Please join us for an in-person event at Hotel Indigo in downtown Tulsa. Lunch will start at 11:30am followed by a presentation of "Petroleum Prospectivity in 1850s North America" by Ray Sorenson and our Annual Business Meeting. 

In-Person Lunch is $25.

ABSTRACT

An evaluation of petroleum exploration potential using drilled wells in North America in the 1850s, without knowledge of the 1859 Drake Well at Titusville, Pennsylvania that stimulated the commercialization of the oil industry, would have been heavily based on study of published literature that described natural oil and gas occurrences. On the assumption that access to major markets in the New England region was a business priority, a literature review of opportunities on the scale of a state or province is assessed for all North America as well as the West Indies and coastal regions of Latin America.

Upstate New York would have ranked as the best prospective region, with geological documentation of petroleum at more than 40 locations, and with transportation corridors to metropolitan markets already in place. Ontario had production from hand-dug wells at Enniskillen and several other shows to the north of Lake Erie and would have been regarded as a western extension of the New York play area. Next on the priority list would have been the Ohio - (West) Virginia boundary area along the Ohio River, plus other locations scattered across Ohio, where petroleum and carburetted hydrogen gas were commonly associated with brine wells used in the salt manufacturing industry. The West Indies island of Barbados was next, with a specific location for the seep that supplied Barbadoes Green Tar, the premier petroleum product for the medical world. Kentucky would have completed the top five, with hydrocarbon indications that were as good or better than in Ohio, but market access would have been less convenient.

The seeps on Oil Creek near Titusville were known, even though they had been ignored by the state geological survey, but a decision to perform a serious study of northwestern Pennsylvania would likely have resulted from its immediate proximity to the more prospective regions of New York, Ohio, and (West) Virginia. Seventh-ranked California had extensive surface shows, but the oil was very heavy and its transportation to New England would have been very difficult. Bitumen shows within the Hartford rift valley of Connecticut/Massachusetts were less impressive than in higher ranked states, but the metropolitan location would have justified serious examination. The Gaspé Peninsula and other areas along the St. Lawrence Seaway in Quebec would also have been of interest due to the easy availability of marine transportation. Oklahoma (Indian Territory) at number ten would have attracted attention as the most prospective inland region west of the Mississippi River, with reasonable proximity to military establishments