HAWORTH. | Discoveries of Oil and Gas. 29 
It was during this period also that gas was first discovered 
at Iola, long considered to be the center of the greatest gas- 
fields in the state. Here, in 1873, the Acers well was drilled, 
which produced both gas and mineral water. The proprietor 
considered the mineral water of more value than the gas. A 
sanatorium was built, the water piped into baths, and, to a 
limited extent, what little gas could be saved was used for 
lighting the sanatorium. Little did any one suspect at that 
time the vast quantity of wealth lying beneath them, only 
awaiting a time when some one with more perseverance would 
sink a drill a little deeper than was done at the Ackers well. 
Third. The third part of the history in the development of 
the Kansas oil- and gas-fields may be considered from 1890 to 
the present time. 
About 1890 Mr. Mills, now of Osawatomie, began prospec- 
ting for oil in the vicinity of Neodesha. He met with some 
success, which resulted in his going east, where he succeeded 
in interesting the Pittsburg firm of Guffey & Gailey in the 
enterprise. They came to Neodesha and began development 
work in 1893, in which they were reasonably successful. They 
piped gas into Neodesha and first lighted it on the evening of 
the Fourth of July, 1894, in connection with the celebrations 
of that day. Earlier in the day they “shot” an oil-well in the 
near vicinity of town, the first event of its kind in Kansas, 
witnessed by a large number of people. Guffey & Gailey 
drilled many wells and had sufficient success so that in the 
autumn of 1895 they sold their holdings to the Forest Oil 
Company, a branch of the Standard. Business was carried 
on under this name for a few years only, until a new corpora- 
tion was effected and incorporated under the name of the 
Prairie Oil and Gas Company, under which name operations 
are still carried on. 
Coffeyville probably should have the honor of piping gas 
into her streets the first of any town in southeastern Kansas, 
being second to Paola, although Iola, Osawatomie and Cherry- 
vale began burning gas not far from the same time. 
IoLA.—The first development at Iola was foreshadowed by 
the Colonel Acers well in 1873, already reported in these 
pages. It was drilled with a diamond drill to a depth of 737 
feet. It produced a small amount of gas and also salt water. 
The water was conveyed into a building used for a sanatorium. 
The gas, imperfectly separated, was used in part to light the 
