A wildcatter is an individual who

drill A drill is a tool used for making round holes or driving fasteners. It is fitted with a bit, either a drill or driverchuck. Hand-operated types are dramatically decreasing in popularity and cordless battery-powered ones proliferating due to ...

s wildcat wells, which are exploration

oil well An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas may ...

s drilled in areas not known to be

oil field A petroleum reservoir or oil and gas reservoir is a subsurface accumulation of hydrocarbons contained in porous or fractured rock formations. Such reservoirs form when kerogen (ancient plant matter) is created in surrounding rock by the presence ...

s. Notable wildcatters include

Glenn McCarthy Glenn Herbert McCarthy (December 25, 1907 – December 26, 1988) was an American oil tycoon. The media often referred to him as "Diamond Glenn" and "The King of the Wildcatters". McCarthy was an oil prospector and entrepreneur who owned many busi ...

, Thomas Baker Slick Sr., Mike Benedum,

Joe Trees Joseph Clifton Trees was a college football player at the University of Pittsburgh, the first athlete to receive an athletic subsidization at the school, and, possibly, an early professional football player. He later made millions of dollars in ...

Clem S. Clarke Clement Steele Clarke (October 9, 1897 – March 28, 1967), was an oilman from Shreveport, Louisiana, who was the first member of the Louisiana Republican Party to run for the United States Senate since implementation in 1914 of the Seventee ...

, and

Columbus Marion Joiner Columbus Marion Joiner, nicknamed Dad Joiner (March 12, 1860 – March 27, 1947), was an American oilman who at the age of seventy drilled the discovery well of the East Texas Oil Field of the 1930s. Newspaper articles referred to Joiner as ...

; the last is responsible for finding the

East Texas Oil Field The East Texas Oil Field is a large oil and gas field in east Texas. Covering and parts of five counties, and having 30,340 historic and active oil wells, it is the second-largest oil field in the United States outside Alaska, and first in tot ...

in 1930. The term dates from the early oil industry in western

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. Oil wells in unproven territory were called "wild cat" wells from mid-1870, and those who drilled them were called "wild-catters" by 1876. For instance, the Titusville ''Herald'' noted in 1880: "The discovery of the fluid in

New York State New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. stat ...

was the signal for a general exodus of wildcatters from all parts of the oil country ..." According to tradition, the origin of the term in the petroleum industry comes from Wildcat Hollow, now in

Oil Creek State Park Oil Creek State Park is a Pennsylvania state park on in Cherrytree, Cornplanter and Oil Creek Townships, Venango County, Pennsylvania in the United States. The park is adjacent to Drake Well Museum, the site of the first successful commercial ...

near Titusville,

. Wildcat Hollow was one of the many productive fields in the early oil era. A speculator who risked his luck by drilling in this narrow valley shot a wildcat, had it stuffed and set it atop his derrick. The mounted cat gave its name to the hollow. Because the area was largely untested and somewhat away from Oil Creek Flats, the term Wildcatter was coined, describing a person who risked drilling in an unproven area. However, ''wildcat'' was American slang for any risky business venture by 1838, long before the rise of the petroleum industry. An example was the

wildcat banking Wildcat banking was the issuance of paper currency in the United States by poorly capitalized state-chartered banks. These wildcat banks existed alongside more stable state banks during the Free Banking Era from 1836 to 1865, when the country ha ...

of the 1850s. Directors of wildcat banks in the Midwest were known as "wild-catters" before

Edwin Drake Edwin Laurentine Drake (March 29, 1819 – November 9, 1880), also known as Colonel Drake, was an American businessman and the first American to successfully drill for oil. Early life Edwin Drake was born in Greenville, New York on March 2 ...

's discovery of oil in Pennsylvania."Wild-cats in Iowa," Chicago ''Tribune'', December 28, 1857, p.2 c.5.

References

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External links

Wildcatters and oil barons of America
Petroleum production History of the petroleum industry in the United States Oil exploration

See also

References

External links