The Last Ten Feet

[Music] the last 10 feet 10 feet of gasoline holes connecting millions of Americans every day with a story of progress the story of oil we Americans take progress for granted we can get gasoline everywhere and friendly free services with it step on the gas and away we go yes hundreds of times a day at work and at play we take progress for granted yet we've come farther and faster in the past century than in the previous twenty centuries put together and it is no coincidence that this last 100 years takes in the whole history of the oil business [Music] to most of us the oil industry is just one person our friendly neighborhood service station man fill er up sir what's the story behind that question what's the story of oil not only for motorists but for farms factories Falls 50 years ago oil supplied less than 10% of our national power needs today almost half it's a record of achievement that begins and ends with men and women two million who work in oil a million and a half more who receive income from oil properties a million and a half more who own stock in any of 34,000 different oil companies in the 28 oil and gas producing states nearly a quarter of a million men are directly concerned with getting petroleum out of the earth refining of oil after it's been produced employs 150,000 transportation and distribution of oil mean jobs for a million more hundreds of special skills from rig building to mineralogy of cost accounting to hard competitive selling from stenography to policymaking go into the story of oil the job America's oilman are called upon to do is too big for any one man to handle or any one group of man 90 years ago in Titusville Pennsylvania this was the oil industry Drake's folly the wiseacres called it in the horse-drawn world of 1859 not many people realized that a new American era had begun when the Titusville well actually struck oil Drake's folly producing crude oil for kerosene for lamps became Drake's triumph then the internal combustion engine began to run around on wheels the automobile age even more the age of petroleum soon the autos were crowding the horses off the city streets remember [Music] across our beautiful land the greatest treasure hunt in the history of man was under way for oil is where you find it the search has led surveyors and scientists to hell and desert marsh and bayou even to the unexplored depths beneath the sea as the demand for oil has increased the methods of finding oil and getting it out of the earth have increased in scope and complexity the geologists have decided that there may be oil here the next step is to drill a shot hole to try and find out the drill bites into the earth finally the whole 50 to 100 feet deep is ready for testing detectors are set out explosive is placed in the hole to produce a miniature man-made earthquake all set and a goal [Music] as the impulses from the blast strike rock formations far below they bounce back to the waiting detectors revealing whether there is any possibility of finding oil here only actual drilling can make it a certainty great machines can take oil men to the most forbidden areas but science has not yet given them a divining rod for oil every attempt every probing of the earth is still a gamble bring up the mighty power plants bring up the skilled crews the boilers in the Derrick's to drill an exploratory well a wildcat but even with all the newest scientific techniques to guide them their chances are only one in five of bringing in a producing well but this is oil this is the one in fire the complex set of valves which oil men call a Christmas tree is moved up to control the well as the subterranean depths yield the real thing weeks many times months of effort have paid off a gamble of perhaps up to a million dollars has been won the field crews move out leaving the Christmas tree behind to control the flow of oil at a rate of maximum efficiency the story behind the last 10 feet at your neighborhood station is also a story of conservation and conservation is good citizenship in today's oil fields scientifically spaced Derrick's assure maximum production with a minimum of waste today American oil men have pushed far beyond the limits of the land probing beneath the Seas to reach the vast reservoirs of oil accumulated there in ancient geological epochs stored there in silent readiness to meet the ever greater demands of the American economy [Music] we Americans used twice as much oil every day as all the rest of the world put together thanks to the ingenuity and resourcefulness of operating oil man again the gambling the testing the willingness to face seemingly impossible risks and obstacles but any one of these wells pay off the chances are still one in five but with every wild cat that becomes a producer the industrial structure of America becomes that much stronger to meet prosperity or the lack of it to serve the expanding civilian economy and the needs of defense as well yes it takes strength and skill and teamwork on the part of the people behind the last ten feet to bring us oil ever seen an oil well being drilled that's the drill bit tough hardened steel through holes at its tip a carefully compounded chemical solution that oil men called mud is pumped under pressure to cool and lubricate the fit in its tussle with a crust of the earth and to wash out dirt and rock and keep the walls of the hole from caving in down she goes the direction and speed of descent carefully controlled by the driller top man of the crew it's time to change the drill bit it's warm the men who proudly call themselves Roughnecks must start another round trip with hundreds of thousands of pounds of drill pipe and equipment up go the elevators with a stand of drill pipe to be racked in the derrick what kind of formation as the drilling reached so far a core or cross-section is tested and it looks as though they're getting into phase and on goes the new bit [Music] and up thro the elevators for more drill pipe the derrick man who handles the top of each standard drill pipe from his perch latches