Century history of Butler and Butler County, Pa., and representative citizens 20th, Part 30

Author: McKee, James A., 1865- ed. and comp
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1526

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THE "SPOTTY" M'BRIDE WELL.

The decline of the Speechley field in Washington and Concord Townships was. followed by the usual crop of predictions that Butler County had produced her last oil pool, and that the shades of oblivion would soon cover the entire district. In the winter of 1904-5 Isaac L. (Spotty) McBride leased a block of 215 acres of land in the southwestern section of Butler Township about three miles from Butler, and located a well on the O. K. Waldron

farm. After much hard labor and many disappointments he formed a partnership with P. F. McCool, Harry Hinchberger, and Mike Finnegan, and let the contract for the drilling of the well. McBride had been in the oil country for over thirty years and had more than the usual run of bad luck. He had drilled numerous dry holes, and when he undertook the drilling of the well on the Waldron farm he was obliged to work on the well as a driller in order to carry his one-fourth interest. The well was completed May 9, 1905, and began to flow at the rate of 2,500 barrels per day. It was by all odds the largest well struck since the days of Thorn Creek, and "Spotty's" fortune was made. A mad scramble for leases followed the striking of the well, and fancy prices were paid. The Simon Barrickman farm of forty acres was leased for $11,000 and the eighth royalty. Two thousand dollars were paid for twenty acres of the Samuel Schlagel farm, and $10,000 for the Ihmsen farm, while equally as fancy prices were paid for other farms in the vicinity. After the McBride well had flowed about 30,000 barrels of oil the owner sold the property for $200,000. Spotty's one- quarter interest represented a neat profit of a little more than $50,000, and he is now living on "Easy Street."

The McBride pool proved to be a freak of the first water. Other wells were drilled but all of them turned out to be small producers and the entire field was a money loser to nearly every one but the owners of the first well.

HOFFMAN'S LUCK.

In May, 1908, Harry N. Hoffman, a pumper for the Southern Oil Company in Penn Township, secured a ten-acre lease on the Dodds farm, on which he proposed to drill a well. About twenty-two years ago an operator named Jones had obtained a lease on the same piece of land and erected a derrick. Before the drill was

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started a dry well or two had been drilled in the neighborhood, and Jones concluded that his was a losing chance. He accord- ingly gave up his lease and sold the rig without drilling. Hoffman knew about the location and always had faith in it. When he secured his lease and started to drill he had to give up his job with the oil company, and when he tried to get finan- cial backing he was met with polite re- fusals and some few intimations that he was crazy to drill on the location that he had solicited. Nothing daunted, he mort- gaged his home for all it would carry, bor- rowed all the money he could get from other sources to pay the contractors, and on the day that the well reached the top of the sand he stood to lose every penny he had saved in twenty-five or thirty years' work or make a fortune. When the driller started to run the last bit, the hole was apparently as dry as the proverbial "pow- der horn." Hoffman was sitting on the anvil in the derrick watching the tools de- scend their hole, and remarked to the drilling crew, "Well, boys, I am all in." "Never say die until the last bit has been drilled," replied the driller, who really felt sorry for Hoffman. Sure enough, when the bit came up in the course of an hour it was dripping with grease, and be- fore the day was over the Hoffman No. 1 was flowing at the rate of 250 barrels a day. The Hoffman well opened an ex- tensive pool in Penn Township which has produced a number of wells in the 100- barrel class, but none of the wells have equalled the first gusher. Hoffman was offered $30,000 for a half interest in the well ten days after it was struck, but re- fused to sell. He drilled other wells on his lease and is on the high road to for- tune. The striking of the gusher caused a scramble for leases and high prices were paid for land in the immediate vicinity of the well.

OIL COUNTRY HONOR.

Much has been written and said about

the code of honor among oil men in the oil country twenty-five or thirty years ago. An instance occurred in connection with the Hoffman well which brings the sub- ject down to the present date. Newton Maharg owns a farm adjoining the Hoff- man lease on the Dodds tract. When Hoffman started to drill his well he went to Maharg and asked him for a ten-acre lease to protect his well. Maharg had no faith in the venture, and refused the lease, but not wishing to discourage Hoffman, he said, "Go ahead with your drilling, and if you get a well I will give you a ten-acre lease for nothing, and all I will ask is the usual royalty." Hoffman took Maharg at his word, and when the gusher came in he went after the lease and got it, although it would have been several thousand dol- lars to Maharg's advantage to go back on his word. The land surrounding the two leases sold as high as $200 an acre, and Maharg could have easily received the top price for the asking.

