Montana oil and mining journal. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1931-1953, 1940-04-27
OUTSIDE CAPITAL NEEDED

Cut Bank. owing chiefly to lack of capi-
tai to drill tests.
And that answers, in part, the ques-
tiOn. There isn't enough investor money
coming into Montana to finance deep
drilling. group of Butte people fl
nanced the Frazer-Rice deep test. That
hole was lost because of the poison gas
which made it impossible to go ahead.
They didn't have the funds, in the abb
s"nce of excitement to drill another well
That well proved that cable tools are
not adequate to drill a DevOnian test.
Rotary tools must be used, yet rotary
equipment is yet a novelty in Montana
drilling.
So there is a second answer: adequate
equipment for deep drilling is not yet
I'm use in Montana. There is only one
operator in Montana who owns rotary
tools. Other operators are not in pO-
sition to buy rotary equipment displac-
ing present cable tools, and thereafter
drill deep tests, even though they are
sure of getting oil.
The major companies will not drill
in Montana because the situation is
dominated by Independents. The majors
have never brought in Oil field in
Montana, excepting Dry Creek, and If
deep sand production is ever found, 1t
will be financed by independent operators.
We do not know one man of any ip
telligence who is engaged in the on
industry in Montana who does not be-
neve that the formations below the
Madison lime will produce MOntana's
chief resources of oil and gas. None
of them denies the significance to nOrth-
ern Montana of the giant DevOnian gasser
drilled by Standard of California at Steve
Vile. Alberta, east of Calgary. But until
Montana has access to investor money
and possesses rotary tools capable of
deeper drilling there will be no develop
ment of formations below the Madison
lime How many possible oil horizons
will be found below the Madison lime,
only the drill can tell Tt is known that
there is a 2OO-foOt sand at the top of
the Ordovician which is the great VIII
cox horizon of Oklahoma, but whether
it contains oil is something that takes
money and rotary tools to determine.
Evidence of deep sand production
means something to the investor who
does not require a wild "bOom" to i'm
spire him. It is possible for investor
to go out today and buy farms in fee
simple known structures, with abso-
lutte faith that in the not distant future
someone is going to prove that, like
Illinois and other states where deeper
drilling has arrived, Montana is going
to produce from horizons below the lime.
To the investor who cannot afford to
buy an entire farm. with all the oil rights
it offers opportunity to join with one or
two or several Others pool the funds
and buy a farm or farms, or to buy
outright n part of the landowners roy
atty. If Montana were as close to
city the size of Chicago is the Salem
field. it would not be possible to buy
oil lands on cost basis of grazing
lands. so it is fortunate for the investor
that the development has been delayed
in Montana. We rest assured that
when someone brings I'm a big producer
as is inevitably coming-the big COM
panies are going to be sitting in the
front row in Montana, drilling down the
lines of the Independents who
are lucky enough to pick up a few acres.
1t is a question of the noise of the boom.
Meantime, the investor who picks up
royalties in producing oil fields on the
basis of values ABOVE the lime is going
TO enjoy the greatest profits that are to
,Ome to the fortunate few who are ION
the ground" before the boom starts. To
the Intelligent investor, the boom means
DrOfit-talzing time, rather than buying
time.
Current publications together with of
fering sheets of available Montana roy
aIties will be forwarded to those who
request them.