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On January 10, 1901, a well at Spindletop struck oil ("came in"). The Spindletop gusher blew for 9 days at a rate estimated at 100,000 barrels (16,000 m 3) of oil per day. [3] Gulf Oil and Texaco, now part of Chevron Corporation, were formed to develop production at Spindletop. [4] The Spindletop discovery led the United States into the oil age.
Anthony Francis Lucas (born Antun Lučić; September 9, 1855 – September 2, 1921) was a Croatian-born American oil explorer. [1] With Pattillo Higgins, he organized the drilling of an oil well near Beaumont, Texas, that became known as Spindletop. This led to the widespread exploitation of oil and the start of the Petroleum Age. [2]
[1] In 1889, Pattillo Higgins, a young Beaumont man, became interested in the possibility that Spindletop Hill covered a vast pool of oil. Higgins was a self-taught geologist and from his extensive studies and observation of surface indications, he concluded that an abundance of cheap fuel was available at Spindletop.
Spindletop became the focus of frenzied drilling; oil production from the field peaked in 1902 at 17,400,000 barrels (2,770,000 m 3), but by 1905 production had declined 90% from the peak. [18] Spindletop Hill turned out to be the surface expression of an underground salt dome, around which the oil accumulated.
Lucas Gusher, Spindletop. Oil was discovered at nearby Spindletop on January 10, 1901. Spindletop became the first major oil field and one of the largest in American history. With the discovery of oil at Spindletop, Beaumont's population more than tripled in two months from 9,000 in January 1901 to 30,000 in March 1901. [citation needed]
The well, which was dubbed "Lucas 1", had an initial flow rate greater than all of the oil wells in the United States combined in that day. [11] The Spindletop oilfield churned out over 3 million barrels (480,000 m 3) the first year of operation, and over 17 million barrels (2,700,000 m 3) the following year.
The first major oil well in the South was drilled at Spindletop near Beaumont, Texas, on the morning of January 10, 1901. Other oil fields were later discovered nearby in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and under the Gulf of Mexico. The resulting "Oil Boom" permanently transformed the economy of the West South Central states and produced the richest ...
Output from Spindletop peaked at around 100,000 barrels per day (16,000 m 3 /d) just after it was discovered and then started to decline. [10] Later discoveries made 1927 the peak year of Spindletop production, [11] but Spindletop's early decline forced Gulf to seek alternative sources of supply to sustain its substantial investment in refining ...