THE OIL MEN'S OUTING ASSOCIATION.

The Oil Men's Outing Association had its inception in 1886, when the employes of the National Transit Company and their friends held a picnic at Slippery Rock Park on the Bessemer Railroad. The affair was such a pronounced success that it was decided to hold an outing every year and include all the oil men and their friends in the entire oil field. The place of holding the annual outing was changed to Conneaut Lake, and a permanent organ- ization was 'effected. One of the features is the publication of the Oil and Gas Mag- azine which is devoted to oil region reminiscences, and contains much valuable information about the oil business. The officers of the association in 1908 were J. W. McKee, president; Hon. E. L. Was- son, vice-president; C. R. Watson, secre- tary and treasurer; Charles H. Olliver, chairman of the executive committee, with the following active members of the com-

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HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY

mittee: William M. Starr, Samuel C.

Redic, Z. P. Lauffer, J. K. Wood, M. M.

Mckinney, H. A. Evans, and Dr. W. R. Cowden.

The production of Pennsylvania crude petroleum in 1859 was 1,873 barrels. In 1860 it was 547,439 barrels, and the high- water mark in production was reached in 1891, when 35,742,152 barrels were pro- duced.

The lowest monthly average price of crude petroleum in 1859 was $20 per bar- rel. It dropped to $2.75 in 1860 and to $.10 in 1861 and 1862. The $4 mark was reached in 1864 and the average price for the year was $9.871/2. The highest monthly average for the same year was $12.121/2. In 1874 the price declined to $.55 and the production was 11,000,000 barrels. The steady decline in the price of crude oil caused financial disasters in the oil coun- try, and Butler County suffered along with the others. It has been said that dur- ing the period of depression that over 2,000 executions were issued by the sher- iffs in the oil country, and this county had its proportionate share.

PRICES OF CRUDE OIL.

The average price of pipe line certifi- cates of Pennsylvania crude petroleum as well as the price in January of each year, is given below :

Year.

Price in January.

Yearly

1860.

$19.25

average. $9.59

1861.

1.00

.49

1862.

.10

1.05

1863.

2.25

3.15

1864

4.00

8.06

1865

8.25

6.59

1866.

4.50

3.74

1867

1.871/

2.41

. 1868.

1.95

3.621/2

1869

5.75

5.631/2

1870.

4.521/2

3,86

1871.

3.8216

4.34

1872

4.021%

3.64

1873.

2.60

1.83

1874.

1.20

1.17

1875

1.03

1.35

1876.

1.80

2.561/4

1877

3.53 14

2.42

1878.

1.43

1.19

1879.

1.03

.857/8

1880.

1.101/4

.941/2

1881.

.951/2

.857/8

1882

.831/8

.781/8

1883.

.93.1

1.0534

1884

1.11

.831%

1885

.707/8

.8778

1886.

.883/8

.711/4:

1887

.70

.6634

1888.

.9114

875%

1889

.865%

.941%

1890.

1.0534

.8634

1891

.7414

1892.

.623/8

.555%

1893.

.531%

1894.

.7934

.837%

1895.

.99

1.357/8

1896 .-

1.425g

1.177/8

1897

.88

.755%

1898.

.65

.911/s

1899

1.17

1.293/s

1900.

1.6658

1.3514

1901.

1.191/2

1.21

1902.

1.15

1.2334

1903

1.521/2

1.59

Since 1904 there was a steady advance until March 9, 1907, when the price of credit balances was quoted at $1.78. There has been no change since.

A DISASTROUS FIRE.

The first disastrous fire in the oil region occurred at the Merrick well near Rouse- ville, April 17, 1861, at which forty-two men were more or less seriously burned, nineteen died from their injuries, and two were incinerated on the scene of the fire. One of the victims of the tragedy was Henry R. Rouse, one of the pioneer oil operators of that region, and the man for whom Rouseville in Venango County is named. The Merrick well had been drilled in on the day of the fire, and started to flow at the rate of two thousand barrels a day. Two or three hundred people had gathered around the well to watch it flow, when suddenly there was a tremendous explosion. The oil and gas took fire and those who were able to get away from the place fled for their lives. Among the vic- tims were two strange men who had come that day from Oil City, each carrying a valise. They were among the missing, and when the fire was under control their

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charred bodies were found near the well. Who they were has never been learned. Among the nineteen who were fatally burned was James Walker, of Butler County, and among the list of injured were Levi Walker and John Glass, both of Butler County.

THOMAS W. PHILLIPS.

