Summary
In 1859, when Edwin L. Drake drilled an oil well in Titusville, he launched the country's modern petroleum industry. During the 1860s and 1870s, an exciting cast of characters in the northwest corner of Pennsylvania supplied the world with petroleum and dominated the industry, as the region itself underwent dramatic and lasting change.
Continue the Story...
Bring this subject into focus through the following chapters. These stories take exploration of the main story further by providing more detail for you to learn and explore.
Overview: Striking Oil
Chapter One: Discovery and Early Development
Chapter Two: Boom and Bust
Chapter Three: Growth and Organization
Chapter Four: Natural Gas
Historical Markers In the Story
Lesson Plans for this Story
Take your students back in history with these discussions and activities for the classroom
Story Bibliography
Timeline
1850 |
Samuel Kier used a whiskey still for refining crude oil and in 1854 opens the first commercial refinery.
|
|
1859 |
On August 27, Edwin Drake and "Uncle Billy" Smith strike oil along Oil Creek, just south of Titusville, Venango County.
|
|
1860 |
Pennsylvania's first gas field is discovered in Erie County at shallow depths along Lake Erie.
|
|
1861 |
First oil refineries open in oil regions.
|
|
1861 - 1865 |
Experiments are carried out to move petroleum through pipelines.
|
|
1861 |
By the end of the year, over 2-1/2 million barrels of oil have been removed from the ground.
|
|
|
1862 |
Gas is used to fire the boilers to pump the oil wells along Oil Creek.
|
|
1865 |
First experiments with the use of underground torpedoes in oil wells.
|
|
1865 |
First pipeline functions effectively from Pithole to Miller Farm.
|
|
1865 |
The oil boomtown of Pithole is incorporated.
|
|
1867 |
D. G. Stillwell drills a gas well within what is now the limits of Oil City and pipes gas to a number of homes where it is used for cooking and heating purposes.
|
|
1868 |
By this date Pithole has lost the majority of its residents; a series of fires furthers its desertion.
|
|
1870 |
By 1870, most of the oil fields of Venango County have been discovered.
|
|
1870 - 1879 |
Oil producers battle Rockefeller's efforts at price control during what is referred to as the "OIL WAR".
|
|
1871 |
Titusville Oil Exchange is established.
|
|
1871 |
Development of the Bradford oil field in McKean County begins.
|
|
1878 |
The Haymaker well at Murrysville "blew in" at 34 million cubic feet of gas per day, and is the largest gas well ever drilled up to that time.
|
|
1879 |
The Tidewater pipeline from the Bradford oil field to Williamsport is completed - a distance of over 100 miles - to compete with Standard Oil.
|
|
1883 |
Gas piped about 11 miles from the Murrysville gas field into Pittsburgh is used for manufacturing.
|
|
1884 |
Gantz Oil Well opens up Washington County oil fields.
|
|
1885 |
Speechley Gas Pool Well opens up deep sand development.
|
|
1902 |
Ida Tarbell begins publishing articles about John D. Rockefeller, in McClure's Magazine, that are later published as a book, History of the Standard Oil Company.
|
|
1911 |
U.S. Supreme Court breaks up Standard Oil Trust.
|
|
1912 |
Development of LP gas (propane) begins.
|
|