Remarkable Nellie Bly’s Oil Drum

by | May 15, 2025 | Petroleum Transportation

Famous 1880s New York World reporter took charge of Iron Clad Manufacturing Company.

 

She was one of the most famous journalists of her day as a reporter for the New York World. Widely known as the remarkable Nellie Bly, Elizabeth J. Cochran Seaman, investigated conditions at an infamous mental institution, made a trip around the world in less than 80 days — and manufactured the first practical 55-gallon oil drum.

The 1901 Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, N.Y., promoted her Iron Clad Manufacturing Company as “owned exclusively by Nellie Bly – the only woman in the world personally managing industries of such magnitude.”

Nellie Bly's business card and her oil drum patent drawing assigned to her as Elizabeth Cochran Seaman.

Recognizing the potential of an efficient metal barrel design, Nellie Bly acquired the 1905 patent rights from its inventor, Henry Wehrhahn, who worked at her Iron Clad Manufacturing Company.

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Staveless Barrel and Tank Company

by | Apr 1, 2025 | Petroleum Companies

The brief oilfield journey of a “staveless” wooden barrel maker.

 

The U.S. petroleum industry was barely a decade old and as oil discoveries spread from northwestern Pennsylvania’s first commercial well, efficiently transporting the resource became critical. In Brooklyn, New York, the Staveless Barrel and Tank Company organized. The company hoped to exploit a new patent for making barrels.

Capitalized in 1867 at $500,000 with 5,000 shares at $100 each, Staveless Barrel and Tank’s barrel-making process included, “application of scale-boards or veneers in layers, the direction of whose grain is crossed or diversified, and which are connected together, forming a material for the construction, lining, or covering of land and marine structures.” (more…)

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