In the years immediately prior to our war of Independence, allusions to the petroleum resources of what are now the United States became frequent; and the commercial value of the product was known to General Washington himself. Washington, who was a great believer in the future of the country, which was in his day called “the West,” acquired three large tracts of land on the Ohio River bottoms. One of these was at Point Pleasant, the birthplace of General Grant; a second at Round Bottom, later the site of the City of Cincinnati; and a third at the mouth of the Kanawha River, rich in coal and oil. The father of his country had a singular prescience with regard to the element which was to play so great a part in modern American industry; for in his will, speaking of this third tract, he says: “This tract was taken up by General Lewis and myself on account of the bituminous spring which it contains, of so inflammable a nature as to burn freely as spirits and is nearly as difficult to extinguish.” Certain of its immense future value, he requested his heirs not to dispose of this particular tract. CHAPTER II WHAT IS PETROLEUM? Petroleum, or to use its comprehensive colloquial synonym, “oil,” has come to play such a widespread part in every-day life that most people, the younger generation especially, take its existence for granted without further enquiry. Few pause to reflect that this basic essential of modern commerce is a comparatively new agent for the service of mankind. Its applications are so manifold that it is now recognized as indispensable; whereas in a period so recent as that of the advent of Lincoln in American history it was almost negligible as a contributor to the nation’s wealth and productive power. The development of petroleum ranks third among the three great discoveries in the realm of applied science which have revolutionized industry in the past hundred years--the other elements being electricity and steam. In company with electricity, it has effected changes in methods of manufacture, and added to the comforts of civilization in ways that it would take volumes to relate. It has been a factor in revolutionizing warfare--as the recent great conflict proved--and it is essential to the arts of peace. Like electricity, with which its development as a servant of man has been coincident, its utility consists in the fact that it is a source of light, heat and energy. But unlike electricity it is a passive as well as an active agent. For illustration, the same motor car which is propelled by one product of crude petroleum is also lubricated and enabled to travel by means of another product of the same commodity.