The Canadian Record (Canadian, Tex.), Vol. 110, No. 49, Ed. 1 Thursday, December 7, 2000 Page: 6 of 28
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THURSDAY 7 DECEMBER 2000
7^ (fatadiM RECORD
The players: celebrating the
wildcatter spirit and ingenuity
||N A CLEAR, COLD JANUARY MORNING, as
fit he drill bit was pulled above the derrick floor, as
Hit had been hundreds of times in the past four
months, mud suddenly bubbled up. Then mud ex-
ploded out of the drilling hole, hurling six tons of pipe
into the air like straw over the derrick top to land like
giant spears in the ground.
After a few moments of si-
lence, there came a terrific roar
like a heavy cannon shot. Mud
erupted from the hole, followed
by a terrific column of gas and
then heavy, greenish oil that shot
150-200 feet into the air. It would
take the astonished men several
days to cap the well.
In 1901, the Lucas gusher at
Spindletop Hill signaled the be-
ginning of a new era—propelling
modern industrial development
with a cheap and abundant fuel
source.
In wildcatter fashion, the men
who came together and brought
in Spindletop were extremely re-
sourceful and demonstrated un-
yielding faith. Patillo Higgins
started with the vision. Anthony
F. Lucas contributed expertise
and doggedly raised the money.
Remarkable technical ingenuity
was delivered in spades by the
Hamill Brothers.
Higgins had the unwavering
belief that oil was under
Spindletop Hill. More times than
not, popular consensus and cur-
rent wisdom ran counter to his
declarations in the decade leading
up to the gusher.
A self-educated man, Higgins
left school in the 4th grade to ap-
prentice as a gunsmith. Always an
eager learner, he went through
life completely self-assured. As a
teenager, he was described as a
practical joker and troublemaker,
a fact that was evidenced by the
loss of an arm following an alter-
cation with deputies. Still, he was
known as a better fighter than
most men with two arms.
Working in the violent and im-
moral atmosphere of the east
Texas logging camps, Higgins’
life was turned around during a
Baptist revival meeting. "I used
to put my trust in pistols...now my
trust is in God,” he then said.
Returning to Beaumont, Hig-
gins began a real estate business,
but dreamed of creating an indus-
trial city. His religious life contin-
ued as he taught a
Sunday School
class for young
women.
After church,
many picnics were
taken on a grassy
knoll known as
“The Hill.” As a
self-taught natu-
ralist, the
seepages, bad
odors and
wraithlike figures
of St. Elmo's lights
in the evenings led
Higgins to believe
that oil could be
found there.
While on a re-
search trip to east-
ern brick factories,
Higgins not only
saw producing oil
fields, but also in-
vestigated the
clues the land
gives on the loca-
tion of oil. He
learned that the
most efficient brick factories of
the day were oil burning. Thus be-
gan his crusade to find oil on
Spindletop Hill.
In 1892, he convinced two
Beaumont businessmen to invest
in the Gladys City Oil, Gas and
Manufacturing Company. The
company was named after Gla-
dys Bingham, a young woman in
his Sunday School class. Higgins
unsuccessfully drilled in 1893 and
1895.
By 1896, most oil experts and
Beaumont residents believed
finding oil at The Hill was a
worthless pursuit. Undaunted,
Higgins advertised in magazines,
newspapers and industrial jour-
nals for engineers and geologists
interested in developing the tract.
Captain Lucas, an Austrian
expert on salt-dome mining, re-
sponded to the ad. Educated as an
engineer and having served in the
Austrian Navy, he settled in the
PARTI
IN A SERIES OF FOUR
FEATURE STORIFS
PR1PAH1D If INI
SPINDIHOP 2001
COMMfMORATIVf COMMISSION
★
The gusher that changed the world
The gusher that changed the world was captured by Fort Arthur news photographer Frank J Trust
within hours of the event that took place at 10 32 am, Jan 10, I'M) I In the photo the drilling crew
works to cap the well, a feat they accomplished by pumping mud stirred up by cattle-into the well
Starting
Friday
Robert DeNiro
Cuba Gooding Jr.
MEN of
HONOR□
Palace Theatre
wwwpalacetheatre.com
7:30 p.m. Fri.-Thurs. ♦ 2 p.tn. Sun.
United States because he liked
the optimism, adeptness, perse-
verance and the risk-taking en-
trepreneurship of the American
people.
After visiting the site and ex-
amining Higgins’ records, Lucas
also felt oil was present, in part
because he had found some oil in
similar formations while salt min-
ing in Louisiana.
In June 1899, Lucas partnered
with Higgins and leased a tract of
land from Gladys City to drill. Af-
ter six months, and only drilling
to 575 feet with equipment that
proved to be too light for the task,
money ran out
Still believing in the project,
Lucas traveled east to seek addi-
tional funding. He soon met with
James M. Guffey and John H.
Galey, a famous Pittsburgh wild
catting team That ui turn, suc-
cessfully engaged the interest of
Eastern-financier Andrew
Mellon.
Showing good faith with the
new partners, Lucas drew no sal-
ary and he and his wife soon were
selling furniture out of their home
to meet household expenses
Money and contacts brought
the final critical players to
Spindletop—the Hamill Brothers
Uniting Company from
Corsicana, the best rotary drillers
of their day.
In October 1899, using the
heavier and more advanced drill-
ing equipment that the hard rock
and quicksand site would de-
mand, the Hamills met each chal
lenge with ingenuity and
resourcefulness.
As in most drilling operations,
the crew of A1 and Curt Hamill
and Peck Byrd worked around
the clock for $2 per foot drilled.
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Ezzell, Nancy & Brown, Laurie Ezzell. The Canadian Record (Canadian, Tex.), Vol. 110, No. 49, Ed. 1 Thursday, December 7, 2000, newspaper, December 7, 2000; Canadian, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth736278/m1/6/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Hemphill County Library.