Los Angeles herald., 1892-09-04
OUR PETROLEUM INTERESTS.
Origin of MOore's Poem Of the
"Fire-worshippers."
The Great Oil Wealth of Ohio and
Pennsylvania.
How Manufacturing City May Be Kept
Smokeless - The Wells Of South
ern California-The Petrole-
um Ship of the Future.


petroleum or kerosene, just as the
reader may see fl to call it, were made
not far from the city Of Baku, on the
Caspian sea. Forty odd years ago a
grim and gaunt figure might have been
seen on that ground, clad in the robes of
a Parsee OF India. The devotee was one
of the last of race that had been for
centuries making its pilgrimages across
the Himalayas into the "Land of Eter-
nal Fire." one of the race of whom
Moore has spoken 30 eloquently in the
lines of Lallah Rookh.
On all sides of this stony-iaced dream
. er were heard the sound of the hammer
and saw, but the Parsee was absorbed
in his prayers, and needed not the en-
croachments of Mammon, who was
erecting, upon the ruins of his forefath-
ers' temples, several oil derricks and
kerosene distillery. These were the
work of the Noble Brothers, the same
parties who manufactured glonoin, or
nitro-glycerine, as it is generally known
to the world OF commerce, for eight years
before anybody else ever thought of
making that dangerous explosive.
TdE TlhELESS GLOBE-THUTTER
who invaded the czar's dominions some
time in the late forties and was fortu.
nate enough to get out without being
cast into prison fortress, brought with
him valuable secret to the effect that
wonderful discovery had been made
on the banks of the Caspian sea that
springs of oil exuded from the rock and
hoated off intact upon the surface of
small stream that sluggishly meandered
on towards the Caspian waves; that
from this oil came An Illuminating fluid
which could be made so cheaply that
whale oil could henceforth be valuable
only as lubricant; and that from the
residue left after extracting the fluid oil,
was made a substance of glutinous ma
ture, called vaseline, which afforded
great relief in cases of burns or scalds.
This discovery was too valuable to re-
main long without imitation. Scores of
busy prOspectors set out, remembering
that they had seen such substance
floating on the surface OF streams in the
great Appalachian range; and in few
weeks all the mountain ranges were
alive with people, from Port Jervis in
New York to the headwaters of Tar
river, in North Carolina.
TWO YEARS OF cEAsELEss TOLL
intervened before any really valuable
discoveries were made, however, for
most OF the prospectors bore away to the
southwark, and expected to find in
North Carolina and Virginia what was
really located in the state of Pennsyl-
vania, the most valuable deposit of
petroleum in the world. But it was on
the 18th day of August, 1869. that E. L.
Drake discovered (and shortly afterward
erected the first oil derrick, "a feet high),
near the present site of the town of
Titusville, in Pennsylvania. What has
since been vast source of maritime COM
merce as we'll as q great help to the
poorer classes who, but for it's discovery,
would now be paying probably $3.50 or
81 per gallon for the whale oil of Nan
tucket and New Bedford. The discovery
of coal oil in Pennsylvania virtually
closed up the whaling industry of the
two latter cities, though it affected the
poorer classes only, as the rich people,
whose opulsnce arose from the blubber
traffic, had invested great share of
their profits in real estate in the cities of
New York, Boston and Philadelphia. So
that it was only the laboring classes in
Nantucket and New Bedford. who suf-
fered when
THE SAILS WERE UNBENT
from the tapering spars and the hulls
that had slowly threaded the icy wilder
ness OF the Ochotsk, lay idly at the
docks. In the mean time, petroleum
grew to the most fabulous proper
tions in Pennsylvania; and men
who had good flowing wells made
more money in q month than
the gold mine owners of California and
Nevada acquired in year. The houses
of these petroleum princes were gener-
ally located in New York or Philadel-
.phia, with summer cottage at New
port or in the Adirondacks. In
q word, the average petro-
leum millionaire was not content
with home, he must have pvlace. In
later years the oil of the rocks became q
gamble in New York, and 30 great was
the excitement surrounding it, that
building was erected on Broadway es-
pecially for that purpose, at cost of
81 ,000, 900. The fortunes of the eleven
men who comprise the Standard Oil COM
pany, aggregate something in excess of
1876, ,OOO, 900, and all accumulated inside
of twenty-three years, while Cornelius
Vanderbilt was forty-four years in &C
cumulating $50 100000 How does that
look as stride towards monarchy?
And now, having sufficiently discussed
the subject abroad, let US see how our
own state figures in the question under
discussion.
MATToLE VALLEY, HUMBOLDT COUNTY,
is believed to be the place where the
first attempt to pump oil on the Pacific
coast was made, although the existence
of oil, in small quantities, in Ventura
county, was known as early as 1857.
The old schooner Julius Pringle brought
up a barrel of it which had been obtain
ed by drilling three holes down into
rock and blowing out the intermediate
core with charge of powder, after
which it had been baled up with tin
dipper on the end of six-foot pole.
When this barrel reached Market.street
wharf there was division of opinion
about it. Some people said it was oil
of tar, while others pronounced it the
genuine petroleum of Pennsylvania.
Both were wrong. for it was q petroleum
but wholly different from that of Penn
svlvania, which has parafne base,
while that Of California has only an
asphaltum base. Hence it is that
our native oils, up to date,
have paid better to sell as
Y, 6sz