In June another exasperating episode occurred, growing out of the attempts of the oil men to secure independent routes to the seaboard. As we have seen, two enterprises had been launched late in 1877 under the patronage of the Petroleum Producers’ Union. As soon as the Equitable had acquired its right of way to Buffalo, Mr. Emery, the head of the company, his papers in hand, sought an interview with representatives of the Buffalo and McKean road, and told them if they did not consent that the Equitable lay a pipe-line to their road, and did not contract to carry the oil from that connection to Buffalo, the pipe-line to Buffalo would be laid. After considerable negotiation a contract was made with the railroad, and by June the new company was ready with pipe-line, cars and barges to carry oil to New York. But no sooner did they attempt to begin operations than the railroad, under pressure from the Pennsylvania Railroad it was claimed, refused to carry out its contracts. The cars the Equitable ordered sent to the loading track were refused, a side track it had laid was torn up, the frog torn out; everything, indeed, was done to prevent the Equitable doing business, though finally a vigorous appeal to the law brought the road to terms, and in July oil began to flow Eastward by this indirect route. No sooner did the Standard find that the Equitable people were really doing business than they appealed to the railroads. A meeting of the representatives of the trunk lines was held at Saratoga in July, and the rates on crude Eastward were dropped to eighty cents to meet the new competition. While this fight was going on against the Equitable all sorts of interference were being put in the way of the seaboard line between Brady’s Bend and Baltimore. It was ridiculed as chimerical to attempt to pump oil over the mountains, and General Haupt was declared to be a visionary engineer with a record of failures. All the old stories retailed in 1876 were dragged out again. The farmers were told that the leakage from the pipe-line would ruin their fields and endanger their buildings, and an active campaign to excite prejudice was carried on again in the farmers’ papers. Philadelphia and Pittsburg both fought the plan, the press and chambers of commerce opposing the free pipe bill at that time before the Legislature, and the project generally. In Pittsburg the opposition created almost a riot, for the oil producers of the Lower Field, who had long bought their supplies there, now threatened to boycott the city if the pipe-line was fought. So strong was the opposition that capital took fright and the company found it most difficult to secure funds. This opposition to the pipe-line was, of course, charged against the Standard and the Pennsylvania Railroad.