| Few East Texans
remember Lyne Taliaferro Barret, but they should: Barret drilled the first oil
well in Texas. Moderns
may also struggle to remember when oil reigned as king of Texas industries, but
from the Spindletop field discovered near Beaumont in 1901, to the EasTex field
around Kilgore in 1930 and the expansion of the business to West Texas, oil was
THE industry associated with the state for most of the 20th century. Barret
was born in Virginia in 1832 and a decade later his family moved west, settling
first in San Augustine County and later on a plantation near Melrose in Nacogdoches
County. Barret's interest in oil exploration predated the Civil War. As early
as December 1859, he leased 297 acres from Lucy W. Skillern in an area known as
Oil Springs. Barret selected that site because crude oil seeped out along with
spring water there. The
Civil War kept Barret from pursuing his search for oil. Meantime, he clerked for
the Harademan mercantile firm and became a partner by 1862. He also served as
quartermaster for the Nacogdoches District in Confederate service between 1863
and 1865. On December
21, 1865, Barret joined Benjamin Hollingsworth, Charles Hamilton, John Flint,
and John Earle in organizing the Melrose Petroleum Oil Company. Drilling began
on the Skillern tract in the summer of 1866, and on September 12 they struck oil
at a depth of 106 feet. The well produced only ten barrels per day, but it proved
that oil was beneath Texas soil.
It is ironic that the first oil well
in Texas was drilled in Nacogdoches County, which then led to the first surface
storage tanks and the first pipeline for oil in Texas, but these "firsts" never
produced great wealth there as did later discoveries at Spindletop to the south
and the EasTexas field to the north. Modern
residents can drive to the site of Texas' first well but they won't find much
there. For years former Nacogdoches Fire Chief Delbert Teutsch labored to preserve
the well area and several others, among them the late Lucille Fain, tried in vain
to get Texas Parks & Wildlife to develop a state historical park there.
That effort should be renewed by any legislator who represents Nacogdoches County--where
oil was discovered first in Texas.
All Things Historical
February 4-10 , 2001
A
syndicated column in over 40 East Texas newspapers
Published
by permission. (Archie P. McDonald is Director of the East Texas Historical Association
and author or editor of more than 20 books on Texas)
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