Oil and Gas History of Kentucky: 1860 to 1900

Contact: Brandon C. Nuttall

[Kentucky Oil History Home] [Pre-Drake] [1860 to 1900] [After 1900]

• 1860, Kentucky: Discovery of Bear Creek oil field, Cumberland County. The Gilbreath No. 1 on Oil Fork, Bear Creek, was brought in 1860 at a depth of 20 feet with an estimated [daily?] flush production of 500 barrels. (Jillson, 1951)
• 1860: First well drilled solely for oil in West Virginia, located on Burning Springs Run on the Little Kanawha, was dug using a spring pole rig and completed 1-May-1860. It produced oil from the Cow Run sand at 303 feet. (White, 1904)
• 1860: J. M. Williams raised between 200,000 and 400,000 gallons of oil from the Petrolia field, Ontario. By the fall of 1861, there were 400 wells in the field. (O'Meara, 1958)
• 1861, Kentucky: The Matilda Gabbard Well in Clinton County was drilled to 225 feet and was credited with the discovery of Ordovician Granville production in the area of the Creelsboro, Desda, and Decide Pools, Clinton and Russell County. Described as a flowing well, no initial production is available. The Gabbard well was located across the Cumberland River from Creelsboro. (Diamond, 1943, Eyl, 1922, Hoeing, 1905, Loughridge, 1890)
• 1862, Kentucky: John Nicholson and Herman Veeder took over the property on which the Old American Well was located to make salt. To prevent the dilution of the natural brine by fresh surface waters, they made wooden groove and socket pipe (the Civil War blocked transportation of appropriate sized iron pipe). They successfully cased off the surface water and began producing salt which was sold to Confederate agents, barged to Nashville, and supplied to the troops of the Army of the Tennessee. (Jillson, 1947)
• 1862: At a depth of about 158 feet, Hugh Nixon Shaw's well blew in on January 16 and produced an estimated 2,000 barrels per day sparking a drilling boom at Petrolia and Oil Springs, Ontario, Canada. (O'Meara, 1958)
• 1863, Kentucky: Between 1863 and 1865, the first Devonian shale gas wells in Kentucky were completed in Meade County near Brandenburg, western Kentucky. The gas was primarily used for fuel in the production of salt. (Hamilton-Smith, 1993) The first wells were drilled at the site of an oil spring in a tributary valley of Doe Run Creek known as Oil Hollow. The Alonzo Moreman well was drilled to a depth of 527 feet where a "crevice" was struck yielding a strong flow of gas and salt water. Additional wells were drilled at what became the Moreman Salt Works. Initially wasted to the air, the gas was eventually used in the manufacture of the salt. (Foerste, 1910, Hoeing, 1891, Orton, 1891, Sutton and Wagner, 1930)
• 1864, Kentucky: Between 1864 and 1867, a boring made on the banks of the Ohio, just below Covington, gave a supply of gas that lasted forty years. It was so abundant that it became a source of danger to the distillery near which the well was situated. With some difficulty the well was closed, so as to prevent the further escape of the gas. (Shaler, 1879)
• 1865, Kentucky: The end of the Civil War marked a the start of a drilling boom in Kentucky. Those Union soldiers who were familiar with Drake's success and who had noted Kentucky's salt, oil, and natural gas springs and wells returned to the area to seek their fortune. During the summer and autumn of 1865, shallow gushers came in on Bear Creek (less than 50 feet), on the Cumberland River (less than 100 feet), on Crocus Creek (less than 200 feet). Any oil or feeble gas spring was regarded as an infallible guide to a new Oil Creek (Pennsylvania). (Orton, 1891) Having inspected the site of the Old American Well in the previous year, Dr. B. Franklin prepared a favorable report that led to the incorporation of the Cumberland River Oil and Salt Company of Kentucky (act approved by KY legislature January 23, 1865). While this venture found only "inconsequential" amounts of oil other local wells were more successful (Jillson, 1947). The prospectus issued by this company has survived and a copy of their map showing the Old American Well, other wells, and oil seeps in the area is available. The Wesley English No. 1 well was struck October 3, 1865 at 191 feet on Crocus Creek, Cumberland County. Reported by the Union Standard of Lexington, the well was estimated to be flowing as high as 3,000 barrels per day. Again the Cumberland River was covered with oil from Crocus Creek to Burkesville and far below. ( Hoeing, 1905, Jillson, 1951)
• 1865, Kentucky: Discovery of the Adams field in Barren County along Boyds Creek. The Boyd's Creek Oil Company no. 1 W.S. "Steve" Kinslow was the first well in the county. Drilled on Boyd's Creek 4 miles south of Glasgow the well was completed June 20, 1865 at a depth of 150 feet. Initially, the well came in flowing 2 barrels every half-hour and after "agitation" increased to 160 barrels per day; drill cuttings had apparently not been removed from the hole and the tools were still hanging. The well produced about 125,000 barrels before it was abandoned in 1920. (Shaw and Mather, 1919)
