This stock certificate from the Mt. Diablo Oil Company is currently for sale on eBay.
We need a little help with this one.
Can anyone out there in Claycord tell us a little more about the Mt. Diablo Oil Company? Where was it? When did it shut down, etc.?
Thanks in advance.
9 comments
Short of a google search….
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Cowellian????
Here ya go, Mayor: https://pubs.usgs.gov/bul/0340f/report.pdf (PG 2 / 340) 1900. Mount Diablo Oil Company, on Old Tar ranch. Several wells drilled many
years ago; drilling operations begun again in 1900, but failed to get oil.
Actually the whole thing is an interesting read.
@No Excuses – Amazing, thank you for finding that. That is an interesting read.
Thanks again!
Mayor
You are Very Welcome, Mayor. A request for more information took me to stranger places and, not growing up in California, history lessons I couldn’t have imagined. In 1900, less than 50 years from the “gold rush” days, citizens were complaining about State government and taxes! LOL. Examples: Children under 18 were not permitted to work more than 10 hours a day in manufacturing, production and such. Reform Schools were taxed, but prisons weren’t. Boys from the Ione reformatory dug the Central water canal…. Teamsters (etc) Unions were already in control and demanding more wages… Excellent Google E-read 1900 Edition: https://books.google.com/books?id=UIo-AQAAMAAJ&pg=RA6-PA62&dq=Where+was+%22the+Old+Tar+Ranch%22+in+contra+costa+co%3F&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=1#v=onepage&q&f=false
Being a bit of a history buff, this read took up a lot of my day… and I’m not even a hundred pages in yet.
ANCIENT MARINER! 👋 Hope you enjoy this too.
Sorry…I don’t know how to make those long URL’s any shorter 🙂
Yes, I enjoyed reading that, too!
I didn’t know any oil drilling had occurred around here. Thanks for posting it!
Would appear in 1902 there were some silver tongued devils plying their trade.
Wonder how many of the 500,000 shares they actually sold?
Miner Ranch Site 37° 54.248′ N, 122° 11.37′ W. in Orinda, California
https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=145024
.
“MINER RANCH
Sleepy Hollow and Miner Road Area”
“Many oil wells were drilled from 1888 through 1903 in the Miner Road area of Orinda. Several wells were drilled on Miner Ranch. Some of the wells at Miner Ranch yielded oil, although the actual quantities were small.”
https://tinyurl.com/22m5m7zr Page 36
The deed to our house, and likely many in the county, makes it clear that we don’t own the mineral rights. I forget if it also says who owns them. When looking into if a Walnut Creek building permit is needed for a project we have in mind we discovered that no permit is needed for an oil well.
I though there were active oil and gas wells in the area as I have seen them when looking at aerial photos. See https://databasin.org/maps/new/#datasets=09c1776621a34889ad5d71a0c5fc964e for a map of the wells.
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