The development of the oil field of But- ler County and the oil business generally in western Pennsylvania owes more to Hon. Thomas W. Phillips than any other man living or dead, since the beginning of oil operations in 1859. Mr. Phillips is a native of Lawrence County and a resi- dent of New Castle, and much of his suc- cess and prominence in the development of the oil field have been attained in Butler County. Mr. Phillips went to Oil Creek early in the sixties in partnership with his brother Isaac, followed the developments down the river to Parker and thence into Butler County, and in 1873 the Phillips Brothers were among the large producers in the Parker and Troutman field. When the financial panic struck the country in 1873 the Phillips Brothers met with finan- cial reverses which threatened them in bankruptcy. At that time they owed about $800,000, and they had about $2,000,000 of property throughout the oil country which would have been sold at a sacrifice, but the creditors at a meeting held in Parker City decided to give the two brothers ten years' time in which to pay their obligation, and appointed them trustees to take charge of the estate. A situation which would have appalled less courageous men only served to bring out their strong character, and with magnificent energy they launched into oil-producing on a vast scale on a plan which was originated by Thomas W. Phillips, and in the short term of fifteen years the entire indebtedness of $800,000 was paid off. In the meantime, Isaac Phillips had died and the greater part of

the burden fell on the surviving brother. When the exodus of oil men to Bradford began, Thomas W. Phillips remained in Butler County and gave his attention to the development of the Thorn Creek field, Glade Run and Thorn Creek extension, and it was in these fields that he had made the money to pay the losses of 1873. He not only paid his indebtedness, but ac- cumulated a handsome fortune in addition and established the business now being conducted by the Phillips Gas and Oil Company. Mr. Phillips had been inter- ested in every movement for the protec- tion or improvement of the producing in- dustry, and the producers and operators of western Pennsylvania owe him a debt of gratitude for his watchful care in thwarting hostile legislation. When the movement was undertaken to limit the pro- duction and thus reduce the excessive stock of oil on hand, Mr. Phillips refused to curtail operations until a satisfactory provision, which he proposed, was made to compensate and protect the labor en- gaged in the industry by setting aside 2,000,000 barrels of oil for its benefit.

Mr. Phillips came into public life promi- nently in 1880, during the Garfield cam- paign. He conceived and planned the Republican text book of that campaign, the first ever published, and was its finan- cial backer. His work in this campaign brought him into prominence in Pennsyl- vania, and in the subsequent contest in the legislature for United States Senator he repeatedly received votes in the open con- vention of both Houses. In the fall of 1890, owing to the dissatisfaction existing in the Republican party over the manner in which the successful candidate for Con- gress obtained his nomination, Mr. Phillips was prevailed upon to be an independent candidate and nominated at a convention of representatives of the district held at Harmony. He was defeated at the fall election, but he ran such a large vote that he received the party nomination in 1892

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HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY

and was elected by the largest majority ever given in the Twenty-fifth District, which was then composed of Beaver, But- ler, Lawrence and Mercer Counties. Mr. Phillips was reelected in 1894, and in 1896 declined a nomination to give his time to the labor commission of which he was then a member. While a member of the House, Mr. Phillips was a member of the Commit- tee on Labor, and also that on Merchant Marine and Fisheries. In the extra session of the Fifty-third Congress he introduced a bill for the free coinage of silver based on the natural law of supply and demand, believing that there has been no sensible silver legislation since the Rebellion. This bill was favorably commented on by the

press and men of recognized financial abil- ity. At the second session of the Fifty- third Congress he introduced the bill authorizing the appointment of a non-par- tisan commission to collate information on the labor and industrial problems and was made a member of the commission which afterwards performed valuable services. Although past three score years and ten, Mr. Phillips takes an active interest in the affairs of the company which bears his name, and in 1908 he represented his dis- trict in the Republican national convention at Chicago, and was one of the three dele- gates from Pennsylvania who voted for Roosevelt on the first and only ballot taken.

CHAPTER VII

BENCH AND BAR

Early Court Officials-Early Courts-Origin of "Buckwheat County"-First Quarter Sessions Court-Civil Cases and Other Court Business-Division of Townships- Cattle Marks-The Court in 1805-06-Contempt of Court Case-Probate Court Created-McJunkin-Halleck Tragedy-Court Dockets Written Up-Bredin Ap- pointed Judge-Mohawk Murder Trial-Election of Judges-The Nellis Murder- Duff Trial-Constable Ferguson Killed-Court of 1853-Election of McGuffin- Cooper Murder Trial-Addlington Murder Trial-Hockenbury Trial-Schugart- Martin Trials-Constitution of 1873-Judicial Contest of 1884-Arrest of Coun- terfeiters-Harbison-Monks Baby Case-Lee Murder Trial-Hasler Murder-Ju- dicial Contest of 1893-Election of 1902-Catherine Miller Case-McGrady Trial- The Hoffman Case-Ground Hog Case-The Kreditch Murder-McLaughlin- Hemphill Tragedy-The Schmidt Murder-The Bennett Riot-The Bench; Bio- graphical Notice-The Bar-Biographical Notice-The Butler Bar in 1908.

