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forbearance still grew reaching the record level of 7430 euros but 6 actions Beni Stabili in MayJune figures lead to double the assessmentJuly 31 Alstom will replace Thales in the CAC 40Election period is more synonymous with social truceAccording to counsel the Germany is no need to take any decision on what either todayWhen he called me I only had never met himEquality of opportunity it is also work for allThus the unemployment rate has dropped to 7Deliberate provocation the law requiring local authorities to balance their budgetsAn unforgettable spectacle
The fall of 1900, with the support of James Guffey and the Mellon, Anthony f. Lucas resumed drilling on Spindletop. January 10, 1901, while the drill bit dug 300 metres, the unlikely occurs: the column of pipe drilling weighing several tons breaks into a thousand pieces all down the structure of the derrick. A powerful jet of gas and oil projects in the air of huge blocks of rocks. The show is frightening, unforgettable for those who attend. While at Corsicana well produced 30 barrels per day, are several tens of thousands of barrels exploding in geyser of Spindletop Hill. At the beginning of the year 1901, Texas oil era has just begun. An oil completeness, who has not finished to sink State remains even today the main area of production in the United States and with incalculable consequences on the oil sector. It is indeed in Texas that are born the main companies us oil, including the Texas Company (Texaco future), Gulf Oil (later merged with Chevron), Sun Oil and the Humble (future Exxon). It is in Texas also are built from before 1914 large refineries and the densest pipeline network in the world. But the Texas oil also revolutionized American industry as a whole. Poor quality, it is not for lighting, first outlet of the black gold at this time. Otherwise, it is used heavily in industry and rail transport in place of coal. It is in Texas that begins the mass conversion of coal to the oil industry.
Beaumont in the meantime, it is the rush. In three months, the population of the town goes from 10,000 to 60,000 people. Sunday following the discovery, 15,000 people disembarked a train! Without place, immense tent villages are trained on the outskirts of the city. A land of one hectare who negotiated earlier $ 20 is worth now over 1 million! The city uses it only more than half of the whisky drunk in the State! Cabarets, saloons, hotels and warehouses grow like mushrooms. In some institutions, the baths are by three to save water. Beaumont has its unlucky Drillers victims of the mess room or a fatal Brawl. It also has its celebrities. Among them, three prostitutes from high flight whose name is passed to posterity: Hazel Hoke, Myrtle Bellevue and Jessie George. Spend 20 minutes with one of them, people are ready to make the tail of the hours. Some are even fortune by selling their place! Between the three ladies, it is to align more than customers, up to twenty-five good days!
Des considerable sums
Become the soul of the matter, James Guffey Struts in town now. It is true that the former dandy became immensely rich and is a celebrity in Beaumont, which honours him as a national hero. In 1901 he bought shares of Galey and Lucas in the fields of Spindletop and founded the JM Guffey Petroleum Company, which the Mellon Bank is an important shareholder. The company has for main customer the Standard Oil of Rockefeller which vessels are each day trip to Texas. It also delivers the Shell of Marcus Samuel, who wishes to diversify its oil resources. With the English industrialist, Guffey has negotiated an agreement which guaranteed resumption of half of its production for fifteen years at a price of 25 cents per barrel. What earn huge benefits...
But it is effective without the vagaries of the production. At the end of 1902, at the end of a year and a half of a frenzied exploitation, Spindletop flow collapses literally: 10,000 barrels per day against more than 45,000 previously! Very bad news for Guffey, who can no longer honor the command of Marcus Samuel and amortize its investment spending. At Pittsburgh, Mellon Bank headquarters, there is concern. And if all the building in which the institution has invested millions of dollars collapsed Patriarch Thomas and his son, a Council of war decided immediate sending place of William Larimer Mellon. He quickly to be a religion: it is necessary, he said, change the direction and develop a large integrated oil set. Since Beaumont where it is installed, William Larimer Mellon reorganizes the case thoroughly. Erection of a giant refinery in Port Arthur, on the Gulf of Mexico, construction of a 700 kilometre pipeline connecting the oil fields recently discovered in Oklahoma and just compensate the decline of Spindletop, establishment of efficient commercial equipment. Considerable sums are invested. At the same time, William Larimer Mellon seeks to renegotiate agreements with Marcus Samuel. It is made as early as 1904.
In 1907, the former Guffey Petroleum Company is renamed the Gulf Oil Corporation. Placed at the head of the company, William Larimer Mellon rejected insensitively James Guffey, compensated with a cheque for $ 3 million. As Patillo Higgins, Guffey eventually ruined and covered with debts. With the Mellon, Texas oil permanently between in the industrial era, an era where the discoverers have more place. Until its merger with Chevron, in 1984, Gulf Oil had to prevail among the first US oil companies, is building in the United States, the Canada, the Venezuela and the Middle East and creating one of the first networks of petrol stations in the history as early as the 1920s.
