Claude L. Witherspoon Interview - Claude L. Witherspoon Interview [part 1 of 7]

PIONEERS IN TEXAS OILTOPIC: Corsicana, Spindletop; Ennis NAME: Claude L. Witherspoon INTERVIEWER: Mody C. Boatright PLACE: Dilley, Texas TAPE NO. 94 DATE: 6/27/53 RESTRICTIONS: None

Boatright - All right, Mr. Witherspoon, where were you born?

Witherspoon - I was born in Chatfield, Navarro County, in 1873, May 15.

B.- Navarro County. And what's the name of the town in that county?

W.- Corsicana, ten miles northeast of Corsicana.

B.- Were you at Corsicana when the oil development started there?

W.- Yes sir, I'd been there all my life, at Chatfield. It was right in, you going to take this down?

B.- Yes.

W.- Better not put this in there then, all right.

B.- Go ahead.

W.- No, what I was going to say was that when we go to school there at Chatfield, there ain't no use in recording this.

Unidentified Voice - It's recording though.

W.- Well, all right.

B.- That's all right.

W.- Well, the school at Chatfield was very, no grades you know, no graded school.

B.- Yes. That's the kind of school I went to.

W.- Well, no grades. And we studied geography. And the question was asked us what is the different states noted for. Pennsylvania

for coal and oil, Texas for cattle and cotton and so on, you know, in the states. Well, right where we was studying in the yard of that school building, there wasn't supposed to be any oil or gas south of the Mason-Dixon line ---

B.- Yes.

W.- --- at that time. I drilled a well in that yard, got a gas well.

B.- In the schoolyard?

W.- In the schoolyard, after I got in the business.

B.- Yes, Well, when did oil development start in Corsicana?

W.- Well, I guess it is all right to start back to where it actually started, is it?

B.- Yes. W.- Well, I had nothing to do with that except just watch it. The Johnson-Aiken as I say started that well in 1894, and they finished it along the latter part of 1895.

B.- Well, I thought there had been something happened in '92, what was that?

W.- Nothing.

B.- Nothing happened in '92?

W.- Not '92.

B.- '94?

W.- '94. And they, Aiken, Johnson and Ritusbarger drilled that first water well. They had Jack Davidson working on the rig.

B.- Was that the well they drilled for the ---

W.- Water. B.- --- orphans home?

W.- No, that's the well in town. No, they had already drilled previously. They commenced that in 1892 I think.

But that didn't attract my attention because it was out there all on its own, wasn't looking for anything beneficial to the country except maybe getting enough water.

Well, when they discovered that oil, old Jack Davidson was the only man in that country that knew anything about it.

B.- Now that was the well that was for the city water works?

W.- Yes, sir. They found that sand right at 900 feet. And it filled up pretty good. They bailed out, they were drilling with cable tools and if you know anything about cable tools, why its pretty slow.

B.- Yes.

W.- And they bailed out an awful, quite a lot of oil that run off in the ditch there in the street, curb. So old Jack then got busy and went to Damon and Beaton, a real estate firm there.

And on the quiet told them to go in and lease this land, get it for nothing you know. And they leased about 10 or 15 thousand acres.

B.- Were you working for them?

W.- No sir, I didn't suspicion that there was, it had any value.

B.- Yes.

W.- And the first notice that I had that it had any, the stuff had any value, why was when Jack come back there with those gear.

The Corsicana Development Company had organized to take over these leases from Damon and Beaton and Jack Davidson, And they had drilled, I believe, two dry holes, that's the Corsicana

Development Company. That got me interested commenced to leasing land around in there then, quite a little stir.

And so the Oil City Company, who was old man Tatum who was pretty well-to-do men, merchants there, bankers.

They organized the Oil City Company and organized two or three others and got me to do the leasing for them. This record here will show the dates I took those leases.

And after they had drilled, the Oil City Company had drilled three or four wells, with cable tools. That's all they had. Then old man, I'll think of his name in a minute. He patented the rotary.

B.- Somebody there at Corsicana?

W.- Oh, no. This was up there in Toledo, Ohio, I believe.

B.- Oh, yes.

W.- And he came down there to exhibit, see what it would do. And he brought with him old man Bowden. Old man Bowden was going to be his driller.

And they started the first rotary in the field. And the wells it was taking cable tools three months to drill, they was drilling them in three or four days.

Well, then they started a big row and threatened injunction when they started drilling into that oil sand with water. They said it was going to ruin the field.

And the result was they never did bring an injunction suit, but they threatened it. But they got to drilling those durn wells so durn fast that those wells in a week's time they'd be flowing.