For some time after the erection of But- ler County the legal affairs of the dis- trict were administered by the courts and the attorneys of Pittsburg, Butler County being attached to Allegheny County, for administrative purposes and composing a part of the Fifth judicial district. Since the beginning of the administration of jus- tice in the county, many men have sat on the bench, and many more have appeared as attorneys at the bar and as prosecutors and defenders in a long list of cases that go to make up the civil and criminal docket of her courts. The early judges and attor- neys compare favorably with the bench and bar of today in point of learning and ability. The early judges were usually men of education, dignified, courteous, and always gentlemen. The reading of law books was limited and as their libraries

were usually small, they were unable to draw the nice distinctions which enter into the mysteries of the practice of the profes- sion today. In the absence of law and precedent they fell back on their common sense, which is the basis of all law, and the records made by these early jurists are bright lights in the history of the country.

The early lawyer was handicapped in the same manner as the jurist, and it was his custom to find a principle to fit the case, or a precedent, and failing in either to rely on impassioned eloquence to con- vince the jury, more susceptible then than now to the almost irresistible influence of magnetic oratory. Politics and the law were closely allied in those days and the early lawyers were good speakers on the stump as well as eloquent advocates before the bar, and when they assembled at the

221

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HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY

county seats their tilts in court, and out, were listened to with admiration by their friends. They were usually a hard-worked set of men. Until the advent of the stage- coach they were compelled to ride the cir- cuits on horseback, journeying from county to county as their duties called them, undergoing many hardships and oftentimes in danger. The lawyer was usually his own clerk and he was com- pelled to write out his -briefs in longhand, with a goose-quill pen, and oftentimes dur- ing the session of the court, spent the en- tire night in preparation of legal papers and documents, which are today turned over to the skillful stenographer and type- writer. There were no printed blanks in those days and all forms of legal papers, documents, deeds and conveyances, had to be written with the pen and involved an immense amount of labor.

As might be expected from their sur- roundings, the lawyers of the early day were men of intellect, self-reliance, and marked individuality, and filled with the idea of being leaders among their fellow men. In fact, the early lawyer was always a politician and he was compelled to take an active part in the political affairs of his district. Butler County produced her share of this class of men among her pioneers, as witness the names of Col. John Purviance, Gen. William Ayers, Samuel A. Purviance, John Nelson Pur- viance, Samuel A. Gilmore, George W. Smith, Charles Craven Sullivan, and others who were prominent in the county in the first fifty years of her existence.

The forties and fifties produced another set of men who were prominent in state and national affairs and who took a leading rank among the legal profession of the state, in the latter half of the century. The names of Hon. Ebenezer McJunkin, Louis Z. Mitchell, Hon. Charles McCandless, and Col. John M. Thompson form a galaxy that had few equals and no superiors in the courts of western Pennsylvania.

EARLY SHERIFFS OF THE COUNTY.

. The early officials of Butler County were a self-reliant lot of men of vigorous body and mind, and trained to the hardships of a frontier and backwoods life. They had a rough set of men to deal with, as is shown in Brackenridge's narrative, but they had the physical ability to cope with the emergencies. John McCandless, the first sheriff of the county, was said to be a man without fear, and it was some- thing unusual for the sheriff or the deputy to carry arms.

James McKee, who was the fifth sheriff of the county, never carried a weapon or a pair of handcuffs.

James Gilmore Campbell, who was sher- iff of Butler County in 1843, was a man of great physical strength and undoubted loyalty to his country. On one occasion a stranger who was visiting in the town was discussing politics in front of the old court house with a party of men and took occa- sion to express his disgust for the Repub- lican form of government, and his prefer- ence for the government of England. Campbell promptly knocked him down, and then informed him that if he wished to express tory opinions the best place for him was across the Canadian line, where he had come from.

