The capital invested in petroleum in this country has increased from one-thousand dollars, raised in 1859 to drill the first well in Pennsylvania, to six-hundred-millions. It is just as easy to say six-hundred-million dollars as six-hundred-million grains of sand, but the possibilities of such a sum of money afford material for endless flights of the imagination. Thirty-thousand miles of pipe-lines handle the output most expeditiously, conveying it to the seaboard at less than teamsters used to receive for hauling it a half-mile. Ten-thousand tank-cars have been engaged in its transportation. Seventy-five bulk-steamers and fleets of sailing-vessels carry refined from Philadelphia and New York to the most distant ports in Europe, Africa and Asia. “Astral Oil” and “Standard White” have penetrated “wherever a wheel can roll or a camel’s foot be planted.” In Pennsylvania, South-eastern Ohio and West Virginia thirty-five-million barrels have been produced and eight-thousand wells drilled in a single year. Add to this the results of operations in North-eastern Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming and California, and it must be acknowledged that petroleum is entitled to the chief seat in the synagogue. Edward Bellamy may, perhaps, be imitated profitably and pleasantly in this connection by “Looking-Backward.”
Looking forward is the proper kink,
Smooth as skating in an icy rink,
In one’s planning how to fill a chink
At manifold times and places;
But for winning in a thoughtful think,
Past and present joining with a link
Guaranteed to wash and never shrink,
Looking backward holds four aces.
