So here I am back at work in North Dakota. It’s good and bad to be back to work after such awesome adventuring but here we are. I will get to writing about my adventures in a little while but first what is happening now. I am back in North Dakota (obviously) and in the heart of the oil patch. I am just a few miles from my one and only friend in the state and a few mile the other way to the first and oldest oil well in the state.
Naturally I am very happy to be down the road from my friend and back to work but Arty and friends wanted to go see the oldest oil well. Seeing as this is the very best time of year to be in ND I obliged. This time of year is great in ND everything is green, the fields look lovely the canola is blooming lovely yellow, the bee boxes are out, the sky is blue and best part of all its not supper hot yet. In short it is the best 3 weeks of the year to be in North Dakota.
So the story on this well is that it is the oldest well drilled in the Bakken and in ND. It was drilled in 1951 for Amerada Petroleum. Now with most oil companies the name changes. Amerada is now Hess Oil after a merger in 1969. Amerada was founded in 1919 and did well working with giant like Standard oil, Marathon, and Conoco. Amerada did well in during the depression and war years with discoveries in West Texas and other fields. Drilling this exploration well in 1951 that led to all kinds of geologic finds. In the 60’s Amerada was very stable as far as oil companies go and then Hess came in and did an aggressive takeover of the company and now they are known as Hess Corporation. The exploration spirit didn’t die however and they were among the first to explore in Alaska. They are still around today and operate everything from rigs and exploration wells, to refineries. Recently they sold of the gas station part of the business but the toy Hess trucks are still one of the bestselling Christmas gifts apparently.
I am not working on a Hess project this time but it’s interesting to share a little local history. It has been an exciting week back at work. I celebrated my two year anniversary with this company on Sunday. The longest I have been with a single employer (Yay me!) and on Thursday we had the 4th of July. Always a good time. This was my 3rd here in the legendary state and as usual the locals do not disappoint. But now the switch is flipped. I walked out of the trailer today and wondered when it had gotten so hot. Summer is upon us! Time to head to the lake!