Instead of the water hurting them, why it was something the cable tools wouldn't do. Well, then you was talking about your friend Walter Sharp. Walter and Jim Sharp come in there with a rotary.

And Sturm brothers come

in there with a rotary and they did contract work. And I was leasing land for them all, for nearly all, all the ones I've mentioned.

And when Guffey and Galey came down there they brought a man by the name of Forney (?), George W. Forney as the record will show.

George W. Forney, he was their man. Well, after they sold out, after the other company bought Guffey and Galey out why George B. Forney remained there.

And he and Mr. Carmody (?) were good friends. And Carmody come to me and says, "Would you go out here and lease some land for us?"

I said, "Yes, I'll be glad to." Carmody was pretty close and he said, "Well, what are you going to charge me?" And I says, "Well, whatever you want to pay me."

Well he says, "Would $5 a day be satisfactory?" I said, "Yes." I wasn't making that. So I went out and took these leases for George W. Forney.

That re-cord there will show those leases in years of leasing oil. Well that was in 1898, and possibly run into 1899.

And then when old man Lucas wanted to drill that well in Spindletop in 1901, he came up there. He went and got Galey and took him to Beaumont.

And Galey seemed to like it so he ordered Forney, Forney was still one of their boys, he ordered Forney to go to Beaumont and make a contract for a well.

Hamill brothers was drilling there at Corsicana with rotary rigs too. And he contracted with Al and Jim Hamill to go down there and drill that Lucas well.

And they went down there along, oh, I guess the latter part of 1900 and started that well. And on January 10, 1901, that well came in.

And Al Hamill wired me to come down there, Roy Carmody rather, to come down there that they had a gusher.

And Carmody sent me. I went down there and that well was standing, looked like it was standing 125 or 50 feet high. I went down there.

The well came in on January 10, 1901, and I got down there it was January 11, the morning of January 11, 1901. And on that train now was three oil men.

That is, I wasn't specifically an oil man. I was leasing, a hound they called them then.

B.- Lease hounds?

W.- Lease hounds. Mr. Cullinan and D. R. Beaty, and Tom Wood. Tom Wood was that busted banker up at Oklahoma City, you know. Wrecked that bank up there and got in the penitentiary.

Finally got him. He was a smart fellow. He got out. Well, Tom had got down there at Corsicana and gotten a little production through Whitesall (?), J. E. Whitesall.

Maybe you've heard of J. E. Whitesall. Well, we all went on that same train. That's the first sleeper that I was ever on. I got on that sleeper at ten o'clock at night.

And in that coach, that sleeper, was Mr. Cullinan, Tom Wood, and D. R. Beaty. And when we got there, of course I was all excited.

I had never slept on a sleeper before. And I had instructions to get busy and go to leasingland down there. And I did; I went around and (inaudible)---there and hired a team by the month.

And started out leasing land. And Cullinan and Beaty and Tom Wood, they went up to meet Mr. Lucas. Of course I wasn't big enough man to meet Lucas.

And then Mrs. Lucas, I see from this paper, this book they got out about Spindletop that Mrs. Lucas give them a dinner, a breakfast that morning. Anyway, and then after, it was January 10 that

well came in. And it was in April before that boom started, wasn't anybody down there. There was just a few oil men come from Pittsburgh up in that country and passed on through.

They didn't spend much time there. And, well, I left there. I'd go home, I didn't like that durn country. It was tough. I couldn't stay down there over two or three weeks till I'd get sick and have to go home.

Well, after I spent about three months down there, why old Colonel Stribling, now that's the old man, what's his name that you just mentioned?

B.- Sharp?

W.- No, the old man that got those little wells back over ---

B.- Oh, Speed?

W.- Speed, old man Speed was some kin to Stribling. Stribling was a cedar manufacturer, went down in the cedar breaks to cut cedar for different things. Contracts, big contracts.

And that's how come Speed up there. Speed come up there on Stribling' s side. Well, Stribling, I hadn't yet gotten in the oil business except in royalty.

Here's something that's interesting though. Scale, H. L. Scale, that will be in that book, too. H. L. Scale, he had a cotton seed oil mill there, one of the first ones ever put in Texas.

He had that cotton seed oil mill there. And he and Culberson were partners. And Scale was quite a plunger so he come, he knew me pretty well around there.

And so he comes to me and wanted to know if I'd go out and take some leases for him. I said, "Yes, I'll be glad to do it, Mr. Scale."

So he said, "Now Claude, I just want to go around to, I'll drive you around and show you the lots." See, there's ten lots in a

block down there at nigger town, there's ten lots to a block. And this is where I got started in the oil business now. And he said, "Now you go out and get these leases.

