The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-05-02
ROMANCE AMONG THE OIL WELLS
How Fortunes Have Been Made and
Lost in transactions in Petroleum.


1t is now about two years since the
phenomenal advance in oil, occasioned by
what was thought to be the extinction OF
the stocks in the winter of 1S94-5. During
that two years one of the most exciting
chapters of oil region history has been
written and the epoch passes away to find
conditions but little changed in any re-
spect. The market is a few cents lower.
with a hope of an upward tendency, jus.
as existed at the opening of March, 1898.
The stocks have increased considera Bile.
yet not enough to create any excitement
Inc number of new wells has been un,
precedented IN the two years. more hav-
ing been drilled since the opening of 1895
than in the best three years previously
and nearly as many as in the FIVE years
just preceding.
Two years ago oil men became imbued
with the fear that the Oil territory wac
reaching its limit The notion spread as
the stocks spread rapidly, and in March
such panic took possession of the mar
ket as even the Oldest operators had never
seen, and which, as subsequent experience
es have shown, was wholly groundless.
In few days after the price of crude
started upward it ran away, and from the
edge of the dollar mark it bounded up
ward until the price reached $780, a fig
ure never dreamed of by anybody. 1t
could not long hold that Unnatural lodge
ment and almost as quickly as it went up
the high figures were shaded off. But the
market held above a dollar until just be-
fore the holidays, or nearly two years.
The experience of the two phenomenal
years in the oil field has developed two
things beyond doubt. The American oil
regions are not in danger of exhaustion.
tn do
pend right away again on the big and en-
dC~ing pools that began with Pitholo and
reached the climax in the great back sand
slayer at Bradford. Since the excitement
began in 1885 the drill has been uncommon
ly busy. The number of new wells each
year has exceeded 1000, the total for the
two years being almost $1,000. In the new
territory the scout and wildcatter have
prosecuted their work, and in fields al
ready run over the drill has been made to
do duty. Strangely enough, it is not in
new country that the prizes have been
met that reward the efforts of the opera
tor. The best pools have been in country
thought to have been thoroughly explor-
ed and in its day abandoned Among the
best producers were the Chipmunk and
the Watsonvi1e pools, in the Bradford
field, and every foot of the ground has
been as familiar to the driller for year
as the best leases in the neighborhood.
the Bradford renaissance. Then Watson
vile followed, and a region that had been
drilled and drilled until the notion that
oil would ultimately be found there fur
nished a theme for joke. Chipmunk was
pretty nearly as decisely condemned. Yet
the two of them have been producing oil
enough to stay the decline in stocks and
to add materially to the quantity on hand.
In Washington county the Cecil pool was
one of the most evanescent ever known.
In a few days the production had climb
ed up to hundreds of barrels and in a few
days more the wells were pumping a dry
lead. The jugular vein was small, but
it afforded a rich return for those wells
that tapped it while " held its treasures.
The Frieden and Dist pools in the Sis
tersville country gave promise, and reach
ed a production daily of 5000 barrels This
territory was short-lived, as was the Heb
ron and the Belmont development that
followed. In Pennsylvania, through But
Ter, Allegheny, Greene and other counties.
little pools of apparent magnitude have
come TO light, only to flash in a short
Il lie, and show that but a few thousand
barrels of oil were to result. The two
years of unequaled search for oil have re-
suited in the discovery of nothing that
gives promise for the future so far as the
opening of new territory is concerned,
and nothing that leads to the expectation
of big quantities of oil from any section.
Tennessee, which at one time offered con-
siderable hope, has not held up anticipa-
tions. The Kentucky counties near the
Tennessee line are about as bad. The for
nation is so indefinite that IL affords no
light on what to expect, and the dscoV-
cries are too often merely pockets in the
cavernous limestone to pin any faith to
that section of the union as a source of
supply for the future.
The Big Sandy country In West Virginia
and Kentucky has added nothing to the
enthusiasm Of those who are working in
that vicinity, and well-posted oilmen pro-
fess to regard the region as no good. The
1900 wells drilled in the hope OF finding
rich rewards within the past two years
have brought to the operator the conviction
that i'm the states and in the fields that
are already familiar to him he must do
his prospecting. and that in the territory
once looked upon as exhausted he will
find enough oil 70 keep the market sup
piled II he hunts for Il diligently.
As the situation stands at present the
pools are seen to be Of small caliber. and
the oil production stands where II did two
years ago, except that so much more ex-
ploration has been carried on without find
ing big strikes. Yet that now dlscourages
nobody, and neither does II affect the
market for crude The success OF the men
who have gone over the old fields OF the
upper counties is evidence enough that II
is as useful 10 go back and drill the un-
tested lands as to seek vainly In untrod-
den fields. II Is proven beyond doubt by
the experience of the two years that were
spent IN going over much ground appar-
entity the second time that one well does
not condemn anything around IL, except
for a short distance. A dry hole may be
punched under a derrick the shadow OF
which falls on the borders OF rich pool,
be q ever so small.
The biggest oil production the country
has known was in 1891. when the output OF
Illuminating oil was 3575O,O00 barrels Last
year Il exceeded $4,000. Were Il not
that Lima oil Is entering the markets for
Illuminating oil this production would not
have been any too much for a growing
trade. but with the better methods OF re-
dning Lima oil Is becoming such an I'm
portant factor IN Illuminating that rs old
USES az a fuel oil have been made impos-
sibie by the advancing cost.
Haa L.