The Oil Springs Of Ontario
A gusher that occurred in Petrolia in 1902.
Before there was the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, before supertankers and pipelines, in 1858 there were two men with shovels and a swamp in Canada. One of the men was a luck-starved entrepreneur with the appropriate name of Tripp. The other was a steel-nerved businessman named Williams.
The swamp was in Lambton County in southwestern Ontario and in the 1850s it was one of the least settled regions in what was known as Canada West. The reason for its desolation was simple: While surrounding counties enjo...