Pioneer Days In California PDF Download

The history of petroleum in California deserves to be better known, for oil has been as surely the significant California mineral in the 20th century as the more glamorous gold was in its predecessor. In this coal-short state, oil has long fueled our industry, public utilities and transport. It has contributed to our agriculture by powering distillate-driven pumps for irrigation and in numerous other ways. Above all, through its most valuable refined product, gasoline, it has helped make the automobile our massively preferred form of personal transportation, affecting our patterns of population growth and, in recent years, making us acutely conscious of the hazards of air pollution. Spudding In can whet popular interest in oil history. Its handsome format, superb illustrations and easy reading make it fit for a coffee table, but it is by no means lacking in substance. The author, a longtime, respected oil journalist, has drawn heavily on taped interviews with thirty-five prominent oil figures of early in this century systematically gathered since 1963 by the Petroleum Production Pioneers of California and has supplemented this rich source with a variety of printed materials and his own wide knowledge.