Mrs. Stewart is pictured turning over personal files of her husband to James O. Henry (right). It was from these that Henry got much material for his book. A t left is Biola Librarian Dr. Arnold Ehlert.
there were deep pools beneath the surface of the heavier oil. It was the result of this development that the two partners began their success in the California oil business. AH the agreements between these two men up to this time had been informal and purely verbal. With the prospect of greatly expanded operation in the West, and at the suggestion of their bank ers, they decided to draw up a written partnership, in which Lyman Stewart and his family owned 51 % and Hardison and his friends 49% of the stock. Thus began the first oil company in which these two men were formally allied. At this time Hardison and Stewart decided that if they were to make a success of the oil business
Canyon was heavy dead oil with small kerosene content and was of little value. All the oil that Hardison and Stewart were able to pump and sell in 1884 was not nearly enough to keep them drill ing. They were kept operating by occasional divi dends from oil leases they still held in Pennsyl vania. Both Stewart and Hardison began to suspect that the heavy asphaltic oil that was being found at shallow depths was simply the by product from deeper pools being pushed up by pressure from larger deposits deeper down in the earth. It was this suspicion that led them to bring John Irwin, a relative of Stewart, who was a geologist, from Pennsylvania to study the situa tion. As a result of his advice they began to drill deeper wells. This proved their suspicions that
15
The King's Business/February 1958
Made with FlippingBook HTML5