Population growth created by the first ten years of oil production in the Permian Basin was remarkable. Once the Big Lake field began to develop, a veritable deluge of oil men poured into the Permian Basin. As it turned out, during the mid to late 1920s, that vast lightly inhabited region with no known oil […]
A Company Town for the Ages
There are few examples of the company town concept in oil country. Some come close, like the town of Philips near Borger up in the Panhandle. Others, like the company camp concept, fall peripherally within that range. The reasons they do not qualify are threefold. A company town, to be rightly deemed as such, must […]
Born on a Prayer
Although completion of the Santa Rita #1 well in Reagan County in 1923 was preceded by the Mitchell County Abrams #1 (1920) and the Loving County Russell #1 (1921), firsts do not necessarily denote the most important. The Santa Rita well, which was in the same 100-barrel production range as those which preceded it, received […]
The Century Mark: Midland-Based Fasken Oil and Ranch Celebrates a Momentous Milestone in May
By Paul Wiseman In the early 1900s west Texas was as empty as a whiskey bottle at closing time, and almost as dry. (Some things haven’t changed). What would possess someone in far-off Toronto, Canada, to buy approximately 220,000 acres of the place, sight-unseen, is still somewhat of a mystery. But that is exactly what […]