HE mad rush of frenzied wealth-seekers that has followed the amazing oil and gas development in Crawford County, Illinois, during the past ten months finds a counterpart only in the mining regions of Cripple Creek and other places of note where gold has been found, when the news that went abroad created great rushes for a new Eldorado. With the coming of the spring of 1906 when the people of Robinson, the county seat of Crawford County, at the crossing of the Cairo Division of the "Big Four" and the Effingham Division of the Illinois

POOL OF OIL ADJOINING TANKS.

Central, were contemplating measures for a better exploiting of the oil discoveries of the county, the boom burst upon the little city, with such force that every train that passed through the town from any direction was so crowded that standing room in the cars was at a premium.

But this was not all. Freight trains were loaded down with tools and machinery for drilling, with piping and all necessary supplies and paraphernalia connected with the oil business. At one time the sidings of the Big Four railroad in Robinson held eighty-one loaded cars, with consignments in the yards at Paris, Terre Haute, Indianapolis and one or two smaller points awaiting room for entering there.

Six miles west of Robinson was a little

flag station on the Central called Stoy. It was two miles north of the first wells drilled in southwest of Robinson, and is the location of the receiving tanks. There had been no agent at this place. When pipes were laid there, and shipping of supplies demanded a local agent, a wire was put into a box car and a telegraph and station office opened. On the 10th day of the month the business opened and totaled a little in excess of twenty thousand dollars for the remainder of the month. With the two roads at Robinson the oil business for that month exceeded seventy-five thousand dollars.

Harry Martin, a man

of seventy-five years, had a little farm of eighty-four acres, which he would willingly have sold for $2,500 before the oil boom. He leased it for one-eighth of the oil. It has paid him as high as one hundred dollars per day, and he has refused $1,000 per acre for the fee.

David Guncheon has leases on a block of four hundred acres four miles west of Robinson, on which he has a fine gas well, and a few oil wells. He has refused $200,000 for his leases, which he holds at half a million.

It is estimated that over $25,000,000 have been spent in the oil and gas business in this county.

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well for water at the home farm, about six miles southeast of Robinson, the Creswell brothers encountered a strong vein of gas at a depth of less than two hundred feet. They were so well satisfied with it that they piped it to their

The population of Robinson has doubled in the past year, many persons living in tents, and one-half the residents of the city have roomers. Eating-houses and boarding-houses are numerous. $35,000 hotel is in course of erection. Carpenters sufficient to erect the houses demanded could not be had the past season. Business rooms are in great demand. A half dozen or more machine shops have been put in operation. A glass factory is contracted for, and a refinery is assured. The deposits of the two banks doing business before the boom increased over a million dollars, and a third bank has just commenced business.

There are some fifteen hundred wells in the county, and less than a hundred dry holes. For ten miles west of Robinson, along the line of the Illinois Central, and in the north and southwest oil sections of the County, the derricks are so thick as to present the appearance of old-time deadenings of timber.

In

Like many other points in the United States, Crawford County got the oil craze in the sixties, about the time of the close of the Civil War. Companies were formed and wells put down, but no success of moment crowned these early efforts. boring deep wells for water, gas was encountered in different parts of the county at different times, in years following and, as gradually the gas fields of Indiana began to prove such a great incentive for the location of factories, the hopes of finding gas in sufficient quantities for fuel and manufacturing purposes raised high hopes among the Crawford County people.

About ten years ago in drilling a deep

Robinson, Crawford County, as shown by the map above, is almost directly south of Chicago, a distance of about 210 miles, on the Indiana border line.

homes, where the gas continues to be used for heating and lighting purposes At about the same time gas was found in drilling a well at the home of L. N. Marbry, a mile east of this city. Six years ago a local company was formed here to drill for coal, oil and gas. An expert from the east, with machinery was brought here, and drilling commenced on the Marbry farm. Two veins of coal were found at 600 and 800 feet, and some little gas between 800 and 900 feet. A strong vein of salt water was encountered at some 900 feet, and the well was abandoned, and other experiments of similar character produced no satisfactory results.

In the fall of 1904 a company was formed at Palestine, and an expert driller

and machinery was imported. A find of gas which furnished the town a temporary supply, was the chief result.

In the summer of 1865 a company formed in Clark County, which joins Crawford on the north, found some gas and enough of a showing of oil to give to the place the name of "Oilfield," though the work was abandoned because of caving.

