I am so behind in my posting! I wanted to share my daughter’s field trip with you last Thursday but I have been extra busy with yard sales & family! For fear that I will never sit down and actually share, I am posting the pictures.
We went with my daughter to the Drake Well Park, we also went for a ride on the Oil Creek Railroad We had a great day! It was long and hot, noisy and peaceful at the same time. This particular trip was very nostalgic since I went on the very same trip with my 2nd grade class, from the very same school :) Of course, that was about 22 years ago! We missed going with our son when he was small so this was our last chance to get aboard!
At Drake Well they have a really interesting operating replica of Colonel Edwin L. Drake’s first successful oil well. I hope you enjoy the photos!
History of Drake Well adapted from Drake Well brochure
On August 27. 1859, Edward Drake struck oil in northwestern Pennsylvania and launched the modern petroleum industry, changing the world forever. Drake proved that drilling could produce the commercial quantities of crude oil needed to make kerosene for lamps.
Drake’s Well pumped about 20 barrels of oil daily – double that of any at the time. The Oil Creek Valley filled with speculators quickly, but increased production from later wells drove oil prices so low that Drake was out of business by 1862.
Conductors on the Oil Creek Railroad kept history alive as they continued to point out the site of Drake’s famous oil well to train passengers over the years.
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Thanks for sharing the pics. I so enjoyed going on field trips with my boys, I went on every one I could.
Jen