Friday, January 10, 1901. Spindletop.

 

The first well, the Lucas Gusher, came in at Spindletop Oil Field, Beaumont, Texas.  The gusher, drilled in a salt dome which was not supposed to be productive, gushed 10,000 barrels per day for nine days.

Last edition:

Monday, January 7, 1901. Attacking railroads.

Labels: 1900s, 1901, Boer War, Colorado, Crime

Tuesday, June 15, 1943. Riots in Beaumont.

Riots occurred in Beaumont, Texas, a city just to the north of Port Arthur, when white men, half employed by the Pennsylvania Shipyards, attacked homes, businesses and automobiles of African Americans.

Acting Governor A. M. Aiken had to call out the wartime Texas State Guard and deploy Texas Rangers, while also declaring martial law.

It was the first flight of the jet engined German bomber, the Arado Ar 234.

The twin engined jet bomber was the first of its kind in the world, and would enter service in the fall of 1944, too late to be of consequence.

Manual Jobs that have disappeared. Railroad Crossing Watchman.

This is the Out Our Way cartoon from April 21, 1923, courtesy of Reddit's 100 Years Ago sub.

The thing that surprises me here is that it never occurred to me that there were human manned railroad crossings, but as this photo shows, they existed into the 1940s at least:

Railroad crossing, Beaumont, Texas, May 1943.

Indeed, in looking it up, it seems like the modern type of crossing with the lowering arms came about in the 1950s.  An earlier automatic type called a "wig wag" was patented in 1909, but it must not have had universal use.

By Richamos - I took the picture with my own camera, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6347827

This brings up a number of interesting things, including that signals just weren't what they now are.  This likely explains why railroad crossing accidents were seemingly so common, such as this one, which was discussed in the Casper Daily Tribune about an April 20, 1923 accident.

But another matter, while the world is seemingly getting safer, there's less of a role for humans in it.

We've discussed this before, but automation is eliminating jobs, and has been, for a century.  Crossing guard attendants probably filled that job for a number of reasons, but one of the reasons likely was that some of the occupants of that position simply were suited for a job with pretty much no skills whatsoever, and were fine with a long day to themselves.  Where are they now?  Some of them are unemployed and unemployable.

And with the arrival of AI, this will rapidly expand into the white collar and professional world. We're making a world we literally can't live in.

A monumental day in the petroleum industry. January 10, 1901

It was on this day in 1901 that a well, after many persistent efforts by its backers, struck oil at Spindletop Dome near Beaumont Texas.

Lucas Gusher.

The Lucas Gusher, as it was known, blew petroleum oil 150 feet in the air at a loss of 100,000 bbls per day for nine days before it was brought under control. It was the first producing well on the Gulf Coast and gave rise to Texas' oil industry and, for that part, to much of the oil industry in the United States.  The population of nearby Beaumont went from 10,000 to 50,000 people rapidly and the culture and industry of Texas was forever impacted.

 

Port Arthur, Texas, south of Beaumont.