HAWORTH. | Discoveries of Oil and Gas. 25, 
the Erie Gas and Mineral Company. In August, 1903, they — 
reported that a total of thirty-five wells had been drilled by 
their company, fourteen of which were gas-wells, seven oil- 
wells, and fourteen dry. The gas was piped into the city and 
supplied practically the entire population. During the sum- 
mer of 1903 some prospecting was done in the river valley be- 
tween Shaw and Erie, which in some cases gave very satis- 
factory results, but up to the date above mentioned, nowhere 
to the southeast of Chanute had oil or gas been found in quan- 
tity or volume at all comparable with that in the Chanute and 
Humboldt fields. 
INDEPENDENCE.—The history of the development at Inde- 
pendence is so well told in a letter received from Hon. W. T. 
Yoe that it will be copied entire. Under date of April 9, 1905, 
he wrote as follows: 
“Looking backward to the beginning of the natural gas and. 
oil development in Montgomery county, and especially around 
Independence, Kan., we are impressed with the benefit of the 
speculator and the conservatism of capital. In the early ’70’s, 
coal in thin veins was found near town in several localities, 
and two companies organized to develop veins, but all proved 
failures. In 1884, Dr. B. F. Masterson, of this city, with 
others, raised a fund to drill for coal, and located it on lot 6, 
block 17. The work was expensive and money difficult to ob- 
tain, and when the drill had reached 1200 feet one night the 
gas spouted the oil and water out, and as the oil ran past the 
boiler it ignited and burned all the lumber about the place. 
No one then thought that they had struck natural gas and oil,. 
and as coal had been discovered in quantity, it became im- 
possible to raise money to continue prospecting. Two years 
later, in ’86, a franchise was granted for a gas plant, the rates 
to be $2.50 per 1000 feet for manufactured gas, and street 
lights $33 per year, but the promotors were unable to obtain 
the required number of customers. The following year the 
talk of natural gas at Paola and Fort Scott had reached In- 
dependence and a gas company solicited $5000 in capital stock, 
but found few takers. During the following year there were 
‘revivals of natural gas agitation, but not until 1892-’93, after 
gas had been found at other near-by towns in limited quan- 
tities did gas development take form. In the spring of 1892, 
William H. Barnes, now secretary of the State Horticultural 
Society, then a gardener in our city, had his faith worked up 
and organized the Aitna Gas Company, which sold stock and 
accepted donations ‘to drill 600 feet, or, if necessary, to the 
vein which blew the drill out of the coal-hole well,’ to find 
natural gas. Mr. Nickerson, a well-driller from Miami county, 
was employed to drill, and, in September struck a small flow 