One of the sheriffs in the fifties, it is said, was deficient in education, and think- ing that he would please the court he al- ways attempted to write his official returns in the Latin terms used in court practice. During one of the sessions of court pre- sided over by Judge McGuffin, the court issued a process for the arrest of a witness who had failed to answer a subpoena. The papers were placed in the hands of the sheriff and the party was traced to Muddy Creek Valley, where the sheriff found him sitting on a stump, in the midst of a swamp. The swamp had overflowed with water and there was no way of getting at the fugitive except by a boat. The sheriff returned to Butler and made a return of

223

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

the writ on the back of which he made the following endorsement to the effect that the party named in the writ was "In swampum, up stumpum, non-est-cuma- tum." This return convulsed the court and the members of the bar, but Judge McGuffin gravely received it and dis- charged the sheriff from further duties in the case.

EARLY COURTS OF THE COUNTY.

The first Court of Common Pleas and Quarter Sessions held in Butler County, under the Act of April 2, 1802, was pre- sided over by Hon. Jesse Moore, who was a fine specimen of judicial dignity and a great stickler for the observance of court rules. Judge Moore was à gentleman of the colonial pattern, mild, faithful and firm, who administered justice for justice sake. He had a high sense of the dignity to be observed among the members of the bar outside, as well as in the court room, which, however, was often upset by the fun loving attorneys.

Henry M. Brackenridge, who came to Butler from Pittsburg in 1803, as clerk to Gen. William Ayres, the first prothonotary of the county, and who was also one of the early members of the Butler County bar, being admitted to practice in 1815, in his "Recollections of the West," thus de- scribes in part the first court held in But- ler :

"The first court held in Butler drew the whole population to the town, some on ac- count of business, some to make business, but the greater part from idle curiosity. They were at that time chiefly Irish, who had all the characteristics of the nation. A log cabin, just raised and covered, but without windows, sash or doors or daubing, was prepared for the hall of justice. A carpenter's bench, with three chairs upon it, was the judge's seat. The bar of Pitts- burg attended, and the presiding judge, a stiff, formal and pedantic old bachelor,

took his seat, supported by two associate judges, who were common farmers, one of whom was blind of an eye. The hall was barely sufficient to contain the bench, bar, jurors and constables. But few of the spectators could be. accommodated on the lower floor, the only one yet laid; many, therefore, clambered up the walls, and placing their hands and feet in the open interstices, between the logs, hung there * suspended like so many enormous Mada- gascar bats." * *

John McQuistion Smith, who was born in Butler Borough in 1828, and is now probably the oldest living native born citi- zen of the town, has an excellent recollec- tion of people and events previous to 1850. He says that the log cabin above mentioned stood on east Diamond Street on the site of the Nixon Hotel. As he remembers the building, it was a two-story log affair, with a hall-way through the middle. This build- ing was used as a court house until the first court house was built. A pig-pen, be- longing to a man named Bowen, which stood on the same. lot about where the residence of Clarence Walker now stands, was on the occasion of this court used as a temporary jail. Mr. Smith dug the foun- dation for the Walker house in 1851, and he remembers tearing up the foundation of an old pig-pen that stood in the alley. The first actual jail erected in Butler was a log building that stood on the corner of the Vogeley Alley and South Washington Street, on the ground now occupied by the residence of Mrs. Shultz.

ORIGIN OF "THE BUCKWHEAT COUNTY."

The early attorneys who came here from Pittsburg to attend upon the sessions of the court were much given to telling stories and cracking jests about the poverty of Butler County and her people. It was these same lawyers who, in later years, when the Butler Hotel tables added to their bills of fare the toothsome buckwheat cake,

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HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY

conferred upon Butler County the title of "the Buckwheat County," which name has been perpetuated up to the present time.

PROCEEDINGS OF THE FIRST QUARTER SESSIONS COURT.

The first record of the Court of Quarter Session is dated February 13, 1804. The commission of Hon. Jesse Moore as presi- dent judge of the Court of Common Pleas of the counties of Butler, Beaver, Mercer, Crawford, and Erie, was read, as well as those issued to Samuel Findley and John Parker as associate judges of Butler Coun- ty. The following attorneys were then ad- mitted to practice for the courts, on mo- tion of Steel Semple, William Irwine, Alex- ander W. Foster, William Wilkins, Isaac Mason, Henry Haslett, Thomas Collins, Henry Baldwin, Cunningham S. Semple, John Gilmore and James Mountain. Steel Semple was then admitted upon motion of Thomas Collins. On February 14, Joseph Shannon was enrolled as a member of this bar, and William Nellis and William Mc- Donald were appointed constables.

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Century history of Butler and Butler County, Pa., and representative citizens 20th, Part 30

Author: McKee, James A., 1865- ed. and comp Publication date: 1909 Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1526

Author: McKee, James A., 1865- ed. and comp
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1526