This Week in Petroleum History: July 28 – August 3

July 28, 1924 – Oil Scouts form National Group

The National Oil Scouts Association of America — today the International Oil Scouts Association (IOSA) — filed its charter in Austin, Texas, bringing new standards to an important oilfield profession.

Since the 1860s, oilfield 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.

Learn more in Oil Scouts – Oil Patch Detectives.

July 28, 1953 – Final Oilfield Patent for Zero Hour Bomb Company

Manufacturer of oilfield products since 1932, the Zero Hour Bomb Company of Tulsa, Oklahoma, received its last U.S. patent relating to electric timer explosives for fracturing geologic formations. The service company patented its device for positioning blasting cartridges in wells — a “well bridge”  that automatically opened, “when the time bomb or weight reached a position at the bottom of the well.”

Explosive device of Zero Hour Bomb Company of Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1932.

Oilfield service provider Zero Hour Bomb Company was founded in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1932. Photos courtesy Zebco.

The downhole apparatus was never built, because company executives already were manufacturing and marketing a new, “cannot backlash” fishing reel invented by Jasper “R.D.” Hull, who they had hired in 1947.  Zero Hour Bomb Company changed its name to Zebco in 1956.

Learn more in Zebco Reel Oilfield History.

July 28, 1977 – Trans-Alaska Pipeline delivers Oil to Port of Valdez

The first barrel of oil from the North Slope’s Prudhoe Bay oilfield arrived at the Port of Valdez after an 800-mile journey through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System.

A red-white-and-blue oil drum with "First Barrel of Oil to Valdez."

The Trans-Alaska Pipeline delivered North Slope oil almost a decade after the Prudhoe Bay field’s discovery. OMAR refers to the Organization for Management of Alaska’s Resources, now the Resource Development Council for Alaska.

At peak flow in 1988, 11 pumping stations moved 2.1 million barrels of oil a day. The 48-inch-wide pipeline has been recognized as a landmark of engineering (see Trans-Alaska Pipeline History).

July 29, 1918 – “World’s Wonder Oil Pool” discovered in Texas

Less than a year after the “Roaring Ranger” discovered an oilfield to the south, the Fowler No. 1 well at the cotton farming community of Burkburnett, Texas, revealed a new giant field at a depth of 1,734 feet. Within three weeks, 56 rigs were drilling near the Fowler Farm Oil Company site along the Red River in North Texas.

 "Burkburnett, Texas, the World's Wonder Oil Pool," derrick in oilfield circa 1919.

Circa 1919 photo captioned, “Burkburnett, Texas, the World’s Wonder Oil Pool,” showing eight months’ phenomenal development, viewed from the northwest side, opposite Fowler farm.” A. Newman Photographic Company photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Fowler’s decision to drill a well on his Wichita County farm had been called “Fowler’s Folly” until his oil discovery brought hundreds of oil companies to the county. By January 1919, Burkburnett’s population reached more than 8,000 people — with a line of derricks two miles long greeting new arrivals.

As the “World’s Wonder Oil Pool” made national headlines, teenager Clark Gable was a 17-year-old roustabout working in Oklahoma. Gable and Spencer Tracy would star in Hollywood’s version of Burkburnett oil history, the popular 1940 movie “Boom Town.”

Learn more in Boom Town Burkburnett.

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July 29, 1957 – Eisenhower limits Oil Imports

As America’s reliance on foreign oil continued to grow — discouraging domestic production — President Dwight D. Eisenhower established a Voluntary Oil Import Program with import quotas by region. The intent was to ensure adequate domestic petroleum in case of a national emergency.

Using a presidential proclamation two years later, Eisenhower made the program mandatory. By 1962, oil imports were limited to 12.2 percent of U.S. production. The program continued until suspended by President Richard Nixon in 1973 as domestic oil production reached new highs during the OPEC oil embargo.