another section for the down wood friend drilling a well is a job that calls for the utmost in coordination and teamwork between the driller and his crew a good driller works fast but with precise timing once again a section of pipe comes out [Music] the slips are set so the pipe won't slide back down this year some 38,000 new wells are being drilled an average of one about every 14 minutes in the United States alone send the big pipes up again [Music] drag him up again row on row for the last time they've hit it they've got an oil well if you're the man on top take the shortest way down you've got a right to celebrate to get the most not the fastest but the most out of oil wells oil company research has proved that oil shouldn't be taken out too fast because of the oil industry's policy of progressive conservation almost half of the American oil wells ever brought in are still producing today sometimes several wells in the same field are harnessed to a central pumping plant called a power like this one the natural gas found with oil is captured for fuel and for valuable byproducts usually the rest is pumped back into the formation to maintain pressure the refining of America's total annual production of about two billion barrels of crude oil is chapter two in the big story behind the last ten feet and an important chapter it is crude oil is useless as it comes out of the ground the refineries are the factories of the oil industry 400 competing companies operate them here in these complex combinations of pipes stills rectifying columns fractionating towers catalytic crackers and blending tanks crude petroleum is broken down into its component parts then these parts are reformed through modern chemical and industrial magic into more than 1200 petroleum products from inks to anesthetics one refinery may cover hundreds of acres for new and growing demands bring constant expansion and improvement of refinery plants over a billion dollars worth in the last two years alone but refined to the utmost petroleum would be useless to the nation if it did not reach its 148 million American consumers and so the distribution of petroleum is the third chapter in the story of progress behind the last 10 feet 2,400 transportation companies 1,400 barges nearly 300 tankers bring oil to 18,000 jobbers wholesalers distributors and agents and a hundred and fifty thousand miles of oil pipelines linked the oil fields to the refineries pipelines are oils own transportation system and the most important one big machine speed construction of this cheapest most efficient form of Land Transport in the world when a war machine that ran on oil called forth the flexible steel pipe of Operation Pluto the miraculous oil line under the English Channel the know-how of American oil distributors paid off well who can say how many times in the orchards of normandy oil produced and refined in america was ready to do its job for liberty it fueled and it was the cargo of the famed red ball Express the gigantic trucking system from the French coast to the battle line up to the front for American oil [Music] same cargo different settings the USA one of the hundred and fifty thousand trucks that bring oil products from both Depot's all over the US to local choppers and from Java to service stations factories homes and forums no customer is too big for the American oil industry and no customer is too small or too remote oil keeps over 3 million tractors running keeps farm equipment turning to the tune of 10 billion gallons of petroleum products annually to supply the demand to meet it with better products to anticipate months and years in advance the changing needs of American technology oil companies invested a hundred million dollars on research last year alone farmers need a new insecticide perfected in the petroleum laboratory it goes to work in the orchard in the field bigger richer healthier crops at savings in the millions or the result new lubricants developed in the laboratory have new resistance to friction and rust industry puts them to work American factories needed an oil and water emulsion for hundreds of sharp operations did you ever try mixing oil and water you can't do it no matter how thoroughly shaken the particles just keep right on separating through research a catalyst was found that lofts oil and water together in a permanent emulsion watch now grinding machines work better last longer produce better products cheaper from the chemists sleight of hand came the essential knowledge used in making synthetic rubber from petroleum a fancy trait yes and it helped pave the way to experimental production then for production of one of the greatest and most precious of synthetics the list of oil products developed through research then made available to all of us leaves almost no aspect of modern living untouched luxuries and necessities in plastics cosmetics and medicines alcohols insecticides and nylons plant hormones and preservatives waxes explosives dyes and asphalt research in fuels for the motors and power plants of the future those are unceasingly in petroleum laboratories by compression gasoline engines and wonder-working jet and turbine engines yield up their mysteries to the petroleum chemist [Music] from the laboratory model to the real thing [Applause] [Music] progress in aviation progress and practically everything that moves is tightly connected to progress in oil suddenly and dramatically a US Air Force b-fifty the lucky lady makes a flight non-stop around the world refueling in the air the last 10 feet take on a new meaning holding forth the promise of a strong free America in the world of tomorrow [Music] all of this is the story of progress in oil the story behind those familiar ten feet of hose at your neighborhood service station 90 years of progress of good citizenship of working for the benefit of all for America which runs on oil can look with confidence to the 34,000 free enterprises which are the oil business to serve it well in the future as through 90 years of progress they have done in the past [Music]