History of a Boomtown: Oil in Chatham Township

 

By Miranda Fein

The First Oil Well in the United States

On August 27, 1859, the United States’ first commercial well specifically drilled for oil discovery finally struck black gold near Titusville, Pennsylvania. Edwin L. Drake drilled approximately 69 feet with a method of his own design, using an iron pipe to reach the rock belowground for drilling.

 

“The first oil well”. c1890. Library of Congress.

Medina County’s Early History of Oil

While the first successful commercial oil well was not operating in the United States until 1859, Medina County’s history with oil dates to as early as 1812, when a manual dig in search for salt brine resulted in the discovery of oil in Litchfield Township (Hambley, 2018, 1800s-p. 3). Despite this early oil discovery, Medina County would not drill its first oil well until the 1890s.  

 

Medina County’s first oil well was drilled in 1894 on the F. R. Shaw farm in Chatham Township (Hambley, 2018, 1800s-p. 22). It was drilled using a water well drilling machine. Once drilled, the well was pumped using horse power and mowing machine gear. Approximately 32 oil wells were drilled on or near the Shaw farm over the next three years. Shaw took these over and built a pipeline from his farm to Lodi, where it could be transported by railroad to oil refineries in Cleveland, Ohio. This began Chatham’s longstanding reputation of being an oil town. 

Medina County Gazette, 21 August 19, Section 2 Page 2

Chatham’s First Oil Boom

By 1918, Chatham experienced its first Oil Rush, with nearly every lot in the township having an oil well with a pump. It was during this year that an oil well on Tom McVickar’s farm experienced a gusher, meaning the well had a strong enough natural flow that it did not need pumped or could have been expelled from the well in a geyser-like fashion. While gushers can be a sign of a blowout in a well, they were also common in the early days of the oil industry and “many times were the only indication that a large reservoir of oil and gas had been struck” (International Association of Drilling Contractors, 2022). This marked the year of the big Chatham oil boom, which was the first of three oil booms experienced by the town between 1918 and 1937.

 

Chatham’s Second and Third Oil Booms

During these years, Chatham became known as a boomtown, though there was little documentation about the second oil boom. The third oil boom occurred circa 1937, as the result of a new technique of secondary recovery called water flooding, in which water is used to increase oil production. While water flooding was successful in increasing oil production, it also polluted water wells and streams. The Chatham Sesquicentennial of 1818-1968 notes that “It will be many years before Chatham again has fresh, clean water, but this was a price paid by a 
community for prosperity” (p. 19). 

 

Medina County Gazette, 30 September 1941, Page 1

Chatham Oil: 1960 to Present

While oil recovery continued in the surrounding townships, from the 1960s on, oil production slowed in Chatham. Many once producing wells in Chatham Township are no longer active, with some even abandoned and left unplugged. To view a map of all recorded oil and gas wells in Medina County and their current status, visit the Ohio Department of Natural Resources’ Division of Oil and Gas website at https://tinyurl.com/43wekhsp. 

References

Chatham Sesquicentennial 1818-1968. 1968. Sesquicentennial Committees. 

Hambley, S. D. (2018). Timeline of medina county history. Stephen D Hambley, PhD. 

International Association of Drilling Contractors. (n.d.). Definition of gusher. DrillingMatters.org. Retrieved 2022, from https://drillingmatters.org/glossary/gusher/ 

Ohio Department of Natural Resources. (n.d.). Ohio Oil & Gas Wells. ODNR Map Viewer. Retrieved 2022, from https://gis.ohiodnr.gov/MapViewer/?config=oilgaswells 

Osbun, W. (1959, August 21). Medina County and Its People. Medina County Gazette. Section 2,

Page 2. mcdl.advantage-preservation.com/viewer/?k=oil&i=f&d=01011830-

12311978&e=frshaw&m=between&ord=e1,k1&fn=medina_county_gazette_usa_ohio_medina_19590821_english_10&df=1&dt=3&cid=2992 

Speaking of Shortages—Chatham Really Has One. (1941, September 30). Medina County

Gazette. Page 1 & 3. mcdl.advantage-preservation.com/viewer/?k=chatham&i=f&d=01011830-12311978&e=oil boom&m=between&ord=e1,k1&fn=medina_county_gazette_usa_ohio_medina_19410930_english_1&df=1&dt=10&cid=2992 

The first oil well. (c.1890). [1 photographic print]. Library of Congress.  

https://www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3a14109/