Operations were started in February and after many tedious delays rock was struck at a depth of thirty-six feet. If they were to go farther steam power was necessary, and by August 1st, this had been secured. In the meantime the drilling operations had been the joke of the countryside, but Drake literally could not afford to fail. With steam power it was found possible to drill through the rock at the rate of about three feet a day until toward the end of the month oil was struck at a depth of sixty-nine and a half feet. No record was kept of the exact date, though the New York Tribune a few weeks later fixed it at August 23rd. The well was not a free flowing one, but yielded to the pumping process. The discovery, momentous as it was, did not create much excitement except in the immediate locality. John Brown’s raid, at Harper’s Ferry, and the possibility of the Civil War, which was to ensue within less than two years, were the chief topics in the public mind of America. Shortly after the discovery a fire wiped out the existing plant but kindly neighbours, now satisfied that the experiment was no failure, assisted Drake, and when the well was again set in working order its flow was more promising than ever. In the view of experts, Drake’s achievement as a pioneer may be regarded as limited to one great feat, the drilling with steam power of the first cased oil well. He ceased to be an active factor in the development of the newborn industry with the drilling of this first well. Following his inspiration, others organized it and in the course of a few years a great army of industrial workers, merchants, financiers and distributors of all classes became associated with petroleum and placed it in a foremost position among the world’s industries. Drake himself finally left the oil regions in 1863 with about $15,000 savings, which he soon lost in other forms of speculation. In the stupendous events of the national conflict he was almost forgotten. In 1869, ten years after his discovery, the older oil men who had known him learned that he was sick and penniless, with a wife and family at the point of starvation. They raised among themselves a purse of $5,000 and later the State Legislature was prevailed upon to grant him an annual pension of $1,500, which maintained him in comparative comfort at his home in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, until his death in 1884.