WELL SHOOT: It was the spring of 1949, the waning days of the
Bradford oilfield’s use of a wood standard drilling rig to “shoot”
a well with nitroglycerin. For days, Bob Slike Jr. and his 6th
grade classmates watched with eager anticipation as a well was
drilled on the McFadden oil lease which lies directly behind the
Derrick City School.

Today and tomorrow, Bob’s recollection of this special
event:

“Our teacher was Miss Hester Shelley, who was also principal of
the school,” Bob writes. “We watched intently when Miss Shelly was
not watching us, a Caterpillar D-4 dozer hauling in several stone
boats loaded with rig timbers, bull wheels, band wheel, Buffalo
engine, etc. Then the rig builders dug in the mud sills, ran the
derrick one section at a time using plank staging to stand on while
stabbing in the next section and bolting it together with alligator
wrenches, top it out (the crown) and lastly pull up the crown
pulley and sand sheave. After the rig was tinned in, they were
ready to spud in. The derrick would shake from the pitman jerking
the drilling line (cracker) back and forth, which caused the tools
to rise and drop until they got deep enough to set the drive pipe
(conductor). …

“We saw the crew haul in casing and could plainly hear the
driller and tool dresser dressing the bits between screws. A screw
(measurement of length) is about 6 feet, which meant they would run
the temper screw out to its full length, thus making 6 feet of
hole. …

“We remember well the sound of the Buffalo engine as it was
revved up when pulling out and then its backfiring as the driller
would turn the telegraph wheel back to slow down the tools’ ascent
from the well, enabling the tool dresser to dump a bucket of water
on the top of tools to rinse them down, and then hurry across the
derrick floor to throw the bull rope as the tools came out of the
hole. His timing had to be perfect so that he could stop them just
above the derrick floor, hook them back and chain down the bull
wheel brake lever to hold the tools there while they ran the bailer
and dumped it in the dump hole.

“Finally, the day came to shoot the well…

To be continued…