The Oil Industry: Industrialzition & Urbanization

The Texas Railroad Commission was founded in 1891. The TRC is a state agency that regulates oil and gas industries, natural gas utilities, pipeline safety, and more that are all located in Texas.

In the early 1900s Automobil was first invented and on January 10, 1901 Spindle top was discovered and oil was transformed to other uses such as gasoline and more. Automobil began use gas to power and fuel cars.

On January 10, 1901, a large geyser exploded from a drilling site at Spindle top Hill. Reaching up to 150 feet, that produced about 10,000 barrels. Later on that number increased.

The first well drilled at the Austin Chalk
Formation was in 1920. People were first using the vertical drilling method but as horizontal drilling came about they began to use that method causing oil production to increase.

A man named M. "Dad" Joiner believed that there was oil in Rusk County. He first drilled 2 dry holes near Henderson and on October 3, 1930, he had struck oil. It was the largest oil field in the world at that time, it spanned more than 40 miles in length.

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On March 22, 2014Galveston had dumped 150,000 gallons of oil into the Galveston Bay. The Houston Ship Channel, one of the largest waterways in the world for transportation of petroleum products and more was shut down in effect of this spill.