What will you charge me for them?" I said, "I'll charge you $1.50 -- (inaudible)."He said, "All right."

B.- A dollar and a half what?

W.- For taking a lease.

B.- For each lease?

W.- And taking -- (inaudible), yes. Well, he took me around and he showed me two or three lots he wanted to drill wells, you know. And he was having a rotary machine do the work.

So I took three of them before I realized how I could make some money. I wasn't getting much money out of that, you see, dollar and a half a lease.

Scale was a good friend of mine and I went to Mr. Scale and I said, "Mr. Scale, you go around and show me these lots you want and I'll get that lease for you and it won't cost you a cent.

And I'll make the nigger or white man, or whoever we deal with pay it." Well, he wanted to know how I would do it. I said, "Well, there's only ten lots to the block and I wouldn't get over three wells in a block no way.

So seven people is going to be left out, ain't going to get any oil. And I believe I can get them to pay me royalty to get them a well." Course it was sort of an underhanded way of doing a thing, but it was a way to get started in the oil business.

He said, "Yes, go ahead and do it." So I'd go to those niggers and I said, "Now, John, I want a lease on this lot here. I'm going to put a well on it right away.

And provided you'll give me the first 90 day royalty.

Well that's flush royalty, that's flush production, you know. Well, he'd do it, you know. Well, I guess I took forty or fifty of them all together.

But the first month, and I was just as flat broke as any man ever was or ever could be. All I had was a wife and baby. And the first month I got $1,165 out of that royalty.

Pipeline paid me, you know, nigger signed the order to the pipeline for the money and the pipeline run the oil to me. Well, I got $1,165, and I owed a good deal of money around town.

And I went around and paid practically every dollar of it on my debts. And from now on why I got in the oil business in a pretty good way.

And then Carmody come there for the Oil Well Supply Company in 1898, early in 1898. And so I was, I saw these fellows making money.

Sturm and all those boys making money out of those drilling rigs, so I wanted one. Didn't know anything about it, but, so Carmody wanted me to get one because he wanted to get in on it with me, you know, and did.

So Carmody sold me that rig on credit for $2,000.00 and I'll recollect that thing as long as I live. And there was a fellow by the name of John Garner that was sort of a driller.

There wasn't any drillers those days. There was, anybody could turn a rotary, could open the throttles of an engine and turn the rotary, if he had any sense could get along pretty good.

And that's the way they was drilling anyway, didn't have any experts. Well, John Garner had been down to Spindletop. No, John Garner had been somewhere drilling water wells.

B.- Now this is not the, that's not the John Garner of Uvalde?

W.- Oh, no, oh, no. John Garner was old P. M. Lee's brother-in-

law. You don't know who P. M. Lee was?

B.- No, I don't.

W.- Well, P. M. was a gin man there and a very religious old fellow. And a mighty good man. Well, John had been off drilling, I guess he had been drilling water wells for, working for P. M. Lee on a rotary rig.

And he come back to Corsicana, that was after Spindletop got to going good. He worked down at Spindletop awhile. And he come back to Corsicana, he got tired of that country.

John didn't care anything about money much, just enough to live off of. So he come back there and I said, "John, you know how to run a drilling rig and I know how to lease this land.

And what's the matter with us going in here and getting us a drilling rig and you run it." Well he said, yes, that suited him all right. But he said, "I haven't got but $750."

Well, I knew the rig wasn't going to cost but $2000, you know. So I says, "Well, that's all right if you --- . He says, "I don't know whether P. M. can pay me or not. He owes me the money."

I said, "Well, that don't make any difference. If you want to go into it we'll just buy it on credit, you and I." So we went down to the Oil Well Supply Company and bought that drilling rig.

And made a contract with S. W. Johnson and that bunch to drill ten wells on what's known as the Brighthop (?) place, out in the shallow district. Old Stribling had opened up that.

And Dr. Johnson and Clay and several of those doctors around there went into that. And we made a contract, now get this, we made a contract for ten wells at $400 a piece, 1,000 feet deep.

And out of those ten wells we paid for that drilling rig entirely.

B.- Yes.

W.- And you know how the profit was.

B.- How long did it take you to do that, to drill ten wells?

W.- We drilled about a well a week, well a week.

B.- Yes.

W.- And so John, he always worked for a salary. I'm just going to inject this. I never did work for a salary except for the first three or four years I was a clerk in a grocery store.

So John, he wanted a salary out of it. And I said, "Why yes, if we make any money. I haven't got any money to pay you but if we make any money in this thing, you can draw a salary. How much salary you want?"

