This Week July 25 to July 31
July 25, 1543 – Oil reported in New World
Spanish explorers sailing in brigantines discover an oil seep off the Texas coast that will exist as late as 1903.
The first documented report of oil in the New World is made near the Sabine River on the Texas coast — when a storm forces two of Spanish explorer Don Luis de Moscoso’s seven brigantines ashore.
After a discouraging expedition in East Texas, de Moscoso, who succeeded expedition leader Hernando de Soto, built the seven small vessels and sailed down the Mississippi, according to the Houston Geological Society. After reaching the Gulf of Mexico, the Spaniards decided to sail west along the coast. The storm hit and drove two brigantines ashore.
An account published in 1557 notes “the vessels came together in a creek where lay the two brigantines that preceded them, finding a scum the sea cast up, called copee, which is like pitch and used instead on shipping where that is not to be had, they payed the bottoms of their vessels with it.”
Native Americans had previously used oil from seeps for medicine, tanning hides, waterproofing fabrics, and caulking their boats. Moscoso’s men used pitch from from the offshore oil seep they found west of the Sabine Pass. That seep remained active as late as 1903.
July 27, 1918 – Launch of First Concrete Oil Tanker
Built for Standard Oil Company of New York, the first concrete oil tanker is 98-feet long.
America’s first concrete vessel designed to carry oil, the Socony, is launched at its shipyard on Flushing Bay, New York. The reinforced concrete barge is 98-feet long with a 32-foot beam. Built for the Standard Oil Company of New York, the ship draws nine feet with a cargo of 370 tons.
“Bulk oil is carried in six center and two wing compartments, which have been oil-proofed by a special process,” explains the journal Cement and Engineering News. “Eight-inch cast iron pipe lines lead to each compartment and the oil pump is located on a concrete pump room aft.”
Steel shortages during World War Two will lead to the construction of larger concrete oil tankers.
July 28, 1924 — Oil Scouts form Association
Scouts began as the earliest oil patch detectives.
The National Oil Scouts Association of America — today the International Oil Scouts Association – files its charter in Austin, Texas, bringing new standards to an important oilfield profession.
Since the birth of America’s petroleum industry in 1859, oil scouts have gathered field intelligence on drilling operations — including often sensitive information about the operator, location, lease, depth of well, formations encountered, logs and other data, which may yield a competitive advantage.
James Tennent, author of The Oil Scouts – Reminiscences of the Night Riders of the Hemlocks, proclaimed in 1915 that scouts “saved the general trade thousands and millions by holding market manipulators in check.”
Read more in “Oil Patch Detectives.”
July 29, 1918 – Burkburnett becomes a North Texas Boom Town
A wildcat well comes in on S. L. Fowler’s farm near a small North Texas community on the Red River. The subsequent drilling boom will make Burkburnett famous — two decades before “Boom Town,” the 1940 motion picture it inspires.
"Burkburnett was a sleepy farm town that transformed into a 'Boom Town' as a result of the North Texas oil boom in 1918," explains the Burkburnett Historical Society. A popular 1940 MGM movie results from an article in Cosmopolitan magazine.
At the time of the Fowler No. 1 well’s discovery, future moviestar Clark Gable is a teenage roustabout in an Oklahoma oilfield. The well is completed at the northeastern edge of Burkburnett, founded in 1907 — and named by President Theodore Roosevelt, who two years earlier hunted wolf along the Red River with rancher Burk Burnett.
A collection of 1930s oilfield photography by Farm Security Administration photographers can be found at Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
Although Wichita County had been producing oil since 1912 (thanks to a shallow water well west of town) Fowler’s decision to drill a well on his farm — an attempt called “Fowler’s Folly” by some — will bring an oil boom to Wichita County. Fifty-six drilling rigs are at work just three weeks after his oil strike at 1,734 feet deep. Six months later, Burkburnett’s population has grown from 1,000 to 8,000. A line of derricks two-miles long greets visitors.
By June 1919, there are more than 850 producing wells in "the world's wonder oilfield."
The Burkburnett oilfield joins earlier discoveries in nearby Electra (1911) and Ranger (1917) that will make North Texas a worldwide leader in petroleum production. By the end of 1918, Burkburnett oil wells are producing 7,500 barrels per day. By June 1919, there are more than 850 producing wells in “the world’s wonder oilfield.”
Nineteen local refineries are soon processing the crude oil. The town’s unpaved streets are lined with newly formed stock offices, brokerage houses, and autos stuck in the mud. Twenty trains are running daily between Burkburnett and nearby Wichita Falls. Yet another highly productive Wichita County oilfield is then discovered, bringing more prosperity for North Texas.
But eventually, the oil boom dies out. Affected by the Great Depression, Burkburnett’s population declines during the 1930s. By 1939, the town has a population of less than 3,500. At the same time, the movie “Boom Town” is adapted from a Cosmopolitan magazine article, “A Lady Comes to Burkburnett.”
The 1940 MGM feature stars Spencer Tracy and Clark Gable, Hedy Lamarr and Claudette Colbert. It is nominated for two Academy Awards.
At the time of the 1918 Burkburnett discovery well, Clark Gable was a 17-year-old roustabout in an oilfield outside Bigheart, Oklahoma.
At the time of the 1918 Burkburnett discovery well, Clark Gable was a 17-year-old roustabout working with his father William Gable, a service contractor, in an oilfield outside Bigheart, Oklahoma. In 1922, Gable would collect an inheritance from his grandfather and leave working in the Oklahoma oil patch for good.
Clark Gable’s father is reported to have said, “I told the stubborn mule if he left me this time, he need never come back.”
Today, Burkburnett’s population exceeds 10,000, thanks to agriculture, continued production from its historic oilfield – and the 1941 establishment of nearby Sheppard Air Force Base. Among Burkburnett’s tourist attractions are the Bluebonnet Festival in April — and the Felty Outdoor Oil Museum.
Wichita Falls "skyscraper"
A footnote of the North Texas oil boom is the “World’s Littlest Skyscraper” in Wichita Falls. Just 40 feet tall with 118 square feet per floor, it has survived since 1919. The building is a monument of the boom town era — and a Philadelphia con man who convinced oilmen (who were desperate for office space) to approve fraudulent blueprints.
J. D. McMahon disappeared after collecting $200,000 and completing his promised “skyscraper.” The fine print his investors overlooked noted a scale in inches – not feet. “Apparently too busy to keep an eye on construction, investors ultimately found themselves owners of a building that looked more like an elevator shaft than high-rise office space,” notes the author of “Legend of the World’s Littlest Skyscraper.”
The brick building will become a Wichita Falls landmark and home to an antique store. Today it attracts oil-patch knowledgeable tourists.
July 29, 1957 – Eisenhower begins Import Quotas
As America’s reliance on foreign oil continues to grow and discourage domestic production, President Dwight Eisenhower inaugurates a Voluntary Oil Import Program, including import quotas by region.
Eisenhower intends to ensure adequate domestic petroleum is available in case of national emergency. Using a presidential proclamation two years later, the president replaces the voluntary program with a Mandatory Oil Import Program. The program continues until suspended in 1973 as U.S. oil production peaks — and the Arab oil embargo begins.
