John McKeown drilled on the Farren hill and the slopes bordering the north bank of Bear Creek. Glory Hole popped up on B. B. Campbell’s Bear-Creek farm. Campbell-bluff, whole-souled “Ben”—is a Pittsburg capitalist, big in body and mind, outspoken and independent. “The Campbells are coming” could not have found a better herald. He produced largely, bought stacks of farms, refined and piped oil and was an important factor in the Armstrong-Butler development. At the Ursa Major well, the first on the farm, large casing and heavy tools were first used, with gratifying results. “Charley” Cramer juggled the temper-screw and laughed at the chaps who solemnly predicted the joints would not stand the strain and the engine would not jerk the tools out of the hole. The tool-dresser on Cramer’s “tower”—drilling went on night and day, each “tower” lasting twelve hours and the men changing at noon and midnight—was A. M. Lambing, now the learned and zealous parish-priest at Braddock. The well, completed in June of 1871 and good for a hundred barrels, was owned by James M. Lambing, to whom more than any other man the world is indebted for the extension of the Butler field.
Born in Armstrong county, in 1861 young Lambing concluded to invest some time and labor—his sole capital—in a well at the mouth of Tubb’s Run, two miles above Tionesta. A dry-hole was the poor reward of his efforts. Enlisting in the Eighty-third Regiment, he received disabling injuries, was discharged honorably, returned to Forest county in 1863, superintended the Denver Petroleum-Company, dealt in real estate and in 1866 commenced operating at Tidioute. A vein of bad luck in 1867 exhausting his last dollar, he sold his gold-watch and chain to pay the wages of his drillers. Facing the future bravely, he worked by the day, contracted to bore wells at Pleasantville, Church Run, Shamburg and Red Hot and bore up cheerfully during three years of adversity. In the winter of 1869 he traded an engine for an interest in a well at Parker that smelled of oil. For another interest he drilled the Wilt & Crawford well and secured leases on Tom’s Run. His Pharos, Gipsy Queen and Lady Mary wells enabled him to strike out boldly. In company with his brother—John A. Lambing—C. D. Angell and B. B. Campbell, he ventured beyond the prescribed limits to the Campbell, Morrison and Gibson farms. He “wildcatted” farther south, at times with varying success, pointing the way to Modoc and Millerstown. Reverses beset him temporarily, but hope and courage and integrity remained and he recovered the lost ground. Charitable, enterprising and sincere, no truer, squarer, manlier man than James M. Lambing ever marched in the grand cavalcade of Pennsylvania oil-producers. He and John A. retired from the business years ago to engage in other pursuits. James M. settled at Corry and served so capably as mayor that the citizens wanted to elect him for life. His noble, womanly wife, a real helpmeet always, made his hospitable home an earthly paradise. He had an office in Pittsburg and customers for his Ajax machinery wherever oil is produced. He died in January, 1897. “Who can blot his name with any just reproach?”
Counselled by “spirits,” Abram James selected a block of land on Blyson Run, twenty miles up the Clarion River, as the location of a rich petroleum-field. His luck at Pleasantville induced numbers to believe him an infallible oil-smeller. The test-well that was to deluge Blyson with crude was bored eighteen-hundred feet. It had no sand or oil and the tools were stuck in the hole! The “spirits” couldn’t have missed the mark more widely if they had directed James to mine for gold in a snow-bank.
The Big-Injun well at Bullion, owned originally by Prentice, Wheeler & Crawford, was located in the center of a wheat-patch by William R. Crawford, of Franklin, a member of the firm. His opinion carried against the choice of his partners, who preferred a spot fifteen rods eastward, where a well drilled later was “dry as a powder-horn.” The direction “Smiley’s Frog” might happen to jump was less uncertain than the outcome of many a Bullion well before the tools pierced the sand to the last foot and settled the matter positively.
On October third, 1875, the boiler at the Goss well, J. I. Best farm, exploded, fatally injuring Alonzo Goss and instantly killing A. Wilson, the man in charge.
The first pipe-line in Clarion County was laid in 1871, by Martin & Harms, on lands of the Fox estate. In October of 1877 the Rev. Dr. Newman, President Grant’s pastor in Washington, dedicated the second church the Methodists built at Edenburg. Fire cremated the structure and seriously damaged the third one on the site in 1879. Probably no other town of its size on the face of the earth has suffered so repeatedly and disastrously at the hands of incendiaries as Edenburg. The third great conflagration, on October thirteenth, 1878, destroyed two-hundred buildings and thirteen oil-wells.
Sad accidents happened before drillers learned how to manage a flowing oil-well with casing in it. At Frank Fertig’s well, Antwerp, a man was burned to death. The burning of the Shoup & Vensel well at Turkey City cost three lives and led to an indignation-meeting at St. Petersburg to protest against casing. Danger from its use was soon removed by Victor Gretter’s invention of the oil-saver. Gretter, a small, dark-haired, dark-eyed man, lived at St. Petersburg. He was an inventive genius and a joker of the first water. His oil-saver doubtless saved many lives, by preventing gas and oil from escaping when a vein was tapped and coming in contact with the tool-dresser’s fire in the derrick.
Captain John Kissinger, a pioneer settler, died in 1880 at the age of eighty-five. He was the father of thirty-four children, nine of whom perished by his dwelling taking fire during the absence of the parents from home. His second wife, who survived him ten years, weighed three-hundred pounds.
Lillian Edgarton, the plump and talented platform-speaker, was billed to appear at Franklin. She traveled from Pittsburg by rail. A Parker broker was a passenger on the train and wired to the oil-exchange that Josie Mansfield was on board. The news flew and five-hundred men stood on the platform when the train arrived. The broker jumped off and said the lady had a seat near the center of the coach he had just left. The boys climbed on the car-platform, opened the door and marched in single file along the aisle to get a look at “Josie.” The conductor tore his hair in anguish that the train would not carry such a crowd as struggled to get on, but he was dumbfounded when the long procession began to get off. The sell was not discovered until next morning, by which time the author of the joke had started on his summer-vacation and could not be reached by the vigilance-committee.
Down the zig-zagged stream proved to not a few operators a pleasant voyage to wealth and to others the direct road to disaster. Venango, Clarion and Armstrong counties had been explored, with Butler on deck to surprise mankind by the extent and richness of its amazing territory.