the yellow metal directly from the spot where it grew; also, in some localities they sift the sands of the rivers and mesas to get the dust and nuggets that Nature has already mined and laid away. For the gasoline, however, the "digger" keeps his distance by boring a five or six inch hole sixteen hundred feet or so deep to reach the home of the oil. Even at this comparatively safe distance, occasionally the driller gets shot.

Of course, a great many people haven't known pil except as they see it in the kitchen lamp, smell

against the high price of gasoline. But the terrific noise from the howls and the muffler cut-outs combined seems to have gotten their perspectives out of focus, for they ignore the law of supply and demand as willfully as they do the laws of the road. However, with the grade of oil known as "Pennsylvania crude" selling at two dollars and forty-eight cents per barrel at the wells, there is a special class of individuals who are learning to revere the name of oil-these are the farmers owning the land in the oil producing territories.

There is a farming section in western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio where the oil is one of the farm crops not regularly listed in the agricultural papers. It is a crop that beats potatoes and corn for income from either hillside or bottom land. The competition and interest in oil production is much more intense than that of raising vegetables. The oil as it comes from the ground is a very light colored amber liquid, thin and "sloppy" as kerosene. Most of the new wells are self flowing. This does not mean constant flowing, except in a very few instances and for a short time only.

The wells have a geyser action, flowing in periods of a few hours and for a duration of several

wooden equipment. A 40-horse power boiler and a single engine make up the power plant, though gas engines are used wherever the gas is available.

About twenty-two hundred feet each of onehalf inch wire cable and two and one-half inch hemp rope are necessary for the drilling and subsequent operations of the well. The well casing ranges from ten inches in diameter at the top to about four inches at the bottom. Drills, drill rods, clamps, swivels, wrenches, etc., comprise the "well tools;" besides there must be a forge for sharpening the drills, tools for pipe work, emergency tools, etc., to make up the ordinary equipment. Either daylight or continuous

minutes only. The self-flowing period gradually comes to a close and pumping must follow. The pumping is done each day until such time that the production of the well becomes so low that once or twice a week is all the pumping that it will stand. Tanks, usually made of wooden staves, and having a capacity ranging from one hundred to one thousand barrels, are set up at the well. From these tanks pipe lines are laid to large collection tanks at the pumping stations, from which the oil is forced at high pressures, four hundred pounds or more, to the distant refineries.

The cost of drilling a well ranges anywhere from $1200 to $3500. The wooden derrick must be from forty to seventy-five or eighty feet high. The base frames for the machinery and the housing are of wood also, and wind storms, lightning, and accidental fires play havoc with all the

drilling is carried on, depending upon the competitive rush to get into the "pool." The illustration on preceding page shows several well rigs on and about an ordinary building lot or garden. The "over" drilling in this case was occasioned by the owner of the lot striking a six hundred barrel per day well. Then, of course, his neighbors got extra busy. It is easy to get oil after some one has shown where it is.

The general method of conducting the oil production business is for a drilling company to lease the oil rights from the farmer, paying a bonus that may range anywhere from $50 to $15,000 for the privilege of going on the land. Then a royalty of one-eighth of the oil is allowed, the money for this coming direct to the farmer from the purchasing agent. The oil balances are credited each month. Thus, a well producing two hundred barrels per day would, at the present

quotations, net the farmer $1,858 each month. But the short life of the wells, and the large number of "dry" holes owned by the drilling companies make the investment in oil production hazardous.

When the flow of the well slackens, and even at the beginning when the flow is not very strong, the "nitro-glycerine" man is called in to prescribe for the "hookworm feeling." The dose consists of from twenty to eighty quarts of nitro. This is a smooth flowing liquid that looks like castor oil. The charge is poured into a long tin tube, which is carefully lowered into the well after being tightly corked. In a new well, the charge is exploded by dropping a short piece of two inch pipe, called a "go devil," into the well. If the well has been previously shot, a fuse tube consisting of a three foot section of two inch tin tube filled with nitro and fitted with a three foot

OIL GEYSER CAUSED BY "SHOOTING" A WELL WITH FORTY QUARTS OF NITROGLYCERINE.

fuse and water proofed, is lighted and dropped into the well on top of the heavy charges that may be lying in the big cavity at the bottom. The immediate effect of the explosion is to convert the well into a sixteen hundred foot oil gun, causing an interesting and sometimes exciting spectacle for a few minutes about the derrick.

As to the nitro man, together with his team and special wagon, there is no need that "he should worry" about funeral expenses. There are tragedies in oil production as well as in the burn

ing of it. The outfit shown in the photo has departed from this earth leaving only a piece of a horse shoe as a souvenir of its previous existence. It took a farmer with his team a whole day to fill with field stones and clay the hole in the road where the demise occurred.

The only way that the hopes of the motorists for lower priced gasoline can be realized is for the production of crude oil to be greatly increased. At present there is no promise that the increase will nearly keep up with the demand. Thus, this oily tale has forebodings of a sad ending.

Some interest has been excited recently over the process of making gasoline from oil well gas. All the oil wells produce considerable gas and the greater part of this has heretofore been wasted. Now the method is to connect up a group of "abandoned" oil wells, and by means of a central pumping plant convert the gas into gasoline. This is done by a process of compression and refrigeration. The product consists of three or four grades, all of exceptional purity. The first condensation is what might be called ordinary gasoline. The second is the same but of higher gravity. These may be shipped in the usual iron barrels. The "higher" products are really liquid gases requiring great pressure to produce them. These liquids should be stored in seamless boiler plate cylinders, and the product handled with great care. All these gas oils are perfect solvents for the heavier oils, and hence they are available for "lightening" kerosene and those lower gravity oils. This makes them available for gas engine use with the gasoline carburetor. While it is a satisfaction to know of this conservation of our fuel resources, yet the total production of gas oil is but a trifle as compared to the demand for gasoline, and no lowering of price need be expected from it.

What is said to be a very successful device for starting the largest engines made without the aid of batteries, no matter how slowly they are turned over, has been perfected and placed in the market by the K-W Ignition Company of Cleveland, Ohio.

The device is placed on the end of the shaft in such a manner that when the trigger is set the lever drops down and engages in a notch on a disc on the shaft it holds back the armature of the magneto until the firing point of the engine is passed, when the dog on the magneto shaft disengages the notch and lets the shaft turn over rapidly, thus producing a good, hot, fat spark.

Besides making a full line of ignition apparatus for marine usage, the K-W Ignition Company also manufacture the famous K-W master vibrator and road smoothers for the Ford cars. A complete catalog will be mailed to any one interested, upon application to the company at 2855 Chester Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio.