Los Angeles herald., 1910-05-09
ROTARY INVENTOR
WRITES OF DRILL
Los Angeles Man Claims Present
Day Device Is Imitation
of His Machine .
MADE FIRST TEST IN KERN
Breitwiser Aserts Revolving Ap-
paratus Was a Success
Over Ten Years Ago
MADE FIRST TEST IN KERN

The growing popularity of the rotar"
drill in the oil fields of the San Joa-
ouin valley has induced j. 10. Brett
wiser. 1470 West Adams street, Los
Angeles. who is accredited with pelhs
the inventor of the rotary, to protest
aaainet claims made by present-day
agents and firms that the ROTARY 10
new i'm both device and applcatioil;; u;
Mr. Breitwiser in a specially prepared
arricie Tor The Herald states his slae'
giving also some valuable ln1orudeioIi
about the rotary drill and advice upon
the subject. He asserts that lshI
rotary is a useless piece of machinery
and that any kind of rotary Is
FaiI,,re ,,nless constructed so that
standard stem and bits can be useu
at anv time the formation demands.
Mr.. Breitwiser's article folloWs'
There have been many references IN
the oil news of the several papers 70 70
a so-called "new machine or methou
E of drilling wells called rotary or ny
draulic. In the interest of the truth
and fair NAV 1 desire your space for a
few lines upon that subject. The tact
is that the writer introduced the hrst
machine of this kind and drilled tne
first oil we'll ever drilled in CanIorhlt'
with II in the month of May, 19OO, on
the Kettleman plains some twenty
miles south of Coalinga. The Hanloru
DaiIv News of May "a, 1900, contains
this paragraph: ,,a,a
success as is evidenced by the tact
that II has drilled $50 feet in four
working days or As actual hours time
With this rig 1t is not necessary 10
case up the hole until the well is nm
ished, and if a dry hole not then, so
that all the expensive casing needed
arI rin is saved. j, H.
Breitwiser, the inventor Is supelA'-
tendent," %
A later article gave an account or
the second hole. drilled 1900 feet III
nine days by the same rig which later
was sold for debt because OF iallure
of the company and shipped TO Arizona
where it is still used for water weil
prospecting. oo
The Pacific Oil Reporter of June %.
1900, says:
RIGS ARE DIFFERENT
"There is no similarity between this
rig and the one commonly used Inc
nrinciple of his system is that OF a
drill attached to the lower end or a
four-inch pipe, the latter beng useu
as n shaft with which to turn the drill
AS fast as the depth increases new
lengths of pipe are added INTO tIe
ton of the string of pipe is continually
nnmDe0 q SlTedDi VI NtlNNi
der pressure goes down through the
nine and escaping through two holes
jns the sides of the lower end or tpe
drill comes up to the surface on the
outside of the pipe, thus serving the
double purpose of bringing the drill
ings to the surface and keeping the
walls from caving. Remarkably rapid
rrorress can be made with this rig
for. he went down ESQ feet in 4S hours
OF this so feet was through silicious
formation at 470 feet. The cost or the
labor on this we'll was only 1910.
I have many other references to this
rig printed at the time. To those VINO
desire to hunt up these other articles
would refer to the files of the Pa
ci6c oil Reporter, the Bulletin, the
POST the Call the Examiner and the
Oil Fields and Mines of San Fran
cisco: The Herald, the Times, the EX-
press and Oil Era of Los Angles, as
also the Oil Derrick and the Petroleum
Gazette of London.
CONTROLS HEAvTNG SAND
Immediately thereafter / went to
McKittrick and remodeled the machlhe
in order to adapt it to cleaning out
and controlling the heaving sand IN the
wells of several companies there.
Older men remember that for year
or more these wells did not produce
anv oil because the sand heaved up
into them and completely shut out the
oil time and again after they had peen
drilled out by the standard method.
NV first work there was to clean out
ana remove a mud scowN in the bot
tom of a we'll that had been worked
on continuously for four months ana
without getting the scoW out.
After setting up the machinery the
scow was recovered before noon the
first day and within three days treat
ment the first flowing well California
ever saw was spouting over the top
of the derrick at Mc<ittrick and con-
tinued to so spout until she was forced
down because of lack of sump hole
and transportation facilities. Thls
well was quickly followed with an
other on the same property and three
others for other companies, each OF
which flowed and was in equally bad
condition when they were turned over
for treatment. This was the beginning
of the first oil excitement in California.
Oil dropped from 30 cents barrel
to 10 cents within 30 days, owing to
the fight against the Standard Oil
company, and the withdrawal of tank
cars, and the slump in oil was on as
quickly as the excitement came
FINDS MARKET FOR RIGS
Several of these rigs were sold and
put in use, but in examining we'll
with a party OF san francisco cap
italists in the then undevelopedA Santa
Maria field l received a crushed skull
in saving one of them from falling
derrick and for year was out of oil
altogether. Then took up the matter
of this pew rig again and found oppo-
sition. Every well driller in the state
fought it with every possible objection
and lie he could invent, for he did not
want a rig that would drill we'll in
as many days as he had been taking
months before because it shortened
his job. The stock takers fought it
because they could have no excuse for
their stock schemes covering months
when they had rig that would finish
up the well in two weeks That was
too short a time to work the public,
and 1 tramped from office to office,
both in Los Angeles and San Fran
cisco, showing them better way and
receiving all kinds of compliments on
the better way, but never an order for
a rig, until / got tired of wearing out
shoe leather that way and went into
real estate business. I contended then
and do now that this method is the
only sensible one for drilling new wells