Show history of the oil fields in in san juan count county Y utah written for the mining review by chas Goo boodman ciman bluff city san juan co utah april 5 the the full extent of the san juan oil held field is not yet known not having been fully prospected and yet locations have been made for forty or fifty miles east and west and twenty five miles north and south it lies on both sides of the san juan river and is about miles east of the colorado river and about fifty miles west of the colorado state boundary line the first discovery so far as can be e learned the first discovery of 0 oil in this district was made in august 1882 by a party of three prospectors returning from a trip into the navajo indian reservation on the south side of the san juan river where they had been in the endeavor to find the lost merrick and mitchell mine while the prospectors were in their camp one day a friendly navajo came in and told them they ing a plute indian for a guide he took them over a shortcut short cut route which led to the spot now the site of the dempsy oil shaft shown in photo no 1 these prospectors were cass hite everybody in utah knows cass ernest B hyde and A R VanAn sdale in crossing the river young hyde said what is that smells so bad why said hite it is petroleum ever the time limit of the location expired and the land reverted back fa ebone and ment about this time E L goodridge of ogden utah found himself in durango colorado searching for adventure and wealth there he organized an expedition to float down the san juan river in boats to its juncture with the colorado prospecting for anything in the min 41 te am A P J f 1 Z 44 photo br chai goodman had better get away as soon as possible that the other indians of that section were having a war dance further to the east and would return the next day and that if white men were found there prospecting they would be killed as merrick and mitchell had been killed three years before beford this little party of prospectors took the advice of their navajo friend and lost no time ie in striking northward to the san juan biyer rip var crossing which they were safe hav no 1 the dempsy oil shaft on san juan that black stuff floating on the water they camped on the north side of the river and tested the oil by dipping it up in pieces of bark and burning it the first oil location nothing more was done at that time but a year later ernest hyde returned with his brother frank and set up the first placer petroleum location stakes on the ground nothing was done with the property how 3 5 3 eral line that might come in his way at bluff city then only two or three years old he stopped tore to replenish his supplies going on he sailed by the oil seepages see pages at the prospectors crossing cross ing see photo no 1 without noticing them but thirty miles further down the river he discovered the seeps at johns canyon where about eighteen years afterwards he placed his first drill mentioned later in this article a dempsey enters the field in 1893 one mel vin dempsey came here with the gold placer boom from salt lake city dempsey was a cherokee indian with a good education and further was an expert miner and prospector dempsey after the gold boom died turned his attention to oil he sank the shaft shown in photo no 1 and he is there shown in the act of pouring genuine oil from the bucket this shaft was only eight feet deep in the sandrock sand rock and oil oozed into it from and gas blew out of 0 0 the o rast drill rote ide 1 in n the bottom of the shaft that it was considered dangerous to fire it and so the shaft was never sunk any deeper in connection with A P raplee chas goodman bob mitchell henry diann and a reflecting upon his discovery of oil seep ages at the junction of the san juan river and johns canyon eighteen elighte n years previously sly came back in 1901 to make further investigations he found a backer in col A C ellis of salt lake city an oil drill ing rig was brought in and placed in the A v 4 X I 1 roe photo b y chat goodman no 2 the san juan canyon between honaker trail and johns canyon dozen others who have disappeared disappear eil from the scene dempsey made a good many petroleum locations but failing to get capital interested he gave up and struck out for the gold fields of alaska where reports say he has since made a fortune goodridge returns to field mr E L goodridge in faraway far awa away y oregon san juan and st johns canyons canyo ns w with th the result stated elsewhere in this narrative see photo no 2 for some reason not known to he the writer the rig was abandoned a and nd mr goodridge disappeared in the wilds of oregon for six years he returned in 1907 with a new oil drilling machine with which he succeeded in striking a goodly quantity of high grade oil and bluff city went wild with excitement and everyone turned out to stake oil claims more machinery arrives oil drilling machinery now began to come in thick and fast the next summer 1908 col ellis sent in still another and larger rig which has been very useful and PHOTO NO I 1 THE DEMPSEY OIL 4 SHAFT f 4 4 the first discovery of oil in quan in the san juan utah oil field j in 1895 this is also the place where fr 4 the three prospectors crossed the 4 4 T 5 river when escaping from the in 3 deans and here also they first found the oil seepages see pages in august 1902 the 1 I 4 formation is composed of alternate strata of limestone and sandstone and is of the carboniferous period V V fr 0 PHOTO NO 2 THE SAN JUAN S RIVER CANYON 4 4 5 4 between honaker trail and johns i t canyon where oil seepages see pages are found forty miles west of bluff utah down in this deep dark and uninviting can b 4 yon nearly 2000 feet mr air E L good ridge placed at a big expense his bis first oil tig rig in the year 1901 he j bored down about feet and found 1 I i fr a good grade of oil but there being 4 5 no way of getting it out of the can yon economically the enterprise was abandoned the rig however has 2 f served a very useful purpose since A by becoming a sort of supply depot in j furnishing the broken parts of other 4 4 machines in the field 5 S 0 f PHOTO NO 3 THE SECOND RIG IN THE FIELD 4 4 this photo shows the second rig brought by mr air E L goodridge into the san juan oil field this was in h i october 1907 the rig was placed on 4 a fine tract of oil land on the north t y bank of the san juan river where on 4 march 4 1908 a high grade oil was struck at a depth of only feet im 1 I mediately after the drill penetrated a q 1 I limestone capping ten or twelve feet fr thick and encountered oil the pent up oil and gas shooting up for fifteen or twenty feet and after spouting for a 4 few minutes subsided and finally set 4 tied aled down to seventy feet of oil in the swela 1 well t ol 01 successful in drilling annual labor assessment holes around and over the country harry ashenhurst representing colorado springs capitalists brought in two ac 1 rigs now idle tom brice of ogden with a small rig succeeded in tapping the oil bearing sand in two places thus bringing in two oil wells this in the goodridge oil basin mr goodridge also found oil in another well he bored not far from his first george L gray of chicago backed by arnica salve bucklin landed a big drill at the head of lime creek in the garden of the irish gods not a wheel has been turned in the operation of this rig and the plant is as silent as any of the gods around it A H spencer of denver has a good rig in the field also the connecticut company P A griffin of oakland california and P W dancer have a rig also jackson and mcgee of tucumcari Tucum cari carl N M who have a no 4 keystone and this drill is going down as rapidly as possible z W af 4 photo by bj chas goodman no 3 the goodridge second oil rig in the bluff oil field A W Me mcmorran Morran of spokane backed by boston capital put a drill hole down between and feet striking oil which constituted a discovery when work was discontinued for a time five weds containing oil there are five or six wells in the district containing oil the rest are flowing water or nothing oil men with capital back of them are coming here from all over the land from the atlantic to the pacific they are seeking a high grade re fining oil and here they have found it but it is a pretty well ell settled conclusion in the minds of experienced oil men that it will take standard rigs to reach pay oil there th ere is but one standard rig in the field that of the bluff norwood company this drill dr ill is now down about 1200 feet and sinking I 1 will be continued until oil or some other good thing is found CHAS GOODMAN |