n 1543, a Spanish expedition found oil floating on the surface of the water along the Texas coast and used it to caulk their boats.2
oil was discovered in America
on Oil Creek near Titusville, Pennsylvania, Edwin L. Drake drilled down 69 feet and struck oil, creating the nation’s first oil well.
an oil well on a small hill called Spindletop near Beaumont created a worldwide sensation when it came in with such explosive force that it blew six tons of drill pipe, mud, rocks and crude oil several hundred feet into the air.
2006 employed 3.1 percent of the state’s workforce and paid that workforce $30.6 billion – 6.9 percent of all wages.1