- 1920s - (Part 1 of 14) -
In doing research for the many articles that I have put in the paper, I think the most profound statement I have come across is the one made by Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author David McCullough. “To assume that because people hold positions of responsibility they are therefore behaving responsibly is human shortsightedness and extremely risky.”
In researching The Eureka Herald for news articles, I found almost on a weekly basis references to automobile or truck accidents. These involved not only highway accidents, but accidents involving vehicles being hit by a train and vehicle accidents at the intersections in towns. Another recurring theme was the robberies of homes and businesses in different towns in the county.
“The discovery of oil in Greenwood County made it a mecca for oil company investment and the drawing card for the honest and dishonest people. The rush was on in January 1920 in the oil field and there was a lot of activity on the Teter Pool which was northwest of Eureka. The Empire Oil Co., pioneer in that territory, was erecting rigs as fast as men and trucks could get material on the ground. The road leading northwest from Eureka was lined daily with big trucks hauling material, lumber, casing and drilling equipment. Already twelve rigs had been erected by the Empire, Emerald and Phillips Oil Companies.
The Empire had a small army of men at work laying pipe east from the Teter to Fall River to supply that company with abundant water for drilling operations. The pipe is being buried three feet under ground at enormous expense, an indication in itself that the company is here to stay. There are sixty men on the job. Eight other men are working day and night building rigs and bunk houses. Oil tanks of a total of 10,000 barrels capacity will be completed this week and when the work is finished the Empire Teter No. 2 which is flowing at the rate of 200 barrels per day with the bit only 18 inches in the sand will be drilled in. Oil men say this well will prove a sensation in oil circles; that will cause a rush to this field that will eclipse anything heretofore seen in Kansas.
“We expect Eureka to be headquarters for all operations in Greenwood County and it is my prediction that one month from today the town will not be able to handle the people who will be here. Eureka is bound to see a big oil boom and it is up to the town to prepare for it. Our men want to locate their families here and only a lack of houses can keep them away. A driller can leave Eureka at 11a.m. and be at work on the Teter lease at noon. Eureka is the closet railroad point by at least fifteen miles and it is only natural that this town should be the home of the workmen as well as the supply center for this field.”
Acreage in the Teter pool commands fabulous prices. It is reported Empire paid $26,000 for an assignment on the northwest quarter and has made an offer of $100,000 to P.C. Johnson of Hartford for an assignment of the lease he holds. Acreage as far back as two miles from the production finds a ready sale of $100 per acre.
In March 1920, three men held up H.B. Hyatt night engineer at the Eureka Electric & Ice Co. plant at 3:30 a.m. at the plant and after binding and gagging him robbed him of his watch and $5 in money and made their escape. Hyatt was seated in the engine room eating his lunch when he noticed a man approaching him. He thought nothing of it as he has frequent callers during the night. As the man came closer two other men grabbed Hyatt from behind, pinning his hands to his sides. The three then bound his hands together behind his back with baling wire, using a pair of pliers to twist the wire tight around his wrists. They took him across the room to a cot where they bound his feet with wire, gagged him with a quantity of waste saturated with chloroform, tied a shirt over his head and placed him face down on the cot.
An hour later the lights over town began to get dim as the fire in the engine room boiler died down and I.M. Belles, night operator at the Missouri Pacific depot went across to the light plant, a block from the depot, to see what was the matter. He failed to find Hyatt and returned to the depot.
Ed Booth, an employee of the light company, awoke about five o’clock and noticing the light were dim, phoned the manager of the company, who in turn called the A. Kraus residence, where Hyatt rooms, to ascertain if he was there. All three men then went to the plant and after some search with lanterns found Hyatt unconscious under the cot. They released him and applied artificial respiration for several minutes and was revived and was able to tell the story of the highwaymen. He fully r The robbers doubtless left town on a Missouri Pacific Freight which went through Eureka between four and five o’clock or the morning passenger at 4:46.
In March of 1920, a leather expert brought to Washington, D.C. from the Rock Island, Ill., arsenal, told a congressional committee on expenditures in the war department, that the war department had really purchased 42,000,000 pairs of shoes and that of that number, 32,000,000 were actually delivered for use by the American soldiers. The chairman of the committee calls attention that 32,000,000 pairs of shoes for 4,000,00 soldiers meant eight pairs of shoes for every soldier in service.
Consolidation of rural schools, the shortage of teachers and efficiency were outlined by Thomas Butcher, President of Kansas State Normal School( Emporia State) at a conference attended by 300 school superintendents. “The tendency in the rural districts is for consolidation,” said Mr. Butcher. The second day of the conference was devoted to the teacher shortage as a national problem and the consideration of plans for bringing about immediate increases in the salaries of teachers. In Kansas in 1920 there are approximately 8000 oneroom schools, of which 3000 or 37 per cent have ten pupils or fewer. Of the 8000 one-room schools, 1000 are either closed or have teachers admitted to be below standard.
At a county commission meeting in April 1920, it was decided that there would be no hard surfaced roads built and rejected bids for hard surfacing five miles of the county road leading west from Eureka. The bid for a bituminous macadam road was $24,588 per mile and on concrete it was $48,535 per mile.
The Herald’s prophesy of January 1, 1920, that the biggest oil field in Kansas would be opened in Greenwood County this spring is about to be realized. A forest of rigs on the Teter pool is springing up in that territory and the big play has just begun. The work of the past winter was but the preliminary skirmish. With several wells on the pump each producing 100 to 150 barrels daily, now comes the Teter No. 2 flowing 250 barrels a day natural, with 100 feet of pay sand. The Emerald company has four rigs up on the Teter. Skelly and Inland Co. have three new rigs on their Morris lease.
There is also great activity at Sallyards and in the Hamilton-Virgil pools. Eureka got it first thrill three years ago when oil was struck in the Bitler well just east of the city limits. Development came slowly and Eureka people were inclined to be discouraged at times, but now the extended Eureka field is making the oil fraternity sit up and take notice.
“Believe me or not,” said a prominent oil man in Eureka, a representative of one of the big companies developing the Teter field. “I am not talking for publication, but we have an oil and gas field here that is going to prove an epoch maker in the oil and gas industry. Just think of it, one hundred feet of good sand, fine flow of oil of 40 gravity, plenty of gas. Eureka will reap the benefit of it. The oil men are glad to find a field here. The Eureka people I have seen are like the Teter 3, fine at the start and become stronger and more cordial as you become better acquainted. But you need more houses, if Eureka had the proper housing facilities you would have a thousand more people here within a very short time. Just stick to your knitting, keep abreast of the procession and Eureka will prosper mightily.”
