STATE GEOLOGIST. 45 
insure further exploration, and a second well reached the Trenton in 
October of the same year.t. This yielded both oil and gas in small quan- 
tities, and should be classed as an oil well. Other wells were drilled with 
similar results, and by 1888 the citizens of Tiffin had reached the conclu- 
sion that they must look elsewhere for their gas supply. A branch of the 
Northwestern Ohio Natural Gas Company had already entered the city 
and was supplying gas to residences and factories, but here again the 
company was looking after its own interests rather than those of Tiffin. 
The usual result followed—an agitation for a municipal natural gas plant 
to furnish free or practically free gas to factories. The legislature granted 
the city the authority to issue bonds, and the gas trustees purchased, at an 
exorbitant rate, the gas rights on lands in Wood county.2, By 1890 the 
city had expended over a quarter of a million of dollars on this enter- 
prise, and since the gas was furnished free to factories it is apparent that 
the income to the city was very small. However, free fuel secured the de- 
sired manufacturing establishments, and consequently the city secured 
indirectly what it could not directly. 
Several towns or cities which had failed to secure gas in the under- 
lying rocks, and which did not drill wells and pipe the gas from a distance, 
were supplied by the Northwestern Ohio Natural Gas Company to which 
reference has already been made several times. This corporation sup- 
ported as it was by the great resources of the Standard Oil Company, was 
able to work on a scale which no other company could do. Very early in 
the history of the field it secured the best territory in Wood and Hancock 
counties on relatively easy terms. This it developed in the best manner 
known, and piped the fuel as far north as Detroit, and as far east as San- 
dusky. Asa rule the rates charged did not permit the fuel’s use in fac- 
tories, and this of course, extended the duration of the supply. 
Besides the places named a number of much smaller towns and vil- 
lages in Hancock, Wood, Sandusky, Seneca and Ottawa counties have 
enjoyed natural gas. This has usually been derived from small wells 
close at hand, and since the quantity was not adequate to attract factories 
the life of the wells has been greatly extended. 
PRESENT CONDITION OF THE TERRITORY REVIEWED. 
This can be stated in a few words. The early failure of gas at Find- 
lay has already been noted. Leasing territory and drilling wells in the 
northern part of the county renewed the supply, but only postponed for a 
brief period the fatal day when gas for everybody and all purposes must 
end. Early in the nineties the larger factories could no longer be sup- 
plied; next the smaller ones were dropped, and at present the use of the 
fuel is restricted to domestic purposes. 
——. 
1Geol. Sur. of Ohio, Vol. VI, p. 197-201. 
2ibid, First Ann. Rept., 1890, p. 186-190. 
