Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1895-11-22
Special to the Register.

l-fNA 0iuNr but tolIluS III dl EuIthd Ol
the big gusher on J. NJ. Hammett's farm
the interest manifested in the field has
been very great and oil men are flock
ing to that point in great numbers.
Hundreds Of persons go every day to
see the we'll that flowed six hundred
barrels a day out of condemned terri
tory, and most of them are hunting
I leases. The lana owners are holding
/ their property at fabulous prices. J.
/ ~ Hammett. on whose farm the well
was drilled leased 20 acres more on
/ Tuesday for $4,000 cash and the usual
oue-eiChth of the oil Mr.. Ruclman
I leased IS acres of his farm adjoining
/ the j. H. Hammett property, and part
/ OF which extends to within few hun
I dred Yards of the we'll, for $4,000 and
I the usual one-eighth. Ed Hammett
and Mr.. Keiser. whose farms are near
/ the well. leased 80 and 62 acres respect
/ lively at 500 an acre. The Ed Ham
NETT farm has one or two dry holes on
/ it now. but that did not prevent him
+ from leasing it. He has offers for other
rarts of his farm but is holding that for
$500 an acre. Several other small
/ leases have been made at nominal sums,
most of them being taken before the
well was put down. r. q. HammeJL
| has 200 acres leased little beyond the
wei. which he got before the excite
mcnt for almost nothing, and which at
j present prices is worth q small fortune
The excitement is not caused by the
/ size of the well-fOr while II is splen-
did prOducer. there were many better
in the Old Eureka field-but because II
| 0pens M a new field. or rather eXtends
( the old one into what was by most per-
sons supposed to be g. dry territory.
/ The old Eureka field was pretty well
defined The productive strip was
narrow and back of it was a strip
which was we'll tested by c. n. SHAT
nnclz Fred Rose and others and round
as dry as q bone.
The well which caused all the excite
men- is owned by the Little Venture
! oil Company. and is called the Little
Venrnre No. /. The company IS COM
Dosed of w. VI. Braiden, J. 7. T. Frazier,
Tooes Steele. Adolph and Gust Hoch,
Matt Campbell and ID. S. Mackey. Ihey
bos been drilling a long time and We're
very much discouraged. They had not
fou1d any trace of oil, and last Wednes-
dav when Mr.. Hammett went down TO
see how they were getting along one OF
tbe company remarked that he guessed
they would have to give Il up. Inc
men had decided to stop when another
member of the company came up and
s7id tlev'd better go a few feet further
anyway. The next day the oil was
shouting fifty to seventy-tive feet over
/ the -Op of the derrick. and sending lis
yDr9v for more than one hundred yards
from the well. About 500 barrels OF
/ the oil was caught by dams in the creek
/ bed and was afterward pumped into
tanks. while fully as much more was
| lost. The well flows about every hour,
and ct present fills a siX-inch pipe. The
flow last about three minutes and last
Saturday averaged about twenty-five
/ barrels each time, making the well
good for about 500 barrels q day 1t
l has fallen Off q little, and VIII make
now between 400 and 500 barrels a day,
bu- the drill is but three screws in the
sand. The company VIII drill in deeper
as soon as they complete connections
with the pipe line They have made
Z locations for three new wells and have
machinery or the way.
There IS another part of the Eureka
field that hes never been tested. That
IS i'm the river bottom northwest Of the
dry strip. and between it and the river.
Cy Hugg.us thinks there is oil there,
and he is putting down a well on the
R. @. H8mme-t farm, not a hundred
Yards from Mr. Hammett's house. He
has the rig about completed and will
begin drilling in a few days. Higgins
IS the pioneer operator in the Eureka
field.
Not ffty yards from the famous Burnt
well. which has poured 100000 worth
of cl on the troubled waters with
wonderfully calming effect, is another
well. dry as q fish. There never was
drop of oil in It. although so near the
g1ood we'll and not far from others.
On the hill near the Burnt well is
the cid Mills No l. This well was
drilled i'm 1887 or 1883. and was good in
those 6ays for about ten barrels a day.
Later il began 10 flow a little about
cnce a month from the shallow sand.
Last Monday it broke loose, and between
Z o'clock that afternoon and o'clock
Tuesday morning ;t spouted out over
fifty barrels Of oil from the Berea sand.
Persons living around there seem to
think that perhaps the recent earth
quake shook things up a little in the
bowels of the earth and that the old
well may yet become producer.
Not far from these wells, in the same
line and near together, are the Big
John. Lone Jack. the Cochran Nos 6 and
Z. and other wells, all big producers at
one time and still producing some.
The Cochran No was the biggest pro-
ducer in the Eureka field, coming in at
500 barrels.
East Of this line is the Mccullough
lease of 80 acres, and east of that the
Barnsdall lease each with several good
wells on it, Next to that it the dry
strip in which Shattuck, Rose and 9TH
ers put down wells, and then comes the
unknown field to which the Little Ven
ture No l is directing attention.
While there have been no big wells
i'm the Waverly field that will compare
in any way with the Little Venture No.
I Of the Eureka field, there Is almost
as much excitement there as around
Eureka. The field has been well ex-
plOred. and there seems TO be oil in all
parts Of it. The town is full of strang-
ers every day.
The James Hunter well came in about