He said, "I want a $100 a month."

And I said, "All right."

So John drew a $100 a month and he was the tool pusher. And I did most of the tool pushing myself.

He pushed slow. Well, we drilled those ten wells and cleared for that drilling rig.

Then I wanted another drilling rig and I wanted John to go in with me. No, he wouldn't go in, he had all the rigs that he wanted.

So I bought me a drilling rig myself and started out on what's known as the Bowen lease over there. Well after I had bought it, John decided he'd better get in with me so he got in.

And we drilled about ten or twelve wells on the Bowen. We had, I had that leased myself.

And I had gotten out then to where I could go to Carmody and borrow what money I needed. Carmody wasn't in on that but we drilled ten or twelve wells on the Bowen lease.

Old Greasy Walker was our pumper on it. You've heard me talk about old Greasy. Well, after we got that to going, the Ennis Oil and Development Company, old man

Morrison, and Baldridge and Kaserek and a lot of those Ennis people advertised in the Dallas News for a contractor to come up there and drill five wells, just for oil.

So I went up there. I got a letter from George T. Jester, and he was a bachelor there then. And I got a letter from Mr. Jester and went up there and met those people.

And Mr. Morrison was one of the finest men I ever had anything to do with, and he got very enthusiastic about it. He owned the water works at Ennis, and he was also post-master.

And I wanted to find out where they was going to drill those wells. I wasn't interested, I couldn't make much money on them, or I didn't think I could.

And I didn't want to move up there just to drill five wells unless there was going to be. Ennis is, Redbank on the Trinity River is right due east of them you see, and about 12 miles, I guess.

Now I could take a line across there and there was a good chance if the oil extended that far for that Redbank to have some oil.

B.- That was in line with the Corsicana production?

W.- Northeast and southwest, yes sir. But that missed Ennis eight or ten miles or twelve. So I went up there and met those gentlemen and Morrison got very much interested in it after I talked to him about it.

And he said, well, he said, "I'll handle this thing, we'll drill them all out there." So I drilled the first well at Telico. And the sand was rising that way pretty fast.

And we got a little gas at about 450 feet. I looked for some sand there, but it wouldn't make a gas well. And then Morrison wanted me to go on east of Redbank. And I

said, "Morrison, I believe we're too far north now. If we go to Redbank we're going to miss the whole thing or get water." Well, he says, "I think we ought to go down there anyway."

Of course, I was making, I was getting $500 apiece for those wells. And I was, they wasn't costing me over three hundred so I was making a couple of hundred dollars on them.

So I went to Redbank and drilled a well and to my surprise I got quite a good bunch of gas, but no oil.

Then we come back west, and the crowd then wanted to come back west on the old Telico well.

And I drilled that; didn't have a thing. Missed the whole face of the earth apparently. And then they got sick. They had put up this money, they had put up this money, I think $5,000.

They had it all up so nobody could put it down. So then they wanted to quit, wanted me to come to Ennis and drill a water well.

Well, I wasn't interested in that water in Ennis.

So I says, "No, but I'll tell you what I'll do with you. If you'll give me that money now, we had about $2,500 or something like, of their money. And I'll put $2500 with it in services in drilling these wells.

And I'll drill these wells for $500 apiece, and go out to Powell and I believe I can open an oil field out there."

Well, there was the Jews, and old man Boyd, the banker, he was all right. And one of the Jews was all right. But old man Pace was the worst of that crowd.

Just said, "No, we ain't going to." They wanted to take down the money. I said, "No, you can't take down this money."

Morrison showed them that, said, "You can't take down this money. We've got to spend it and that contract applies for east of Ennis. You can't bring

back Ennis (Inaudible)." Well, they had a big meeting there and everybody got mad. And finally old man Pace was the leader of it and he said, "You fellows can just have my money. I'll get out of this thing."

Well, he did. Serts (?) got out, Pace got out, old man Boyd. And we wound up with nobody in there but old Captain Moore and Morrison and Baldridge and maybe one other.

And they said, "We'll go on down to Powell now, or Corsicana or wherever you want to go and spend this money. And we'll see if we can find some more."

Well, down there at Powell, I wish I had a map of that thing, there had been thirteen dry holes. Not dry holes either. You say a well was here and say a well was here.

And that well to the west there made a 100 barrels of oil a day for about ten days. And cut itself all to pieces and got to making b.s., and never was worth anything anymore.

And then they were drilling around Powell there. And after they drilled 13 dry holes around that thing, two or three of them I drilled myself, not for the Ennis Company.

