The Road to Well-ville

Two Philly guys make a pilgrimage to Oil City, Pa. — birthplace of the American oil industry.

by Bruce Walsh

THE LAST DROP AT THE DRAKE WELL: Over the years, both the oil and the industry in Oil City have been tapped out. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

It's July 2007. Jena Knight, secretary to the mayor of Oil City, Pa., considers me in an awkward silence. I'm wearing torn jeans and an old plaid cotton shirt, and I'm sensing she was expecting someone very different when we made this appointment. Either I start looking and acting like a real reporter, or she might start pressing a little harder about my credentials. (And I sort of don't have any.) I clip my Dictaphone to my chest pocket and flip open my little notebook.

"Can we look around while we wait?" I say finally, breaking the silence. Ten minutes later, I've met every employee in the municipal government of Oil City. Each introduction elicits an exceptionally warm and gracious response, and between handshakes I compare my research with Jena's seemingly unending knowledge of the town's history. Pretty soon she's cracking open almanacs and creaky file cabinets. What a find. Jena is the expert I want to talk to here, not the mayor. 

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The first oil successfully drilled in the United States was roughly eight miles north of what is today Oil City. This fact is unknown to most Pennsylvanians. Edwin Drake hit a pool of crude there with his modified salt mining drill in 1859, sparking the nation's first oil boom. Oil City quickly became the home of the world's first oil corporations: Pennzoil, Quaker State (both now owned by Shell) and Wolf's Head (now Amalie Oil in Tampa, Fla.). They in turn developed pipeline technology (a way of avoiding union controlled transportation — greedy bastards) and created the Oil Exchange, which dictated worldwide prices of petroleum. It's fair to say that the technology, markets and corporate structures for the coming oil age (now) began with that 69.5-foot hole in northwest Pennsylvania.

I came across the Drake Well while leafing through a few of those wacky bet-you-didn't-know-about-PA books in the Center City Borders. But after I shared the factoid with my drinking buddy, Robert, the words Oil City slowly took on a far deeper and somewhat inexplicable meaning for us. Over the next few months, Oil City evolved into a kind of battle cry. We'd belt it out from street corners and barstools. At times, Robert would grab me by the lapels and scream "Oil City, motherfucker, Oil City!" Somehow this simple combination of words put a button on the insanity of our age: American greed and power, climate change, the war in Iraq, our president, completely unnecessary SUVs on Lombard Street. ... Oil City represented the place where these values sprang from the earth in a black gush. The cry was a release of rage and frustration.

Mayor Ed Sharp Jr. (since replaced) chooses to sit next to me at the conference table, rather than behind his desk. He's a barrel-chested man who looks to be somewhere in his 40s, with a thick cop's mustache and a friendly disposition. He's a little less knowledgeable on the oil history than Jena. But once he relaxes into the conversation, we're able to discuss Quaker State's departure in 1995 and the closure of Pennzoil's Oil City refinery in 2000 — still very fresh wounds. More than 300 employees were laid off byQuaker State and 158 more were asked to move to Irving, Texas. In a town of 11,000, that's quite a blow, especially since the big Q represented the last of Oil City's industrial identity. The hospital, school district and Penndot are the only remaining major employers.

I follow Mayor Sharp down the hall toward the elevator, and nearly every employee remarks on his shirt and tie.

"Doing a little public relations today," he explains to them.

"I usually wear work clothes," he says to me. "There's always something that needs painting or whatever." And very suddenly I don't want to write the snarky article I envisioned back in Philadelphia. On the sidewalk there are families walking back from the Oil Heritage Festival, a celebration held every July featuring miniature boomtown replicas, model barge races and praise team competitions. I struggle to remember what I thought was so funny about all of that.

A half-hour later I'm cruising with the mayor in his SUV, and Robert is in the back seat like a pig in shit. It seems the red carpet has been rolled out for us, and I'm wondering if someone — maybe Robert — told him I was from The New York Times.

"Pretty town you got here, Mr. Mayor," says Robert. "Real preeetty town." And for the first time I take a good look at the scenery. Under the bright July sun, it's maybe the most idyllic American town I've ever seen. The Allegheny cuts through the city center, and tree-covered mountains jut up in every direction. O-I-L-C-I-T-Y is actually written in enormous letters on the side of the most prominent mountain, and Victorian houses are cut neatly into the landscape. When we get a little closer to the houses, it's clear that almost all of them are aching for a fresh coat of paint. And as we move toward the edge of town, dilapidated structures surround.

The mayor makes a few tight turns, and we spiral up a dirt road toward a clearing on the mountain. All of Oil City lies bellow us when we get out of the car. I persuade the Mayor to pose for a few photos. He's a little bashful but finally relents. "I love this place. I was born and raised here," he says as I look at him in the viewfinder. "I guess this is just part of the job."

I'm trying to wake Robert.

"What time is it?" he asks.

"6:30," I say.

"Fuck you," he says and pulls his sleeping bag up over his head.

It's a chilly dawn under the forest canopy. I spur the orange embers in the pit with a stick and huddle over them to get warm. We drove down a dirt road to get to this spot and hiked about a half-mile to boot. It's as deep into the forest as I have ever camped. I close my eyes and listen. The only things I can hear are birds and branches. As the sun starts poking through the trees, I can hear the distant rumble of a truck to the west, probably out on Route 8. Over the next half-hour there are more and more rumbles somewhere to the west until I can barely hear anything else.

The museum's lone employee tells me that, unbelievably, the well can still produce crude. I'm ready for it to splash me in the face, and Robert is hoping it does: "Now that's Oil City, motherfucker."

After about 15 minutes of sweaty labor, the mechanic coaxes a sputtering stream of black liquid from the replica derrick. It flows within an inch of my nose. Thirty seconds later the stream fades down to a tiny trickle of black drops.

(b_walsh@citypaper.net)

The Oil Heritage Festival runs July 24-27 in Oil City, Pa. More info at venangochamber.org/ohf.htm.