The age-herald., 1902-01-19

county field in San Joaquin county, Cal,
 lying between the Sierra Nevada and the coast range mountains. Judging from the
 development of that field 1t Is reason- able to suppose that oil will be found all over the Tennessee Valley in spots up to the foothills of the mountains. It is little early to predict in what quan- titles oil will be found, as the wells now being drilled have so far only found first oil sand at a depth of from 300 to 800 feet. The yield of a well can be estimated to produce two barrels of oil to each foot of sand drilled through. If the oil sand is 100 feet deep. the well should be 200 barrel producer. This territory is, how ever, improved and it Is altogether prob
 lematical as to the depth of the oil sand recently discovered as estimates are bas- ed only in past experience. One fact seems certain and that Is judging from the character of the oil sands so far found in this section It should be a good healthy producer of a very high grade Illuminating oil. and may be expected to bring in some big wells as the petroleum gas encountered indicates a very heavy pressure.
 Early History of oil Development.
 The present interest in oil and the de- velopment now in progress is not of re- cent origin The report of the geologi cal survey of the Tennessee Valley re- gion of Alabama by Dr. Eugene A.
 Smith, state geologist, contains some very interesting data on the early at tempts to develop oil in this territory. The report says that mineral tar and
 asphalt springs occur in the Moulton Valley and about a dozen wells have been bored in that valley for gas and oil. Both gas and oil and salt water were found and one of the wells is said by an expert to have been paying well with a capacity of 20 barrels per day. The oil was odorless and of a dark green color though the oil from some of the other wells was odorless and of a black color. This well is also said to have fur
 nished gas at the rate of 250O0 cubic feet per day. and other of the wells are said to have furnished gas in consider able quantities. One of them is now an overfowing or artesian salt water well. Numerous fields of asphalt and bitum- inous rock are found in the neighbor- hood of Town Creek in Lawrence coun- ty and on the weathered surfaces in spots the rocks are streaked with oxida- ton of the crude oil into maltha, and in some places 1t Is further oxidized in- to asphaltum. These rocks burn freely fin a hot fire. Spasmodic attempts have been made to sink shallow, small bore wells in the past without results.
 The Cover Wells.
 Not far from the foot of Sand Noun tain in the southeast corner of Lawrence county the Moulton oil Company sunk six wells with six-inch pipe in 1890-1. Cover well No. 1 according to Dr. Mo Rae, the geologist in charge, struck an odorless gas at 302 feet which burned ten feet high out of the six inch pipe.
 A second gas was struck at 500 feet and had pressure enough to blow away hat held over the opening of the pipe First oil sand was struck at 900 and the sec ond 400. This well was ruined by shoot ing with pitro-glycerine. which let salt water in and drowned out the oil. The other wells were sunk at various depths, capped and abandoned after having fal- len into the hands of the Standard Oil Company.
 On Caps Creek. a branch of Brushy | Fork of Sipsey river in Lawrence coun- | ty there Is a well said by the old set
 tiers to have been drilled in 1867, and