If she hadn’t moved she’d be there still:
But she moved!”
About St. Valentine’s Day in 1866, when the burning of the Tremont House led to the discovery of oil in springs and wells, was a hilarious time at Pithole. Every cellar was fairly flooded with grease. People pumped it from common pumps, dipped it from streams, tasted it in tea, inhaled it from coffee-pots and were afraid to carry lights at night lest the very air should cause explosion and other unhappiness. It became a serious question what to drink. The whiskey could not be watered—there was no water. Dirty shirts could not be washed—the very rain was crude oil. Dirt fastened upon the damask cheeks of Pithole damsels and found an abiding-place in the whiskers of every bronzed fortune-hunter. Water commanded an enormous price and intoxicating beverages were cheap, since they could scarcely be taken in the raw. The editor of the Record, a strict temperance man, was obliged to travel fourteen miles every morning by stone-boat to get his glass of water. Stocks of oil-companies were the only thing in the community thoroughly watered. Tramps, hobos, wandering vagrants and unwashed disbelievers that “cleanliness is next to Godliness” pronounced Pithole a terrestrial paradise. They were willing to reverse Muhlenburg’s sentiment and “live alway” in that kind of dry territory.
“You’re not fit to sit with decent people; come up here and sit along with me!” thundered a Dawson teacher who sat at his desk hearing a recitation, as he discovered at a glance the worst boy in school annoying his seatmate.
Charles Highberger, who had lost a leg, was elected a justice of the peace at Pithole in 1866. Attorney Ruth, who came from Westmoreland county, was urging the conviction of a miserable whelp when he noticed Highberger had fallen asleep, as was his custom during long arguments. Mr. Ruth aroused him and remarked: “I wish your honor would pay attention to the points which I am about to make, as they have an important bearing on the case.” Highberger opened his eyes, glared around the room and rose on his crutches in great wrath, exclaiming: “There has been too much blamed chin-whacking in this case; you have been talking two hours and I haven’t seen a cent of costs. The prisoner may consider himself discharged. The court will adjourn to Andy Christy’s drug-store.” This was the way justice was dispensed with in those good old days when “go as you please” was the rule at Pithole.
John G. Saxe once lectured at Pithole and was so pleased with the people and place that he donated twenty-five dollars to the charity-fund and wrote columns of descriptive matter to a Boston newspaper. “If I were not Alexander I would be Diogenes,” said the Macedonian conqueror. Similarly Henry Ward Beecher remarked, when he visited Oil City to lecture, “If I were not pastor of Plymouth church I would be pastor of an Oil-City church.” The train conveying Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil, through the oil-region stopped at Foxburg to afford the imperial guest an opportunity to see an oil-well torpedoed. He watched the filling of the shell with manifest interest, dropped the weight after the torpedo had been lowered and clapped his hands when a column of oil rose in the air. An irreverent spectator whispered: “This beats playing pedro.”
J. P. ALBEE.
J. P. Albee, laborer, painter, carpenter, rig-builder, pumper, pipe-liner, merchant and insurance-agent, was born in Warren county, reared on a farm in the Wisconsin lead-mining regions, enlisted in 1861, served three years gallantly and was discharged because of a wound in the breast by a rifle-ball. He struck Pithole in September of 1865, shared in the ups and downs of the transitory excitement and was one of the founders, if not the full-fledged father, of Cash-Up. The brave veteran was a pioneer in shoving ahead and demonstrating where oil was not to be expected. He owned fourteen dry-holes in whole or part, a number sufficient to establish quite a record. Drifting to Butler with the tide of developments, he engaged in various pursuits with varying success. Hosts of friends relish his tales of army-life and of ventures in Oildom, a knapsack of which he has constantly on hand. The years speed quickly, bringing many changes in their wake, and thousands who once waded through the muddy streets of Pithole are now treading the golden pavements of the Celestial City. Those who linger here a while longer love to recall the times that can never be repeated under the blue canopy.
Mud-veins in the third sand on Oil Creek and at Pithole would often stick the tools effectually. On Bull Run three wells in one derrick were abandoned with tools stuck in the third sand. The theory was that the mud vein was a stratum of slate in the sand, which became softened and ran into the well when water came in contact with it. Casing has robbed it of its terrors.