In 1745 Louis Pierre Ancillon de la Sablonnière established the Pechelbronn

bitumen Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term a ...

mine at

Merkwiller-Pechelbronn Merkwiller-Pechelbronn () is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. It is notable as the original home of oil sands mining. Oil sands were mined from 1745 in Merkwiller-Pechelbronn, initially under the direc ...

Bas-Rhin Bas-Rhin (; Alsatian: ''Unterelsàss'', ' or '; traditional german: links=no, Niederrhein; en, Lower Rhine) is a department in Alsace which is a part of the Grand Est super-region of France. The name means 'Lower Rhine', referring to its low ...

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

. He was an interpreter with the French ambassador to

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

, then the General Treasurer of the Ligues Suisses and

Grisons The Grisons () or Graubünden,Names include: *german: (Kanton) Graubünden ; * Romansh: ** rm, label= Sursilvan, (Cantun) Grischun ** rm, label=Vallader, (Chantun) Grischun ** rm, label= Puter, (Chantun) Grischun ** rm, label=Surmiran, (Cant ...

. He learned of Jean Theophile Hoeffel's 1734 thesis "Historia Balsami Mineralis Alsatici sev Petrolei Vallis Sancti Lamperti", which described bitumen springs near

Lampertsloch Lampertsloch is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. It is located less than nine kilometres (5 miles) from the French–German border. The commune is part of the ''Parc naturel régional des Vosges du Nor ...

. The farm was later called BächelBrunn/ Baechel-Brunn for a "source of a brook" or "Baechelbronner" in 1768 when purchased by the LeBel family. Along with Jean d’Amascéne Eyrénis, the son of physician Eyrini d'Eyrinis, the developer of the La Presta

asphalt Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term a ...

mine of Val de Travers,

Neuchâtel , neighboring_municipalities= Auvernier, Boudry, Chabrey (VD), Colombier, Cressier, Cudrefin (VD), Delley-Portalban (FR), Enges, Fenin-Vilars-Saules, Hauterive, Saint-Blaise, Savagnier , twintowns = Aarau (Switzerland), Besançon (France), ...

, he obtained permission to start searches around the spring. He created the first oil company in 1740, putting 40 shares on the market.Mines d’asphalte du Val-de-Travers (Neuchâtel)
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References

Further reading