Description: Description: Oil & Gas Museum

History tour of the World's First Oil Fields

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Petroleum, West Virginia railroad station. Named such by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in 1857 because it was where they got the oil to lubricate their equipment.

Map of the early Petroleum, West Virginia oilfield showing "telegraph" pumping system first put in operation in 1861-62 to pump 15 wells with one steam engine. Property purchased by Dr. Robert Hazlett in January 1859 to get oil for his Wheeling refinery.

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Early scene from the Burning Springs oilfield.

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J.C. Rathbone well at Burning Springs, West Virginia. Now part of the Oil & Gas Museum park in progress. It will be the oldest producing oil well in the world when it is put back in operation. First drilled in July 1860. See this well as it appeared in August 2000.

Early picture of part of Petroleum, West Virginia oilfield from 1860s.

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"Girtz" steam locomotive on the Laurel Fork & Sand Hill Railroad servicing Volcano, West Virginia. 1866 to 1899.

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Part of a continuous pumping system using ropes at Volcano, West Virginia. Operated from 1874 until 1974.

Antique wooden oil tank at Volcano, West Virginia.

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Early wooden bandwheel at Volcano, West Virginia. Now in the Oil & Gas Museum.

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Downtown Parkersburg, West Virginia as it would have been seen in the 1870s.

Parkersburg home bought by W.P. Rathbone in 1861. He owned the property on which the Burning Springs oilfield was discovered.

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Blennerhassett Hotel built by W.N. Chancellor in 1889 and still standing! Chancellor was one of Parkersburg's early oil barrons.

A Parkersburg mansion. One of many built by those with money from the oilfields.

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Sistersville at the height of second West Virginia oil boom in the 1890s.

Storytown oilfield outside Sistersville in the 1890s. Pennzoil waterflooded (secondary recovery method) the field in the 1990s.

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Blue Creek oilfield in Kanawha County, West Virginia - about 1915.

Early South Penn truck hauling wooden oil tank in 1920s.

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Last wooden derrick in West Virginia. Probably collapsed in 1975.

Early rodline well pumpjack at Oil Rock, West Virginia.

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Standard Oil's Camden Refinery at Parkersburg, West Virginia. Closed in 1936.

Acme Fishing Tool Company employees. Parkersburg - 1910.

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Advertisment for Kootz & Stroehman engine made in Parkersburg.

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Parkersburg Rig & Reel employees in 1956, headed by Bernard McDonough, Parkersburg industrialist.