Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1907-07-19
BEGIN RUSH
TOOL FIELD
SENDS MEN TO THE
VALLEY
STAMPEDE MAY ECLIPSE ALI
RECORDS
Syndicate Arouses Widespread
Interest-Miners Will
Stake Claims

REPRESENTATIVES of the Standard Oil
\ company, as we'll as private prospectors,
= left Los Angeles last night over the Salt
Lake road for Lund, Utah, where they
'wil go by team and horseback to the
new oil bonanza district in and around
5Virgin valley.
The rich strikes made by the Timothy
$Spellacy syndicate which owns lands on
one side of the Virgin river and the
Harper -Schenck- Montgomery syndicate,
owning 5000 acres on the other side, start
ed a stampede outstripping any other in
local oil annals.
kilograms, letters and maps have
changed hands rapidly here all day and
rig and machinery houses in Los Angeles,
Salt Lake City and San Francisco have
been notified by mail and by wire to
ship outfits to the new country at once
Salt Lake City has the advantage in
freight rates, and as the Mormons have
for over a half century settled in that
section the boom will be specially felt
in Utah.
Reports from Nevada are that many
idle miners are being grubstaked by
moneyed men who want to get some of
the oil land under placer claims.
BY next week incorporation papers for
a number of new companies will be for
warded to several nearby state and ter
ritorial capitals, assuring plenty of work.
ing sinews for extensive prospecting and
development work
viii Establish Camp
Next week Messrs. Schenck of Los An
geles will make another trip into the oil
strip. They will arrange for the placing
of more drills and also study the freight
situation.
A camp will be established on Virgin
river or North creek. where accommoda-
tions will be furnished travellers who will
pour into the new country and where
teams and vehicles will also be kept
There are no such conveniences now, ex-
cept at long intervals.
George Montgomery, known among
miners as Monty" and among Indians
from the Gulf of Mexico to far up in
Canada as Captain" is responsible for
the present boom.
Montgomery has spent his life in the
western country and there is probably not
a creek between Hudson's bay and Puget
sound on the north and Mexico and the
Gulf of Mexico on the south where he
has not roamed camped or fished
Montgomery Power
THE Indians almost worship him, and
in Utah he holds the absolute confidence
of the Mormons, western travellers and
prospectors say. He is a man of infiu-
enCe III lne mormon SeltlenlenlS III
dicative of the type of prospector he is,
it is said of him that several automobile
concerns have already offered him large
sums to install an auto line from the
Salt Lake road stations to the oil country
Not on your life," said Montgomery.
81 would rather run the machine off a
cliff than scare the horses of the men
there and start them on stampedes.
Those horses up there must get used to
II,v i
soon enough. There are plenty of horses
to be had and they will take any man
anywhere fast enough for some time
to come"
Montgomery spent months in asking
friends to help him push the oil prop
osition. He is brother of e. A. (Bob)
Montgomery, the millionaire miner, but
has always padded his own canoe.
Mrs. Montgomery who was a Miss
Nellie Singleton of Provo, Utah, has
tramped the western country with her
husband for ten years. She can travel
twenty miles day on foot without much
fatigue.
Rush at Mayors Office
Mayors Secretary Herbert D. Kennedy,
one of the Harper Schenck Montgomery
syndicate, stated yesterday that the COM
pany would probably be organized in a
few days. He has already received many
suggestions for names, but the right one
has not yet been found.
Several Salt Lake men who are in Los
Angeles-Al Morgan, an old prospector;
an operator named Reed who owns
hundred teams; Bill Smith of Needles and
Thomas Hewitt of Las Vegas-are among
those who will go into the Virgin river
country at once for themselves and on
behalf of moneyed friends
Mayor Harper's office was lined with
train of callers all day, whose business
was principally to learn about prospects
of getting into the oil game on the ground
floor.