July 30, 1942 – U-166 sinks, discovered 60 years later

A Navy patrol boat attacked and sank a German U-boat in the Gulf of Mexico after the submarine had torpedoed a U.S. freighter. Despite being depth-charged, the U-166 was believed to have escaped — until a natural gas pipeline survey revealed it 59 years later.

The U-166’s identity was not learned until advanced geophysical survey technologies arrived in 2001, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The discovery resulted from an archaeological survey prior to construction of a natural gas pipeline by the British company BP and Shell Offshore Inc.

Sonar image of sunk U-166 Nazi Sub and photo of its deck gun.

A natural gas pipeline survey revealed the U-166 about 45 miles off the Louisiana coast in 2011.

Remotely operating vehicles (ROVs) and an autonomous side-scan sonar revealed U-166 separated from its last victim, the Robert E. Lee, by less than a mile. BP and Shell altered their proposed pipeline to preserve the site.

With the petroleum industry the principal user of advanced underwater technologies for seafloor mapping, other World War II vessels have been discovered during oil and natural gas surveys.

Learn more in Petroleum Survey discovers U-boat.

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August 1, 1872 – Iron Pipeline delivers Pennsylvania Natural Gas

The first large-scale delivery of natural gas by pipeline began when gas was piped to more than 250 residential and commercial customers in Titusville, Pennsylvania, home of America’s first oil well, drilled in 1859. An iron pipeline two inches wide carried the natural gas five miles from a well producing four million cubic feet of gas a day.

Investors, including the mayor of Titusville, had formed the Keystone Gas & Water Company to construct the pipeline and deliver “the most powerful and voluminous gas well on record.” The well produced into the 1880s, according to the Drake Well Museum and Park.

August 2, 1956 – Missouri builds First U.S. Interstate Highway

Missouri became the first state to award a contract with interstate construction funding authorized two months earlier by the Federal-Aid Highway Act. The highway commission agreed to begin work on part of Route 66, now Interstate 44.

Missouri officials stand at the first interstate, I-44.

Missouri launched the U.S. interstate system after “inking a deal for work on U.S. Route 66.” Today, I-44 stretches across south central Missouri and is a major corridor linking the Midwest and the West Coast.

“There is no question that the creation of the interstate highway system has been the most significant development in the history of transportation in the United States,” proclaimed the Missouri Department of Transportation (also see America on the Move).

August 3, 1769 – La Brea Asphalt Pits discovered

A Spanish expedition discovered what would be called La Brea (the tar) pits on the West Coast. “We debated whether this substance, which flows melted from underneath the earth, could occasion so many earthquakes,” noted the expedition’s Franciscan friar in his diary.

Outside the Page Museum of Los Angeles.

The Page Museum of Los Angeles offers life-size replicas of extinct mammals at the Rancho La Brea in Hancock Park. Although called the “tar pits,” the pools are asphalt.

The friar, Juan Crespi, was the first person to use the term “bitumen” in describing these sticky pools in southern California — where crude oil has been seeping from the ground through fissures in the coastal plain sediments for more than 40,000 years. Native Americans used the substance for centuries to waterproof baskets and caulk canoes.

Illustration of crude oil seeps.

Sticky pools form when crude oil seeps to the surface through fissures in the earth’s crust.

Although popularly called the tar pits, the pools at Rancho La Brea are actually asphalt — not tar, which is a by-product made by the distillation of woody materials, such as peat. Asphalt is a naturally formed substance comprised of hydrocarbon molecules (see Asphalt Paves the Way).

Learn more in Discovering the Le Brea Tar Pits.

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August 3, 1942 – War brings “Big Inch” and “Little Big Inch” Pipelines

War Emergency Pipelines Inc. began construction on the “Big Inch” line — the longest petroleum pipeline project ever undertaken in the United States. Conceived to supply wartime fuel demands — and in response to U-boat attacks on oil tankers along the eastern seaboard and Gulf of Mexico, the “Big Inch” and “Little Big Inch” lines were extolled as “the most amazing government-industry cooperation ever achieved.”

