"In March, 1857, the following letter appeared in the Rochester (NY) Democrat: "I have just seen specimens of benzole, camphene oil and tallow from coal up in the vicinity of Smethport, McKean county, superior to anything ever known. One ton of coal makes eighty gallons of benzole, forty gallons of fluid, twenty gallons of lubricating oil and fifteen pounds of tallow or sperm. The actual cost of benzole, etc., will not exceed fifteen cents per gallon. * * * There is a machine (for manufacturing purposes) now on the way to Bradford. Depend upon it, this is no humbug." Nor was it, for buildings were erected opposite the present Riddell House, and coal oil manufactured there. In November 1859, a New York and Boston company erected a coal-oil mill at the Hermit opening between Marsh's Corners and Kinzua, where they hoped to mine sufficient coal for obtaining this oil. Gilbert, one of the projectors, did not then dream that oil existed here in oceans, although the Drake well, at Titusville, was completed August 28, 1859, and even before this, in 1858, J. M. Williams' well in Canada, and other wells in Enniskillen township, in the county of Lambton, same country, were in operation. The coal oil manufacturers had before them the efforts of S. Kier and Nevin, McKeown & Co., of March 1857; the latter company's well at Greensburg, Penn., in 1858; the offer of $1000.00 for a lamp that would burn petroleum made by S. Kier in 1857, and also the shipments made to New York in November, 1857, by A. C. Ferris, and the introduction of a lamp in which the odorous oil would burn. Col. Drake's well soon shadowed the coal-oil extract works out of existence, and nothing was heard throughout Pennsylvania but stories of wells and drills and oils.

In April, 1861, oil was found on the Beckwith farm, a mile west of Smethport; at Port Allegany the citizens drilled a well, while near McCoy's mill pond (in the vicinity of Smethport) oil was discovered, and down the Tuna exploration was carried on. About this time some irreverent drillers placed a sign on their new derrick, "Oil, Hell or China." Their resolution amounted to little as they did not strike oil, ------- or China. In 1862 the old Barnsdall or Bradford well near west city line was drilled, a spring pole being part of the machinery used. With this rude driller and ruder ideas of the reservoir, it is no wonder that the tired and disappointed owners abandoned the work at the depth of 200 feet, or within 825 feet of the productive sand. In 1865-66, the citizens of the little village of Bradford formed a bee to explore farther, and drilled to the depth of 875 feet, when they surrendered the works within 150 feet of the point where perseverance would bring victory. Basing their ideas on the Oil City fields, where the top of the productive third sand is 528 feet above ocean level, they, with little labor, essayed to elevate the level of the Bradford third sand which is 114 feet below that of Oil City, a physical impossibility indeed. In 1864-65 the Dean Brothers drilled 900 feet on the Shepherd farm, near Custer City. Here another disappointment waited on ignorance of geological structure, for while the old Bradford sand could be found 1,100 feet below the surface there, it was at least 200 feet deeper down on the Shepherd farm. Men were wild in those days. Impatience as well as ignorance of altitudes and structures ruined many individuals, whose ideas were otherwise practicable. The Dean Brothers did poorer work on the Clark farm (Tarport), where they halted within 400 feet of the top of the producing sand, after wasting time and labor on a 605 feet hole. Kinzua Village oil-field dates back to 1865, when the Kinzua Oil Company and the Kinzua Oil Association were organized, and six wells drilled to a depth of 600 feet, but oil answered the drill in only small quantities. In 1875 Hunter & Cummings drilled on the Cobbett farm without success, and in 1878 E. A. VanScoy & Co.'s venture on Wolf Run was equally unsuccessful, although residents and others were much enthused by the appearances and disappearances of oil. In the winter of 1884-85 James Parker & Co. drilled on the Fuller farm, and on March 27, 1885, the "Kinzua Gusher" was expected to drown out all other wells, but yielded only twenty-five barrels. Later, however, staying wells were developed and worked successfully.

In 1868 the several oil enterprises of Job Moses, in the neighborhood of Limestone, gave an idea of what the true development of this region would yield. The Salem Oil Company's well was drilled in August, 1871, on Shepherd's Run, near DeGolier and the Elk Lick spring. The W. H. Taylor Oil Company organized in September, 1871, with J. K. Haffey, president; J. W. Hillon, vice-president; T. J. Campbell, treasurer, and T. J. Melvin, secretary, to drill wells on Kendall Creek, on the Moore farm. Mark Hardie, of Mt. Alton, and others were members of this company. In August, 1871, a meeting held at the new Bradford House, at Bradford, to consider means to develop the oil field, organized the Barnsdall Oil Company, with J. W. Hilton, president; J. R. Pomeroy, vice-president; C. C. Melvin, treasurer; T. J. Melvin, secretary; James Broder and Enos Parsons, directors.

In 1871 old-time methods changed for the better. The Foster Oil Company was organized with C.H. Foster, Job Moses and James E. Butts, members. They drilled at a point two miles northeast of Bradford, and in November struck a ten-barrel-per-day sand 1,110 feet below the well's mouth. Even with this example of perseverance nothing more of importance was accomplished until December 6, 1874, when Butts & Foster opened Butt's well No. 1 on the Buchanan farm, a half mile northeast of their first well, and struck a seventy-barrel-per-day stream. The product for the month was seventy-five barrels. Before April 1, 1880, there were 4,000 producing wells in the Bradford oil district, yielding 50,000 barrels a day."

Many more wells were drilled from this point on, the extensive history can be read in the book the above information was taken from. You will also find a list of wells drilled, production levels, and much more relating to this industry. The book is a wealth of information.