Oil Industry In Texas

People usually think of oil when they think of Texas. For many years, Texas oil had little value. In the early 1900s, lumber was still the leading industry in Texas. However, after oil was discovered at the Spindletop in 1901, it became the state’s number-one industry. The discovery of huge amount of oil in Texas affected the economy as well as many aspects of daily life.

For the Texans, the 20th century began on Jan. 10, 1901 when the Lucas No. 1 well blew in at thte Spindletop near Beaumont, a hill which was formed by a giant underground dome of salt in southeastern Texas. With that dramatic event, Texas ' economy was changed from its rural, agricultural roots into the petroleum and industrial age. The discovery at the Spindletop fueled a revolution in transportation and transformed Texas into an industrial giant like never before. Beaumont almost instantly became a boomtown with investors from around the states and the nation participating in land speculation.

Daniel Yergin, a famous author of the book Prize, stated that “a new language was born on the hill, for it was at the Spindletop that a “well borer” first became a “driller”, a skilled helper a “roughneck”, and a semiskilled helper a “roustabout” 1

Oil was being pumped out of the

Spindletop, the oil boom in Beaumont created the modern oil and natural gas industry, changed the future of American transportation, and also brought many new oilfield technologies. “Spindletop was to remake the oil industry.” 3 Before the discovery of Spindletop, oil was only used for lamps and lubrication. After the Spindletop, petroleum would be used as a major fuel for new inventions as the airplane and automobile. Ships and trains that had previously run on the power of coal, now switched to oil. The cheap fuel helped to revolutionize American transportation and industry. Refineries, pipelines and export facilities became major industrial region that began to form along the Texas coast from Port Arthur to