Map of Big and Little Big Inch 24-inch pipelines from Texas to New Jersey.

The longest petroleum pipeline project ever undertaken led to construction of a 24-inch pipeline from East Texas to Illinois, and a 20-inch line as far as New York City.

With a goal of transporting 300,000 barrels of oil per day, the $95 million project called for construction of a 24-inch pipeline (Big Inch) from East Texas to Illinois, and a 20-inch line (Little Big Inch) as far as New York and Philadelphia. The pipelines would reach more than 1,200 miles (the Trans-Alaska pipeline system is 800 miles long).

Learn more in Big Inch Pipelines of WWII.

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Recommended Reading: The Oil Scouts – Reminiscences of the Night Riders of the Hemlocks (1986); Trek of the Oil Finders: A History of Exploration for Petroleum (1975); Amazing Pipeline Stories: How Building the Trans-Alaska Pipeline Transformed Life in America’s Last Frontier (1997).  Early Texas Oil: A Photographic History, 1866-1936 (2000); Eisenhower: Soldier and President (1968); The Extraction State, A History of Natural Gas in America (2021); Torpedoes in the Gulf: Galveston and the U-Boats, 1942-1943 (1995). The Big Roads: The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways (2012); Monsters Of Old Los Angeles – The Prehistoric Animals Of The La Brea Tar Pits (2008); Oil: From Prospect to Pipeline (1971). Amazon purchases benefit the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

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The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. Copyright © 2025 Bruce A. Wells. All rights reserved.

 

Zebco Reel Oilfield History

Oilfield service provider Zero Hour Bomb Company in 1949 introduced its “cannot backlash” fishing reel.

 

Zebco oilfield history began in 1947 when Jasper R. Dell Hull walked into the Tulsa offices of the Zero Hour Bomb Company. The amateur inventor from Rotan, Texas, carried a piece of plywood with nails arranged in a circle and wrapped in line. His device included a coffee-can lid that could spin.

Hull, known by his friends as “R.D.,” had an appointment with executives at the Oklahoma oilfield service company.

Since its incorporation in 1932, the Zero Hour Bomb Company had become well known for manufacturing dependable electric timer bombs for fracturing geologic formations. It designed and patented technologies for “shooting” wells to increase oil and natural gas production.

Explosive device of the Zero Hour Bomb Company of Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1932.

In 1932, the oilfield service company Zero Hour Bomb Company began manufacturing electric time bombs in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Photos courtesy Zebco.

Zero Hour Bomb Company’s timer controlled a mechanism with a detonator inside a watertight casing. The downhole device could be pre-set to detonate a series of blasting caps, which set off the well’s main charge, shattering rock formations.

Hull’s 1947 visit proved timely for Zero Hour Bomb Company, because post World War II demand for its electrically triggered devices had declined. With the military no longer needing oil to fuel the war, the U.S. petroleum industry faced a major recession.

The company and other once booming Oklahoma service companies were reeling, and the future did not look good. 

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“Vast fossil fuel reserves beneath other Middle Eastern nations were being unlocked,” noted journalist Joe Sills in a 2014 article. With OPEC beginning to take shape, Texas and Oklahoma-based oil production could only look forward to taking “a decades-long backseat to foreign oil.”

Further, with company patents expiring in 1948, “the Zero Hour Bomb Company needed a solution,” explained Sills, an editor for Fishing Tackle Retailer. After examining Hull’s contraption, a prototype fishing reel, the company hired him for $500 a month.

Meanwhile, as “fishing” petroleum wells helped recover downhole tools, Hull received a patent that transformed the Zero Hour Bomb Company — and sport fishing in America.

Downhole Patents

Beginning in the early 1930s, Zero Hour Bomb engineers patented many innovative oilfield products. A 1939 design for an “Oil Well Bomb Closure” facilitated the assembly of an explosive device capable of withstanding extreme pressures submerged deep in a well.

