“He has walk’d the way of nature; The setting sun, and music at the close, As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last.” [Illustration: ISAAC N. PHILLIPS CHARLES M. PHILLIPS JOHN T. PHILLIPS THOS. M. PHILLIPS ] The rich pickings around Petroleum Center set many on the straight cinder-path to prosperity. The four Phillips brothers—Isaac N., Charles M., John I. and Thomas M. came from Newcastle to coin money operating a farm south of the Espy. Prolific wells on the Niagara tract, Cherrytree Run, back of the Benninghoff farm, added to their wealth. They cut a wide swath in all the Pennsylvania fields. Three of the brothers have “ascended to the hill of frankincense and to the mountain of myrrh.” Thomas M. was a millionaire congressman. During the heated debates on free-silver, in 1894, he scored the hit of the season by suggesting to convert each barrel of Petroleum into legal-tender for a dollar and let it go at that. Crude was selling at sixty cents, which gave the Phillips proposition a point “sharper than a serpent’s tooth” or a Demosthenean philippic. Dr. Egbert offered Isaac Phillips an interest in the Davidson farm in 1862. The offer was not accepted instantly, Phillips saying he would “consider it a few days.” Two weeks later he was ready to close the deal, but the plum had fallen into the lap of Charles Hyde and diverted prospective millions into another channel. George K. Anderson figured conspicuously in this latitude, his receipts for two years exceeding five-thousand dollars a day! He built a sumptuous residence at Titusville, sought political preferment and served a term in the State Senate. Holding a vast block of Pacific-Railroad stock, he was the bosom friend of the directors and trusted lieutenant of William H. Kemble, the Philadelphia magnate whose “addition, division and silence” gave him notoriety. He bought thousands of acres of land, plunged deeply into stocks and insured his life for three-hundred-and-fifteen-thousand dollars, at that time the largest risk in the country. If he sneezed or coughed the agents of the insurance-companies grew nervous and summoned a posse of doctors to consult about the case. Outside speculations swamped him at last. The stately mansion, piles of bonds and scores of farms passed under the sheriff’s hammer in 1880. Plucky and unconquerable, Anderson tried his hand in the Bradford field, operating on Harrisburg Run. The result was discouraging and he entered an insurance-office in New York. Five years ago he accepted a government-berth in New Mexico. Meeting him on Broadway the week before he left New York, his buoyant spirits seemed depressed. He spoke regretfully of his approaching departure, yet hoped it might turn out advantageously. He arrived at his post, sickened and died in a few days, “a stranger in a strange land.” Relatives and loved ones were far away when he went down into the starless night of the grave.