The term wildcatter is seldom heard anymore, seldom used. It has (or had) a romantic ring to it once-upon-a-time. Probably, today, it is better left among its own: That ownership of the term is wherever the spirit of men like Michael Halbouty or Glen McCarthy (both of Texas), or The Hughes brothers, Dan and Dudley (Texas and Mississippi), or perhaps the granddaddy and most colorful of all wildcatters, Columbus (Dad) Joiner, an old Alabama country boy who at the ripe old age of 70 promoted and sold (and oversold) The East Texas Field, the largest in the world at the time.
His fanciful business “skills” put him in receivership and “white knight” H.L. Hunt rode in to claim the field, its promotion, and development drilling (also risky). Hunt was always something of a business wildcatter as opposed to a geological wildcatter. But by damn he could make money without bribing the Ukrainian or Chinese governments. But getting a bit ahead.
Back about a million years ago when I was a graduate student in mathematics, I worked for a couple of oil finders in Louisiana. Two geologists, Frank Harrison, and Jack Martin. I often watched as they analyzed old electric logs of previously drilled wells (dry or productive) and penciled out subsurface maps of where a particular kind of structural trap might be (or a stratigraphic trap like the East Texas monster).
They taught me some of the techniques and I occasionally would gather a pile of well-logs, a blank base map, and scribble and piddle myself. Technique and concept relatively easy, drawing maps that had accurate results, difficult. Then often with the tutorship of an independent landman, I learned the process of title examination and acquisition of leases.
Nevertheless, their own money was spent to generate prospects, and then the process of money for drilling necessarily was sought—and it wasn’t from the government. No, the government doesn’t help you make money, it helps you spend it. And spend it, and spend it, and…
Wildcatters are always looking for money (amateur economists call it capital). The government calls it capitol.
But it was these wildcatters and businessmen who were the risk pioneers around whose spirit the great quantities of “black gold” in this once happy land of free enterprise were found. And such resources were found and developed by men who not only understood risk but understood the science of “earth.” They understood the science of the “climate.” They understood economics, with its basic parameters of supply, demand, and price.
Not altogether uncommon was the fact that (as in the U.S, military history) a disproportionate number were Southerners. And if they were not such, their spirit was the heart of agrarianism. These wildcatters were and had the same backbone of the farmer, a “wildcatter” in his own right who took his chance with his own money to feed his (and many city-slickers) family against the risks of wildcatting in nature’s unpredictable weather (a parameter of climate, not the other way around).
This was the nature of wildcatting (whether exploration or farming), taking great risks to free people and feed people. Farmers grew food on top of the earth, wildcatters found oil and gas underneath the earth. The surface fed stomachs the subsurface fed liberty.
And then came the brave new world of bureaucrats, the hydrophobic dogs of government! The Mad Dogs.
The history of this collection of self-serving, vicious government monsters is as long as the history of the oil and gas business. The liars and fools among the Washington bureaucracy have their roots as deep in history as far back as Colonel E.L. Drake and John D. Rockefeller.
And today it has its hands in the control of the modern oil and gas industry through the worst kind of Washington liars and fools. It has liars and/or fools such as Al Gore and his babbling word-salad book of Earth in the Balance. It has silly Jr. High-mentality-deficient gals like the Secretary of Energy (what a ridiculous concept) Jennifer Grandholm and her silly little sing-a-long about “bad old gasoline.” And the list goes on with pitifully educated children like AOC and her dumbo group called the “squad.” These women know as much about thermodynamics and natural processes as these late-night comedians know about humor.
And now to the top of the pile of Washington’s government criminals. The demented, criminal president and his “artful” corrupt son who having bribed foreign governments and their gas companies for cold hard cash, now blame not only the Russians but the American Oil Companies for high prices. A 50-year bureaucrat who has never done anything but live off of the government payroll, a lying, pitifully unhinged man and his son and their climate control experts rule the once Jeffersonian republic.
“These are the times that try men’s souls.” Thomas Paine, turn in thy grave.
Mad dogs, barking, growling, and biting, risking nothing more than the fortunes and honor and hard work of others blame wars and misfortune on the wildcatters and the people these wildcatters have served.
These people, these mad dogs don’t worry about money. They don’t have to earn it (and they never do) they print it. These are not good people. It sometimes is a question if they are people. They are corrupt and evil flesh-peddlers.
It doesn’t take a “Nobel Laureate” in economics to understand why gasoline may reach $10.00 soon. It takes only a private or family educated man or woman to understand (publicly educated morons don’t even understand the great mask hoax) why?
But demented Joe tells us that oil and gas are bad so we must not have any, unless it comes from somewhere else where the laws of green physics don’t apply—Venezuela, Iran, the moon, wherever.
Joe, and Al and AOC et al, morons running the show in our great “democracy.”
They aren’t wild cats. They are mad dogs. When are the dogcatchers going to stand up like men?
Probably won’t unless gas gets to $25.00/gallon—or I say “men and women.”
To hell with them.
By Paul Yarbrough
Paul Yarbrough writes novels, short stories, poetry, and essays.
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Should not be a great surprise if you’ve been paying attention to what folks in the EU pay for petrol,…it’s been at that level for some time. It’s just that Pedo Joe pulled the rug (of government subsidies) out from under your feet and he’s laughing at you as you fall for the nonsense that this has anything to do with Russia….
I have several friends who made their future lives working the oilfields in the 70’s 80’s.
You omitted The King Of The Wildcatters – Tom Slick. His son Earl (oh – Skull & Bones) moved to Winston-Salem through his friendship with Dick Reynolds. Bought DC-3s post WWII, started the first freight airline. Financed Tom Davis at Piedmont Airlines. Built an out of town subdivision for his friends. Its main drag was Lazy Lane. (Houston/ River Oaks, we have a copy cat).
Earl died several years ago at home. His obit made the W-S Journal 7 days after his funeral. By his order. That’s REAL $$$$$$.
I feel dumber for having read that.
The same basic understanding applies to farming & ranching laws, wildlife management laws, public education laws, voting laws, housing laws, employment laws, immigration laws, small business laws, Foreign Policy Laws, etc: TPTB are out to destroy America. It is a Felony to shoot predators because they are to destroy ranchers; a Felony to shoot deer to because they are to destroy farmers; a Felony to shoot migratory birds because they are to spread diseases; a felony to dig a pond in a wetland area to have minnows year round to eat mosquito larva because mosquitoes are to spread diseases; a Felony to shoot alligators because they are to kill people; a crime to spend silver and gold as money; a crime to own a gun in half the states and that is a violation of Citizen’s Constitutional Rights; it can be a crime to transport a valuable if a Cop so determines; a statement of biological facts can be ruled hate crimes in violation of Citizen’s Constitutional Rights; White males are legally discriminated against in violation of the 14th Amendment; we are censored and sometimes fired for telling the Truth in America.
The saying goes that a little knowledge can be dangerous.
The fact is that wildcatters survived in a world where oil was easy to find. That is no longer the world we live in. All the easy oil has been pumped and today it takes sophisticated techniques to find the oil and to pump it. It is not the kind of business that lends itself to low capital operations. Oil is now a business that takes massive amounts of capital to operate, and that means it will remain the realm of mega corporations.