Oil Country

Oil Country Tour Description

Oil Country Tour Locations

Oil Country Tour Itinerary

Oil Country Tour Map

Description: Displays and programs here revolve around the early oil boom time era. From spring to autumn, an environmental education specialist presents historical and environmental programs. Be sure to see the other displays and the interactive computer information lab. Petroleum Center also serves as a train station where the train still runs through Oil Creek Valley and stops here just as it would have 100 years ago.

Environmental Issue: The world's first commercial oil well was drilled in Oil Creek Valley. The Petroleum Visitor's Center tells the story of the early industry. Within six miles of Oil Creek Valley is Pithole, America's largest oil boomtown. Oil was discovered at the Thomas Holmden Farm in January 1865, attracting many people to the area. By September 1865, a town had grown nearly overnight to a population of 15,000. The oil soon ran out and many people left the town. By December 1866, there were fewer than 2,000. Little remains of the town today except some cellar holes in a hillside meadow and evidence of the streets that once ran through town.

Oil Creek and Titusville Railroad

Description: Catch the train either in Titusville or at Petroleum Center to enjoy a scenic trip along Oil Creek. You can even take your bike along with you on the train, ride one way on the train and return by bicycle. The open-air car offers a perfect view of the scenery. You can also send a postcard from the only working Railway Post Office in the U.S. Travellers often see wildlife from the train, from groundhogs and wild turkeys, to deer and eagles. The train is accessible to people with disabilities. It will pick up bicyclists at the Petroleum Center, Rynd Farm Station, or the Drake Well Station.

Environmental Issue: For the last few decades, automobile-released air pollutants such as carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and hydrocarbons have caused an increasing number of problems with human health and the environment. A mass transit system, such as railways, is better for the environment because it reduces the amount of pollution released into the air by providing an alternative to private transport that can be used by many. If most people used a public transport system instead of private vehicles, the pollution problem could be greatly ameliorated.. Mass transit systems are also generally more energy efficient modes of transportation than automobiles. A rail transit system would also be cheaper and faster to build and expand than roads are. Mass transit systems also have the added benefit of providing transportation for the non-driving public.

Drake Well Museum

Description: This 9.7-mile paved bike trail, open to two-way bicycle traffic, runs through the scenic Oil Creek Gorge. There are trailheads at both Petroleum Center and the Drake Well Museum. Bicycles can be rented at the Old Egbert Oil Office at the Petroleum Center and there are picnic tables, benches, rain shelters, and restrooms at key points along the trail. Historical markers detail specific events of the 1860s oil boom era.

Environmental Issue: As you ride or walk along the trail, you will see picturesque view of Oil Creek, which the trail follows. Today, the creek is clear; long ago, naturally-occurring oil seeps clouded the water. Seeps were places near the creek where oil was collected. Native Americans were first to gather the oil, sometimes floating on top of the water. One trader, Tobias Hirte, wrote in 1792, that he saw Native Americans using feathers to dip into a seep to bring up oil. Other early gatherers shoveled oily gravel into canoes and then poured in water so that they could skim off the oil. Water was the key so that floating oil could be skimmed off and gathered. In the 1800s, it was also common for wool blankets to be used to catch floating oil. Today, there is little evidence of the massive amounts of oil that flowed through the area, although an occasional bursting rainbow in Oil Creek may be a drop escaping from an old well or a buried pipe.

Just as oil has almost disappeared from the Oil Creek region, it is also diminishing every day from reserves around the world. On average, each person in the United States uses more than 60 barrels of oil per year! Americans consume as much energy in one day as most people will use in a year in less developed countries. This energy consumption clearly links to the great comfort we enjoy in this country as well as posing huge environmental challenges.