But I'd made up my mind in between them for -- Tom Wood had drilled a well down there, well, this is southwest here.

Tom Wood had drilled a well down here in the bottom, made a mystery well out of it.

Nobody never did know he didn't have anything out of it. He was that type of fellow. And the furtherest well north was up here about two miles.

This well over here was a 100 barrel well at 860 feet. And these wells up here were 900 and something. And this well down here we didn't know how deep it was.

But over on the Ward place there had been two wells drilled and had a little oil at different levels, 900 and 950 feet, wouldn't make a well. And

in other words around that area there, I don't suppose there was over 800 acres. There wasn't that much, five or six hundred acres clean around it.

But all those wells showed oil or gas or salt water, everyone that had been drilled. Well, this thing had died out. This was in 19, well, I've forgotten exactly what year it was.

Anyway I went down there and I leased 100 acres from old man Brown. And Carmody and I had a lease on a 145 acres on the Lontree's, (?).

And Odie Burk (?) had 225 acres there but he wouldn't lease it. Good friend of mine but couldn't get a lease out of him. Ray Springfield had 260 acres down there and I got that.

So I went to Odie then, Odie had a little old tank right in the corner of his field. It was a blackland farm, a beautiful farm. And the development out there hadn't been profitable at all.

And they'd get a little oil well out there and ruin two or three acres of land, you know, fooling with it. I went to Odie to get him to lease me some of that land.

He said, "No, Claude, I won't lease it to you at all. You ain't going to get anything in the first place. And I don't want my land butchered up."

It was on Sunday. I said, "All right, Odie, I'm going to drill a well out here. I'm going to drill a well on the Brown right here right away, going to start it right away."

He said, "Well, all right." So I went home. And Odie called me up, he got to thinking about it. He had a little old branch that run down across the corner up there.

And he had a tank on it. And he owned all the water there was in the country there pretty near, right close around. He told me I could have the water.

And he called me up and said, "Claude, there's about 60 or 80 acres

there. I'll give you a lease on that if you want it, if you'll drill a well over there and move over by my tank." I said, "All right, I'll do it."

So I went out there and we located that well right close to the tank. And drilled that well. Well, at 749 feet, I drove up to the rig one evening.

It was an awful hot evening and showering around. And I had Nick Parrish, was the one who was doing the drilling.

But he was one of these lazy devils that slept most of the time and make his helper do the drilling, you know.

So I walked up on that derrick floor and I looked down there. And looked like there was oil running off there, just a rainbow, you know, but pretty heavy.

And I said, "Hold on here, Cloy, I believe we've got an oil well here." So I picked up that bucket and it was full of the prettiest sand I ever saw in my life.

And I said, "Where did you get this? Did you hit a hard place before you got into this thing?"

He said, "Yes."

I said, "How far up?"

He said, "About 14 feet."

He measured on his pipe. He was in that sand 14 feet.

Well, I says, "We've got an oil well here." And old Nick woke up out there in the tool house and come in.

And he looked at it and said, "Hell no, that ain't oil sand. That's white, you never saw any white oil sand."

Well I said, "I bet you it's got oil, it makes an oil well anyway."

Well, now those days we drilled with the same pipe we set in the casing. We didn't have any tool joints or nothing like that.

B.- Yes.

W.- And we drilled with a straight pipe down where we wanted to and then pulled it out. And take off the bit and set the pipe.

Make a test, you know. So we did, and it was late in the evening then.

And I said, "Now you all put, wrap some old toe sacks around the bottom of it and put it back in there tonight. And then go to bailing the well, don't swab it, just bail it."

So he did. And the next morning about six o'clock they called me up and said that well was flowing over the top of the derrick. So I went about half crazy then, you know.

B.- That was your first well?

W.- That was the first good oil well I ever had.

B.- Yes.

W.- So that was, Ennis Oil and Development Company had half of it and I had the other half.

B.- Yes.

W.- Well, Garner had a half of it, a quarter of it. I had a quarter and Garner had a quarter. Well, that well made 86 barrels the first 24 hours.

Got a tank out there and got a gauge on it. And so old Garner, he couldn't get enthusiastic about it.

And I moved over on the Brown then and drilled a well and got a 125 barrel well. That was on the Beden (?) Company lease.

And then I drilled two or three other wells, Garner and I did. Garner and I drilled two or three other wells. And I went to, I got busy.

I got me two other rigs and started out there to drilling. And that just shocked Garner, you know, me putting in all that money in that drilling rig. So he wanted to sell out. He went to talk-ing to Dick, Tom and Harry -----( End of Tape )