Spindletop.

JAMES A. AND MICHAEL T. HALBOUTY CLARK

Publication: Random House, 1952, New York

First edition. 8vo. Decorated cloth, titles stamped in gilt on the spine, decorated front and rear endpapers, xvi, 306 pp., acknowledgments, foreword, illustrated, plates, portraits, appendix, index.

Basic Texas Books 30 says, "This is the best account of the great discovery of oil near Beaumont on Spindletop Mound, "where oil became an industry." Neff, Oil History A51: “Clark and Halbouty wrote a popular, easy-reading and exciting history of the field from their intimate knowledge of the people and events.” Swanson, A Century of Oil and Gas in Books…., p.150: “History of the 1901 discovery at Spindletop, the events leading up to it, and boom days which followed; significance of the field in launching a new era of the oil industry.” Dan Ferguson: “…a sound piece of accurate reporting carefully checked by an experienced geologist and oil operator. A lively, animated and absorbing narrative…probably the best coverage now extant of this event of such unusual historic importance.” The authors, one an associate of Glen McCarthy and former oil editor for the Houston Post and the other a geologist and petroleum engineer, combine their talents to produce a cornerstone work on the spindle top discovery. They also examine the technical and operational advances that resulted like improved drilling techniques, innovations in geology and geophysics, and techniques for controlling well fires to name a few. One of three books on the oil industry to receive the full bibliographical treatment in Jenkins’s Basic Texas Books.

Fine bright copy in a fine bright price-clipped dust jacket with minor wear to the spine ends, corners and extremities with one closed tear to the top edge of the rear cover.