The history of the petroleum industry in the United States goes back to the early 19th century, although the indigenous peoples, like many ancient societies, have used petroleum seeps since prehistoric times; where found, these seeps signaled the growth of the industry from the earliest discoveries to the more recent.
Spindletop is an oil field located in the southern portion of Beaumont, Texas, in the United States. The Spindletop dome was derived from the Louann Salt evaporite layer of the Jurassic geologic period. On January 10, 1901, a well at Spindletop struck oil. The Spindletop gusher blew for 9 days at a rate estimated at 100,000 barrels (16,000 m3) of oil per day. Gulf Oil and Texaco, now part of Chevron Corporation, were formed to develop production at Spindletop. The Spindletop discovery led the United States into the oil age. Prior to Spindletop, oil was primarily used for lighting and as a lubricant. Because of the quantity of oil discovered, burning petroleum as a fuel for mass consumption suddenly became economically feasible.
Petroleum engineering is a field of engineering concerned with the activities related to the production of Hydrocarbons, which can be either crude oil or natural gas. Exploration and production are deemed to fall within the upstream sector of the oil and gas industry. Exploration, by earth scientists, and petroleum engineering are the oil and gas industry's two main subsurface disciplines, which focus on maximizing economic recovery of hydrocarbons from subsurface reservoirs. Petroleum geology and geophysics focus on provision of a static description of the hydrocarbon reservoir rock, while petroleum engineering focuses on estimation of the recoverable volume of this resource using a detailed understanding of the physical behavior of oil, water and gas within porous rock at very high pressure.
Well drilling is the process of drilling a hole in the ground for the extraction of a natural resource such as ground water, brine, natural gas, or petroleum, for the injection of a fluid from surface to a subsurface reservoir or for subsurface formations evaluation or monitoring. Drilling for the exploration of the nature of the material underground is best described as borehole drilling.
Corsicana is a city in Navarro County, Texas, United States. It is located on Interstate 45, 56 miles northeast of Waco, Texas. Its population was 25,109 at the 2020 census. It is the county seat of Navarro County, and an important agribusiness center.
Baker Hughes Company, incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law and headquartered in Houston, is one of the world's largest oil field services companies. The company provides products and services for oil well drilling, formation evaluation, completion, production, and reservoir consulting. It operates in over 120 countries, with research and manufacturing facilities in Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Germany, Norway, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Missouri. From 2017 to 2020, the company was majority owned by General Electric (GE); however, GE no longer owns an economic stake in the company.
Hughes Tool Company was an American manufacturer of drill bits. Founded in 1908, it was merged into Baker Hughes Incorporated in 1987.
Howard Robard Hughes Sr. was an American businessman and inventor. He was the founder of Hughes Tool Company. He invented the "Sharp–Hughes" two-cone rotary drill bit during the Texas Oil Boom. He is best known as the father and namesake of Howard Hughes, the famous American business tycoon.
Anthony Francis Lucas was a Croatian-born American oil explorer. 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.
Reuben Carlton "Carl" Baker, Sr. was an American oil industry drilling pioneer. He established Baker Oil Tools in 1907 after developing a casing shoe that revolutionized cable tool drilling. In 1903, he introduced the offset bit for cable tool drilling to enable casing wells in hard rock and in 1912 the cement retainer that allowed casing to be cemented in the wells. Baker further improved the process with the float shoe in 1923. Having only a third grade education, he obtained more than 150 patents on oil drilling tools. Baker Oil Tools merged with Hughes Tool Company in 1987 to form Baker Hughes Incorporated.
Glenwood Cemetery is located in Houston, Texas, United States. Developed in 1871, the first professionally designed cemetery in the city accepted its first burial in 1872. Its location at Washington Avenue overlooking Buffalo Bayou served as an entertainment attraction in the 1880s. The design was based on principles for garden cemeteries, breaking the pattern of the typical gridiron layouts of most Houston cemeteries. Many influential people lay to rest at Glenwood, making it the "River Oaks of the dead." As of 2018, Glenwood includes the annexed property of the adjacent Washington Cemetery, creating a total area of 84 acres (34 ha) with 18 acres (7.3 ha) still undeveloped.
The Drake Well Museum and Park is a museum that interprets the birth of the American oil industry in 1859 by "Colonel" Edwin Drake along the banks of Oil Creek in Cherrytree Township, Venango County, Pennsylvania in the United States. The museum collects and preserves related artifacts. The reconstructed Drake Well demonstrates the first practical use of salt drilling techniques for the extraction of petroleum through an oil well. A historic site, the museum is located in Cherrytree Township, 3 miles (4.8 km) south of Titusville on Drake Well Road, situated between Pennsylvania Routes 8 and 27. The museum is accredited by the American Alliance of Museums.
NOV Inc., formerly National Oilwell Varco, is an American multinational corporation based in Houston, Texas. It is a worldwide provider of equipment and components used in oil and gas drilling and production operations, oilfield services, and supply chain integration services to the upstream oil and gas industry. The company conducts operations in more than 500 locations across six continents, operating through three reporting segments: Rig Technologies, Wellbore Technologies, and Completion & Production Solutions.
Dudley Crawford Sharp was Secretary of the Air Force from December 11, 1959 until January 20, 1961, under president Dwight D. Eisenhower.
The East Texas Oil Field is a large oil and gas field in east Texas. Covering 140,000 acres (57,000 ha) and parts of five counties, and having 30,340 historic and active oil wells, it is the second-largest oil field in the United States outside Alaska, and first in total volume of oil recovered since its discovery in 1930. Over 5.42 billion barrels (862,000,000 m3) of oil have been produced from it to-date. It is a component of the Mid-continent oil province, the huge region of petroleum deposits extending from Kansas to New Mexico to the Gulf of Mexico.
Smith International was a Fortune 500 company headquartered in the Greenspoint district and in unincorporated Harris County, Texas. Smith International ceased to exist as an independent company following the merger with Schlumberger. This company supplies products to gas and oil production and exploration companies. The company used to be identified by its red Sii logo. The company has recently changed its logo to consist of the word "SMITH" in black capital letters with a green globe.
A blowout is the uncontrolled release of crude oil and/or natural gas from an oil well or gas well after pressure control systems have failed. Modern wells have blowout preventers intended to prevent such an occurrence. An accidental spark during a blowout can lead to a catastrophic oil or gas fire.
Pattillo Higgins was an American businessman and a self-taught geologist. He earned the nickname the "Prophet of Spindletop" for his endeavors in the Texas oil business, which accrued a fortune for many. He partnered to form the Gladys City Oil Gas and Manufacturing Company, and later established the Higgins Standard Oil Company.
Walter William Fondren Sr. was an American oil industry businessperson and philanthropist in Texas. He co-founded Humble Oil Company, an antecedent to ExxonMobil.
The Texas oil boom, sometimes called the gusher age, was a period of dramatic change and economic growth in the U.S. state of Texas during the early 20th century that began with the discovery of a large petroleum reserve near Beaumont, Texas. The find was unprecedented in its size (worldwide) and ushered in an age of rapid regional development and industrialization that has few parallels in U.S. history. Texas quickly became one of the leading oil-producing states in the U.S., along with Oklahoma and California; soon the nation overtook the Russian Empire as the top producer of petroleum. By 1940 Texas had come to dominate U.S. production. Some historians even define the beginning of the world's Oil Age as the beginning of this era in Texas.
