About This Item

Share This Item

The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

AAPG Bulletin

Abstract


Volume: 69 (1985)

Issue: 9. (September)

First Page: 1445

Last Page: 1445

Title: Early Days Along Oil Creek, Pennsylvania (1859-1865): ABSTRACT

Author(s): Samuel T. Pees

Article Type: Meeting abstract

Abstract:

Beginning in late August 1859, with the success of the Drake well at 69.5 ft, early oil exploration concentrated along Oil Creek in the stretch between Titusville and Oil City, but other areas in northwest Pennsylvania also saw discoveries. Tributaries to the creek had their share of activity. Pioneer, Benninghoff, Cherry, and Wildcat Runs were famous names. Wildcat became the standard word for a rank exploratory well. The 1859 (and later) oil boom rivaled and usually surpassed the excitement of the 1849 gold rush in California according to some adventurers who saw both.

A proliferation of oil strikes in the narrow valley included wells such as the Noble and Delamater ("Golly, ain't that well spittin' oil?"), which produced over 700,000 bbl in 21 months, Buckeye well (1,000 b/d and the first oil from the creek to be exported abroad), the Maple Shade (never stopped flowing even when it burned) and the Phillips well (4,000 b/d). These wells were among a multitude of phenomenal gushers. Most wells had a total depth of less than 500 ft, some less than 200 ft. The drillers, operators, investors, and brokers learned of the local sequence of Upper Devonian Venango sands (First, Second, Third Stray or Gray, and Third) and described their trends as veins or streaks. These beach, bar, and nearshore deposits abruptly pinched out, leaving one wildcatter with a fe barrels and a neighboring well with initial gauges in the hundreds or thousands.

This study traces the early major oil strikes down Oil Creek and describes the geology of the shallow sands that they tapped. Period photographs and steel engravings of the 1860s are compared to a photographic essay of the creek as it is today. Many of the famous wells are still there. Oil Creek is a shrine to the unique personality of the oilman and the titan industry, which at the outset, had to cope with rugged conditions and seemingly capricious sands.

End_of_Article - Last_Page 1445------------

Copyright 1997 American Association of Petroleum Geologists