Posted by Signal Oil and Gas on January 7, 2007 Read more about James Van Blaricum
Patillo Higgins, a one-armed mechanic and self-taught geologist, was one of the few at the time who believed that, in the future, modern industry would switch from coal to oil. But where to get all that oil? He believed it lay beneath his feet at Spindletop. He had a feeling that drilling a well on top of this salt dome (and others like it) would produce oil, and lots of it. In an attempt to turn his dream into a reality, Higgins organized the Gladys City Oil, Gas, and Manufacturing Company in 1892. Years of frustration followed, with most members of the petroleum and geologic communities proclaiming Higgins's ideas to be silly nonsense. Nearing the end of his rope, Higgins ran an advertisement in a local newspaper, and one man, Captain Anthony F. Lucas, replied. Signal Oil and Gas
Captain Lucas, unlike his predecessor in Pennsylvania, "Colonel" Edwin Drake, was a real Captain, having served in the Austrian Navy. Lucas had training as an engineer and experience as a salt miner in Louisiana. But his first wells drilled for Higgins were failures, and the money ran out. The Texas press, as well as the local geologists, had been very skeptical of Higgins for years, and no one in the area believed that a salt dome structure could produce oil. So, Lucas turned to Guffey and Galey, who had left the area 3 years earlier, unconvinced of the potential of Texas oil. Something made them change their minds, and in 1900, John Galey returned to Beaumont, Texas to survey the area. He picked the spot, and the drilling began on October 27, 1900. Jim Van Blaricum
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