In 1903 the facts relating to the operations of nearly forty years previous were brought to the attention of Messrs. J. J. Hoblitzel & Son, of Pittsburg, oil operators of prominence and much experience. The representations made to them were sufficient to enlist them in an enterprise to experiment with modern. methods. The first well drilled by these

BIG OIL POOL ADJOINING WELL.

men, which was in Oilfield, proved a good gasser, but not much oil. A second well was completed and shot in October, 1904, with an initial production of thirtyfive barrels per day. This was sufficient to attract the attention of other operators from the east, and leasing became quite active, as well as drilling. Several good wells as pumpers were brought in, but there were no gushers. The work then extended southwest, and Casey soon became known as the center of operations. The average depth in Clark County for oil is about 650 feet.

As about all the territory that looked desirable, and which could be leased for an oil royalty was taken up, leasing over the line into Crawford County began. In August, 1905, drilling was com

menced on the Athey farm, Licking Township, twelve miles northwest of Robinson. In the Illinois field there is what is known as gas and oil sand that takes the place of the Trenton rock of Indiana and Ohio. This well on the Athey farm was designed to be a test well for the benefit of the lessee only. The intention was if a showing of gas or oil, or both, should be found, then operations should stop and the hole be plugged until such time as the lessees had secured surrounding territory on favorable terms. But the drill, at a depth

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a little short of 1,000 feet, had scarcely penetrated the sand ere there was rushing of gas, followed by such a flow of oil as could not be hidden. In fact it was but a few minutes until the ground was getting saturated, and the smell going afar. There was no use trying to hide it, and in a few hours oil was running down a ravine adjoining the location.

Of course this discovery created quite a furore of excitement, not only in the immediate neighborhood, but in different sections of the county, and among oil men who were operating in Clark county. The word went East and there were visits of oil men from Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and Indiana.

As there was a strong flow of gas, a franchise for gas was at once sought from the City Council of Robinson, and after it had changed hands once or twice, the gas was piped to Robinson for general use.

The surface of the area producing oil is, in the northern and southern parts of this field, mainly prairie with little deviation in level, while in the central part, along the streams, it is quite hilly or broken. Wherever bluffs or hills are found they are the results of erosion. But few outcrops of rocks occur within the oil fields, and they are limestones, sandstones or shales of the carboniferous sort, exposed in gullies or along streams where the water has eroded channels through the drift and boulder clay, everywhere covering the oil territory from fifteen to one hundred feet. The rocks producing oil in Illinois belong to the carboniferous system, and are divided into three groups-upper or barron coal measures; lower coal measures, and mansfield sandstone.

In Illinois, as in Indiana, there are absolutely no surface indications which denote the presence either of gas or of oil in paying quantities in the underlying rocks. Gas and oil are found in Crawford county, at depths ranging from 800 to 1,100 feet below the surface, and the conditions are such that no man can with any certainty locate in advance a productive well. Hence going any distance from a well producing paying quantities of gas or oil may well be considered wildcatting. Such being the case land own

The oil began to flow as soon as the producing sand had been pierced two feet, and work was suspended. Efforts were made to stop the flow, which was forced out by the large volume of gas, and by the middle of April there were seven 250 barrel tanks full of oil, without being shot or pumped. This well was shot in August, and produced 1,000 barrels a day.

The leases which had been taken for Messrs. Anchor & Seybert provided for a royalty of one-eighth only. There was some considerable unleased lands in the vicinity of the Shire wells, and there was quite a rush of oil men to secure this territory. The first lease made to attract attention was that of an eighty acre tract in an adjoining section, for which a bonus of $25 per acre and one-eighth. of all oil was the condition of the lease. A well was put down on this land at once, which proved both a good gas and oil well. No. 2 on the same tract proved such a gusher that oil was thrown to the top of the derrick.

He was successful in securing for them some 20,000 acres of leases. As they did not care to go to the expense of experimenting themselves, they granted to The Minnetonka Oil company one-half of each lease in order to have that company put down some test wells. This company sub-leased to Messrs. Hughes & Finley some 2,800 acres in consideration that they should-sink two test wells, one on the Shire farm, some seven miles southwest of Robinson; the other in the vicinity of Oblong. About the first of the year 1906 a well was drilled in on the Shire land, which made the following

Twenty-five to thirty-five dollars per acre, and one-sixth of the oil now became the prevailing terms for leases in this section. In two or three instances sixty and seventy dollars per acre bonus was paid, and in one instance $108.00 per acre in addition to one-sixth of the oil. The lands which were leased at these prices were lands of a poor character