• 1865, Kentucky: Gas discovered in a well in Webster County, western Kentucky, at depths between 450 and 536 feet. (Orton, 1891) Long Falls Creek pool, about 2 miles north of Calhoun, McLean County on Beech Grove Road was the first oil discovered in western Kentucky. (Bushong, 1970, Eyl, 1922)
• 1865: Col. E.A.L. Roberts successfully "shoots" the Ladies Well on Oil Creek, Pennsylvania, with 8 lbs. of black powder. (Tallini, 2000)
• 1866, Kentucky: A shallow well in the Bear Creek oil field, Cumberland County, the Phelps No. 1, flowed 1,000 barrels per day from 47 feet. (Jillson, 1951)
• 1866, Kentucky: Discovery of oil on the Uriah Porter farm, 3 miles west of Scottsville, Allen County. The well is located on Bays Fork of Big Barren on a line between Scottsville and Bowling Green and about 7 miles from the former place and 18 from the latter. This reservoir was tapped some time in January of this year (1866?) at the moderate depth of 55 feet. It yielded for a number of days by pumping about 400 barrels of oil and strong brine per day, half of which was oil. By Februrary 13, it had produced altogether about a thousand barrels of petroleum. The oil was shipped to Louisville and St. Louis for refining but was rank with sulphur and therefore counted of no value. (Orton, 1891)
• 1872, Kentucky: John Lillis was contracted to drill a well at the intersection of High and Main Streets in Frankfort, Kentucky. The well is reported to be 645 feet deep. At a depth of 140 feet natural gas was encountered, the first that had been discovered in this part of Kentucky. The gas was ignited and flamed from the casing to a height of 30 or 40 feet. The close proximity of a number of frame and other dwellings to the burning well caused it to be regarded as a public menace and after burning a few days it was extinguished. According to the Frankfort City Clerk's record, the well was begun in June and was plugged and abandoned about December 10, 1872. (Jillson, 1931)
• 1873: Natural gas first used for iron working, Leechburg, Pennsylvania. (Orton, 1891)
• 1874: The piping of gas on a large scale began with carrying the gas of the famous Harvey well, near Larden's Mills, Butler County, Pennsylvania, to the iron mill of Spang, Chalfant & Co., at Etna, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The line was six inches in diameter and seventeen miles long, and the gas was first used from it in the iron mill in October, 1874." (Orton, 1891)
• 1875, Kentucky: Nathaniel S. Shaler, the second Kentucky State Geologist, produces the first geologic map of Kentucky. (Shaler, 1877) The "Odd Fellows Well" was drilled in Eminence, Henry County, to a depth of 1,100 feet encountering only salt water and a small show of natural gas. (Jillson, 1931)
• 1877, Kentucky: John J. McLaurin visits the Beatty well guided by Dr. W. G. Hunter of Burkesville and an unnamed "unfortunate who was squatting in squalor on the property." (McLaurin, 1896)
• 1879, Kentucky: Shaler writes the first publication on oil and gas in Kentucky: Petroleum (Series 2, Bulletin 1, Part B). In this paper, Shaler makes the earliest reference to the "Corniferous" in Kentucky, "In a small part of the State there is a coarse, flinty, calcareous sandstone, lying just below the black shale, and possibly the equivalent of the Corniferous limestone. In Canada, and probably other districts, this rock has yielded much oil. So far as is known to me, this rock has not afforded any strong trace of oil in Kentucky." Shaler assessed the petroleum potential of Kentucky's regions: The Bluegrass and the lower waters of the Big Sandy (in eastern Kentucky) are excluded, the upper regions of the Kentucky river and western Kentucky are "hopeful of success." Shaler advocates using dug pits for the recovery of oil as opposed to boring slender tubes. He argues that boring results in the walls of the boring being "much compacted by the action of the boring tools." (Shaler, 1879)
• 1881, Kentucky: Discovery of the Martin County gas field (initially Pennsylvanian Salt Sand and Mississippian Maxon and Big Lime production). The discovery well, the "Warfield well," was drilled on Tug Fork. The well was allowed to waste into the atmosphere for 10 years after which it was used in the production of carbon black until 1901 when a pipeline was built from the field supplying Ashland, Catlettsburg, Ironton (Ohio), and Huntington (West Virginia). (Jillson, 1922)
• 1883: J. B. Ford of the Pittsburgh Plate Glass Works, Creighton, Pennsylvania, began using natural gas in his plant. The Rochester Tumbler Works, Rochester, Pennsylvania is credited with the first application of natural gas to glass making, but the exact date of this use is not given. (Orton, 1891)
