The Effect of Striking Oil - January 22, 1882

(Reprinted from NOVEMBER 2005; Vol 25 NO. 5; “The Cannonball”, The official publication of the Pittsburg, Shawmut and Northern Railroad Company, Historical Society) with permission

January 22, 1882

(NEWSPAPER UNKNOWN)

THE EFFECT OF STRIKING OIL

A VILLAGE OF TWO HUNDRED INHABITANTS INCREASING TO FIVE THOUSAND IN SIX MONTHS

Richburg, N.Y. , Jan 22, -- Last July this was a village of less than 200 inhabitants. It was a pious neighborhood, peopled by a community of Seventh Day Baptists. In July a man named Boyle struck a 250-barrel oil well near the village. Land went from $10 to $300 an acre. There are now 550 oil wells in the neighborhood, producing 10,000 barrels of oil a day. Richburg has five thousand inhabitants. It had three murders within six weeks. There are several hotels, an opera house, banks (faro and national), Chinese laundries, bagnios (brothels for those who did not know), and rum potels (possible pot house or place where beer and ale or in this case rum is sold). Four railroads have been built within three months. The Seventh Day Baptists have all sold their land and become rich. Six oil wells are completed daily; yielding from 15 to 250 barrels each, on the start. Every door yard has its derrick, and one man had taken his front porch for a boiler house. A short distance away a village of 3000 inhabitants known as Bolivar, has sprung up from a collection of farms. Four railroads centre at that place. The oil production of this district at the present rate of increase will be 15,000 barrels a day by February. No district in the history of the trade was ever developed so rapidly, notwithstanding that crude oil is only 80 cents a barrel, and that the Bradford field is alone producing 25,000 barrels of oil a day more than there is any demand for. There are now stored in the tanks of the United Pipe Lines in the Oil region over 25,000,000 barrels of oil, waiting for a market. About 65,000 barrels of oil are run through the pipe lines every day. There is $180,000,000 invested in the Bradford field. Not less than $5,000,000 have found a place for investment in this new territory since it was opened. At the present very low price of oil, producers get twenty per cent returns for their money. The United Lines take all the oil that is offered to them. If the northern field becomes exhausted rapidly, that company will control about all the crude oil there is in the county. With their 13,000 miles of pipe line they hold the key to oil transportation. They now pipe oil from the oil regions to Cleveland, Buffalo, and to the seaboard. This latter line extends from Olean to Rutherford, N.J., with a double line completed to Port Jervis.