cheaper means were necessary. Then came the pipe lines, which to-day are connected with 21, 900 wells, re ceiving from them daily 65, 900 barrels of oil. In addition they
 hold, stored in iron tanks, over Al ,O00, ,00C
 barrels, representing the surplus for ac- cumulated stock. To transport and
 store this enormous quantity of oil about 5000 miles of pipe line and over 1,6OC
 iron tanks of an average capacity are necessary. Besides the 5000 miles o branch pipe lines in use in the region there are 1,2OO miles of trunk line fol , piping oil to the refneries at the sea board in Cleveland, Buffalo and Pitts , burg. Between Clean, N. Y, and Nev
 York City nearly 10000 barrels of oi
 are piped daily. Most of the tanks a , present being built are of 35,OO0 barrel B capacity. These huge cauldron-lik
 structures stud the oil regions from en, ! to end by hundreds. They are uni q formly 28 feet high and 90 feet in diam