A 1940 innovation provided a hook mechanism for safely lowering torpedoes into wells. The locking method could “positively prevent premature release of the torpedo while it is being lowered into the well.”

Two patent drawings from July 1953 for the Zero Hour Bomb Company

The July 28, 1953, patent for a canvas “well bridge” would be among the last Zero Hour Bomb Company received as an oilfield equipment manufacturer, thanks to R.D. Hull’s late-1940s design for a fishing reel (insert) illustrated in his February 2, 1954, patent.

The separate patent in 1941 improved positioning blasting cartridges using a plugging device made of canvas. It looked like an upside-down umbrella that automatically opened, “when the time bomb or weight reached a position at the bottom of the well.”

In 1953, an improved “well bridge” design took the concept even further, but it would be the last patent Zero Hour Bomb received as an oilfield equipment manufacturer. By then, the earliest model of Hull’s new “cannot backlash” reel attracted large crowds at sports shows.

Zebco Reels

“After trying to design ‘brakes’ for bait-casting reels, and even failing at launching one fishing reel company, Hull hit on a better way one day as he watched a grocery store clerk pull string from a large fixed spool to wrap a package,” reported Lee Leschper in a 1999 Amarillo Globe-News article.

First Zebco reel of 1949.

Zero Hour Bomb Company’s first “cannot backlash” reel made its public debut at a Tulsa sports expo in June 1949.

Hull realized he needed a cover to keep the line from spinning off the reel itself and soon developed a prototype, Leschper noted.

“Zero Hour officials asked two company employees who were avid fishermen for their opinions on the reel,” Leschper explained. “One tied his set of car keys to the end of the line and sent a cast flying through one of the windows in the plant. The other sent a cast high over the building. All were impressed.”

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Given his own Hull-designed fishing reel at about age six, Leschper recalled, the “tiny black pushbutton reel” came with 6 lb. monofilament line (see Nylon, A Petroleum Polymer) and a four-foot hollow fiberglass rod. His small rig included a hard, yellow plastic practice plug. “I wore it down to a nub pitching it across the hard-baked grass in our front yard.”

Close-up of Zebco reel with "Zero Hour Bomb Company" stamped on base.

White House security officials in 1956 quickly submerged in water a Zero Hour Bomb Company package addressed to President Eisenhower. Photo courtesy Fishing Tackle Retailer magazine.

Earlier, Hull had tested several designs before developing a manufacturing process; the first reel debuted on May 13, 1949. Called the Standard, it made its public debut at a Tulsa sports expo in June. By 1954, the reel included the simple push-button system used today.

In 1961, Brunswick Corporation acquired Zebco — and introduced the 202 ZeeBee Spincast, “an instant classic.” 

White House Insecurity

The regional marketing name — Zebco — became popular, but the bottom of each reel’s foot remained stamped with the name of the manufacturer: Zero Hour Bomb Company. The official name change to Zebco came in 1956 — soon after a friend of President Dwight D. Eisenhower asked the company to send a reel to the president.

According to a Zebco company history, when White House security officers saw the package labeled “Zero Hour Bomb Company,” they plunged it into a tub of water and called the bomb squad. After changing its name to Zebco, the company left the oilfield for good.

Petroleum history is important. Support link for AOGHS.

Jasper R. Dell “R.D.” Hull joined the Sporting Goods Industry Hall of Fame in 1975 after receiving more than 35 patents. At the time of his induction, 70 million Zebco reels had been sold. He retired from the former oilfield time-bomb company in January 1977 after being diagnosed with cancer and died in December at age 64.

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The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells.

Citation Information – Article Title: “Zebco Reel Oilfield History.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/oil-almanac/zebco-reel-oilfield-history. Last Updated: July 23, 2025. Original Published Date: February 20, 2018.

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