The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-05-01
LUCK THAT CAME OF OIL
MEN WHO TAPPED
WEALTH n DIED POOR.
Death in Poverty of the Man That
of the Pennsylvania Oil Fields.

New York Sun.
Il see that Tinecum Bill Smith is dead"
said an old-time operator in the original
Venango county oil regions, land that re-
minds me that when he jabbed the pioneer
drill into the ground on Watson's Flats in
the summer of 1859 there wasn't a man be-
tween the New York state line and Pitts
burg that was worth 100000. Yet in less
than three years there We're more men, and
women, too, worth ten and even twenty
times that amount than there had been
people in the county worth $40, 900 in 1S59-all
because of the jabbing down of Bill Smiths
drill.
William A. Smith-or Tinecum Bill, as he
was called, because he was a noted salt we'll
borer at Tinecum-started the first drill that
tapped the petroleum deposit of Pennsylva-
MIA, from which hundreds of millions of dol
lars have been added to the wealth of the
country. OF course, he wouldn't have done
it if he hand't been hired to do it by Col. E..
L. Drake.
People whereabouts thought Drake was
crazy, and they ridiculed him., and no one
could be induced to work for him or aid him
in putting down his test well; so he sent for
Bill Smith. The people would very likely
nave looked upon Drake still more unkindly
if they had known that as an employe of
the New York & New Haven Railroad the
responsibility for a recent disaster by which
many lives were lost had been placed on
him-although unjustly, as it afterward
came out-and that he had left Connecticut
because of that and sought the seclusion of
the then isolated Oil creek country in Penn
sylvania. His going there was not an aim
Ioe1 o,,rUo. IT, coryoroJ roo ne thA Naxxy
York drug firm of Eveloth & Bissell had
been manufacturing a liniment which those
whose memories can go back forty-ive
years or so will remember as the Mustang
Liniment, a preparation famous for its far
reaching odor. That odor came from the
liniment's base, which was a natural oil OBJ
tanned from the surface of a spring on prop
erty which the drug firm owned near Titus
vile, Pa. This oil was collected by dipping
blankets in the spring and wringing out the
oil they absorbed. Thus a gallon or so OF 1T
was gathered and shipped to the New York
drug firm from Ttusvllle daily for several
years until 1893.
In the fall of 1858 the New York drug
house turned over it's holding in the Gran
ford county oil spring property to a hrm
in New Haven to which it was indebted. A.
member of the New Haven firm was a
great friend of Drake and when the latter
got into trouble his friend advised him to
go away for a time and to utilize his time
by looking over the Crawford county prop
erty. That was why Drake sought particu-
larly the Oil creek wilderness as the place
OF his seclusion. ,yca
THE FIRST WELL.
Everybody knows how brakes investiga-
ions led to the origin and building up of the
great petroleum industry of this country by
which almost unprecedented private for
tunes have been made, but everybody
doesn't know that William A. Smith was
the man who put down the first drill and
was the only man that could be induced to
undertake the crazy job, as the Oil creekers
called it. He began the we'll on July /,
1859. working the drill with his foot and a
spring pole. on the morning of Aug. 80,
having quit work the night before with the
drill down nearly seventy feet and no oil IN
sight, Smith went out and found the. well
full of oil. and in d short time he dipped
from it a barrelful. That original barrel OF
crude petroleum was sold III Plttsburg Tor
S34. Drake was no longer a lunatic. He be-
came instantly the lion of the Oh creek VAL
ley. The news of the discovery was mashed
over the country from P%ittsburg, and the
memorable oil excitement began. Drake
never made a dollar out of his discovery and
subsequent oil operations, and after a rev
years left the oil regions almost pennlless.
Ten years later the State of pennsylvania
granted him a pension OF $l,5OO a year, ana
but for this, in spite of the millions he had
caused to flow into other pockets, he Wouid
Have filled q pauper's grave. Tlnecum BIZ
Smith, who put down the original oil well,
died a destitute old man., and 1t isn't likely
that half a dozen men in the oil trade to-
day ever knew of the interesting part he
took in the starting of the business.
Il remember a good many persons VINO
were poor one day and became mllllonalreS
the next, without an effort on their part,
and many who struggled hard to gain the
good fortune that at last came to them.
The first of the flowing wells to become
famous along Oil creek was the Funk we'll
1t was struck in June, 1861. 1t began flow
ing at the rate of three hundred barrels q
day. The farm on which this Wei was
drilled belonged to John Funk, a Venango
county farmer. who, like all the rest or the
farm owners in that region, mad never peen
able to produce on his farm more tnan
enough to keep himself and family alive.
The leases. royalties and Interests that ne
secured from persons anxious to operate on
his farm made him more than a million
aire in less than a month.
'"This gushing oil we'll received the name
of 'The Fountain and before the region
had recovered from it's aStoniShment caused
by the Funk well. the Phillips we'll, on the
Tarr farm. penetrated the sand and began
spouting two thousand barrels a day. Jim
Tarr, the owner of the land. was q teamster
in the employ of the Collins Brothers. Ium-
bermen. While that well was drilling Tarr
offered to sell his farm to the senior mem
completed. The Phillipses had leased the
part of the tract where the we'll was going
down. which gave it it's name. AS in the
case of John Funk, Jim Tarr became a rich
man. as one might say, in a day: HIS farm
yielded him a sum away. up IN the mlillons;
and he retired with his family to a splendld
property near Meadville, where he lived SO
ostentatiously and even riotously, and
dipped so largely in speculation. that
when he died. in 1871, his magnificent for
tune was but a shadow of its former self.
ANOTHER PIONEER.
Another one of the pioneer millionaires
of Oil creek was Jim Sherman. He had no
money to begin with, but he had a lease of
the Foster farm. His wife had $500, which
she was willing to risk in the hope of MAX
ing a fortune in oil. This money was all
consumed before Sherman had fairly begun
his work. 1t was necessary for him to get
an engine to sink his well, and he had no
money to purchase one. Two men who
owned an engine, but had no money to OBJ
tain land to use it on, proposed to. Sher-
man that he give them a share IN MS Well
in return for the engines. He gave them an
eighth interest, and drilling was begun.
Another eighth interest was disposed or by
Sherman tor $500 cash. The drill was put
down to within a few feet OF the supposed
oil sand and then the funds ana cred1t or
the operators were exhausted.
Sherman offered a sixteenth interest In
his well for $500. No one wanted 1t. He at
shotgun. He sold the gun for SIS, and with
the SIS capital thus raised the drill was
started again. Again the funds ran out and
the coveted vein was still untapped. An
other sixteenth interest Sherman offered
for $50. Spectators fought shy of the Eos
ter farm for some reason and Sherman
could not find any one to pay that sum or
and he at last traded the interest for a
horse, which he thought he might be able
to turn into cash. He got a customer for
the horse and sold it for 500. This new