• 1884, Kentucky: The oil boom in south central Kentucky attracts national attention with Oil Regions of Kentucky and Tennessee, a map by Peckham and others that was included with the Tenth Census Reports of the United States. (Jillson, 1951)
• 1885: I. C. White publishes the anticlinal theory of oil and gas accumulation. White acknowledged early workers like Henry Rogers of Pennsylvania and his mentor Dr. John J. Stephenson (at West Virginia University) for originating the idea in discussions as early as 1860-61. (Carter, 1961, White, 1885)
• 1887, Kentucky: The first time that a geologist was used in Kentucky to locate oil and gas. The Union Gas Company of Louisville asked Major W. J. Davis to locate more gas in the Meade County area. Davis mapped what became known as the Davis Arch and succeeded in obtaining a good flow of dry gas. This successful venture eventually led to the formation of the Louisville Gas and Electric Company. (Miller, 1919)
• 1888, Kentucky: First mention of use of explosive fracturing in Kentucky. The Bowling Green Petroleum and Fuel Company #2 well on Drakes Creek, near the site of Sweny and Potter's mill, 5 miles east of Bowling Green, was torpedoed with 75 lbs. of No. 1 Aetna blasting powder. The result was unfavorable, however. In May, a well on the Bickerstaff Farm in Meade County, drilled by the Kentucky Rock Gas Company, was shot with 45 lbs. of dynamite and "greatly improved thereby." Its daily volume was 2 million cubic feet at a depth of 426 feet in the Devonian shale. (Orton, 1891)
• 1889: A well at Cloverport, Breckinridge County, was drilled to 896 feet and secured gas. Daily yield was 2.5 MMcf. "Cloverport thus becomes the first town in Kentucky to secure the inexpressible convenience of natural gas for fuel in quantities largely in excess of the demand." (Orton, 1891, Foerste, 1910)
• 1890, Kentucky: In 1888, the Kentucky Rock Gas Company proposed to build a pipeline from the Brandenburg gas fields to Louisville. The company raised $400,000 and built 32 miles of 8-inch wrought iron pipe. "A fair supply was brought into Louisville for the winter of 1890-1, most of which was turned to account as fuel for domestic use." (Orton, 1891)
• 1890, Kentucky: Eureka Oil and gas Company, under the direction of W. Carroll and Sons, erect a refinery 4 miles west of Glasgow, Barren County. The capacity is 600 barrels per week. (Orton, 1891)
• 1890: Willard Rouse Jillson born in Syracuse, New York.
• 1892, Kentucky: The first flowing well in eastern Kentucky results in the discovery of the Beaver Creek field, Floyd County. The Howard Purchase No. 1 well was drilled by Louis H. Gormley, an experienced oil operator from New Castle, Pennsylvania, who later founded the New Domain Oil and Gas Company. The well was drilled in the vicinity of a natural gas seepage on the headwaters of the Right Fork of Middle Creek that because of its conspicuous location was known as a "place of notoriety" to the early residents of Floyd County. Judge Lewis Collins in his Historical Sketches of Kentucky (1847, cited in Jillson, 1918) called it the "Burning Spring" and stated that it "instantly ignites on the application of fire." (Hoeing, 1905, Jillson, 1918, Jillson, 1937)
• 1892, Kentucky: Chapter 100, an act of May 14, 1892, entitled Petroleum, Natural Gas, and Salt-water wells was adopted. Provisions of the act required wells not in use to be plugged to prevent waste. It required filling a well with rock and stone and driving wooden plugs at least 20 feet above producing zone and another to a point at least 5 feet below the casing seat after casing was pulled. Enforcement of this act was left up to the individual County's Attorney and was largely ignored. (Hoeing, 1913)
• 1895, Kentucky: The Beaver Creek Sand was discovered in Wayne County, southeast Kentucky. This strike led the Cumberland Pipe Line Company to lay a pipe line to these wells from Somerset. With a market for the oil, drilling was rapid, a large portion of the Cooper-Oil Valley district being developed within the three years following. (Munn, 1914)
• 1895: When sperm oil (whale oil) dropped to 40 cents a gallon in 1895, due to lack of demand, refined petroleum, which was very much in demand, sold for less than 7 cents a gallon. (Chemical Institute of Canada, 1999)
• 1898, Kentucky: Captain Geary supervised the construction of a crude oil pipeline from Monticello, Kentucky to Somerset, Kentucky and then on to Hamlin, West Virginia (Acrea, 2000)
• 1899, Kentucky: The "Ragland" sand was discovered in Bath and Rowan County. Statewide production increased from an average of about 4,755 barrels per year to 18,280 barrels with this discovery. (Jillson, 1926)