Hungry Horse news and Columbian. [volume] (Columbia Falls, Mont.) 1946-1948, 1947-10-17
birth Fork Oil Is Tradition, Faith

BEFORE Henry Ford built his fir,
Ford, when Pennsylvania oil field
lighted the lamps of the nation an
young men courted in carria oe,
Editor John w Pace in the Janrar
Z, 1892 columbian" wrote of q
up the Flathead rivers North For
ION the North Fork manv pal
Ions of oil have been gathered from
the surface of water bodies. an.
samples sent east have been pro
nounced of the best quality"
Editor Pace Of Columbia Fall
first newspaper also knew of tn,
white settlers tale of 60 years agc
about Flathead Indians using nj
from North Fork seepages in thei,
hair. First refineries were Indiar
blankets placed in Sage creek; mex
step was to wiring the blankets out
and there was oil.
First Wells at Kintla
Then followed likely the first
prospecting for oil in the state of
Montana. On the old Dan Dover
spike place between the two Kintla
lakes in what is now Glacier ma
tional park, shallow test holes
were put down. A flow of natural
gas resulted.
1t was the worlds most scenic
Oil prospecting field. For in the IS
mile wide Rocky mountain trench.
the first derricks were in the sha-
dow Of white capped Glacier and
Waterton national park alpine
peaks. Moose and deer visited the
,, derricks as they do to this day,
and each autumn the larch turned
gold in the middle of the spruce
and pine forests. Man hoped that
another gold would ANY day now
come forth from holes in the earth.
Only road into the area was I'D
the North Fork, and the rest of Ca
NADIA was separated from the de-
velopment by mile after mile of
the Fernie-Cranbrook primitive
area, a big game hunting area.
Groceries and pipe came in from
Columbia Falls las it does today,
and the town hoped that oil would
come out.
For nearly so years coil up the
North Fork" is story of great
hopes, and the spending of sever
al million dollars. Sage creek &C.
ross the line in Canada (outside
the two national PARKS became
the center Of drilling. In 1913, the
Flathead Petroleum company, Wy
oming capital, put down a test
well, and old-timers Matt Brill and
Harry Holcomb, still living on the
North Fork, recall how old Andy
Anderson, the trapper, drove his
Model T for Is years on seepage
from that early well. There is still
seepage.
Formations Favorable
The geologic formations have ia
niliar tlames-Madison lime, Col
,rado sha1e and Kootenai coal. De-
that came later less
han 100 miles away across the
resulted in the great
Turner and Kevin-Sunburst oil
fields.
Except for the two wars, there
las been drilling up the Flathead's
North Fork year after year. There
vas the Butte well, the British Co.
umbia and the Crows Nest wells,
ne Columbia with it's 1872 foot steel
ig that employed 81 men at one
ime. Canadian, English, Pacific
cast and Iowa corn money flowed
1to the North Fork, but no oil
commercial quantities flowed
ut.
Most spectacular, the Columbia
yell went down to 8,OO7 feet, but
1e drilling was sideways, and the
stimated depth below the surface,
400 feet. Old-timers are convin-
ed that the Columbia would have
cen a producing well, but that
le sponsors wanted nothing but a
usher
The two oil men of Columbia
alls and the North Fork today
re A ] Knutson and G J Walling-
,rd. Their faces light up as they
Tx of the flowing gold that should
me from the shadow of the peaks. h
Knutson Arrived In 1920 h
Knutson, who joined the old 5
rows Nest company in 1920, q
ased land from Madge Cooper \
1888 six miles north OF
e border in British Columbia, =
i'd eight miles west of the Sage
eek wells in the center of the =
ockv mountain trench. Drilling r
the Border Oil well started lii r
80, and was resumed after the
ar. It is down to 1900 feet under T
new rig. {
Wallingford, a Portland automo-
e dealer, acquired leases In 1870
d started drilling the present n,
,otenay well in 1943. It's down to a.
100 feet, and is a three-mile dis ~
nee neignbor of the Border OIL al,
mpany well. Snow that in OCT he
er comes down to the foot OF
I,