Oilfield Trash: Life and Labor in the Oil Patch

List of Illustrations

Areas and time frames (map) xiii The oil business in Texas got off to a running start on January , . xvi Excursion trains brought thousands to Beaumont.  Tents and temporary shelters were places to feed the mass of people at Spindletop.  The Hogg-Swayne tract at Spindletop  Practicing an artificial respiration technique, ca.   One of the most dangerous stages of an oil tank fire  Drilling floor on an early rotary rig  Drilling floor on an early cable tool rig  The driller and his “toolie” hold sixteen-pound sledge hammers.  Oilfield teamsters at Spindletop, ca.   Rigging up a cable tool rig on location in   A shooter pours a can of nitroglycerine into a shell, ca. .  Casing crew tightening a joint of casing in   A tank-building crew decks a ,-barrel steel-riveted storage tank.  Pipeline laying crew, ca.   Street scene in Burkburnett, ca.   Main Street in Ranger, ca.   Breckenridge in , complete with rigs  Borger in the late spring of   Interior of an oil company mess hall, ca.   Oilfield workers and their families in front of oil boomtown dwellings  List of Illustrations x ILLUSTR ATIONS A sixteen-horse team pulling an eight-wheeled, wide-tired freight wagon  Newfangled trucks, hauling pipe in   One-hundred-foot wooden derricks in   Camp housing for Humble employees during the s  Kilgore inundated with steel derricks in   The model oil company town of Texon  The area around Wink during the boom of the late s  Night scene at TXL  Side booms lowering welded pipe into a ditch  The “jackknife” drilling rig  Odessa ca. , before the discovery of oil  Odessa in the mid-s  Typical oil company camp in the midst of the Permian Basin  Coming out of the hole with a treble stand, ca.   Derrick man racking trebles  Rig builders putting the finishing touches to a wooden derrick, ca.   Typical earthen pit oil storage  Tank builders constructing a battery of -barrel tanks, ca.   Preparing a well to be shot in the s  Pipeline crew preparing a ditch for a pipeline in South Texas during the s  A Christmas tree, a specialized term adopted by oil patch hands  ...