Oil and Gas Industry in Pecos County

The county's output can be followed through the decades. Its wells yielded 15,387,000 barrels of crude in 1938 and 22,579,000 in 1948. In 1952 the county's largest gas field opened on the M. C. Puckett and Son Ranch south of Fort Stockton, and in 1982 Pecos County produced 274,741,143,000 cubic feet of gas-well gas and 50,472,709 barrels of crude. Production fell through the 1980s, to 31,994,000 barrels in 1989, and by January 1, 1991, the county had produced almost 1,505,424,000 barrels since 1926.

What the plaque says

Oil and Gas Industry in Pecos County Located in the petroleum-rich Permian Basin, Pecos is one of the most prolific oil- and gas-producing counties in Texas. The petroleum business here began about 1900 with the drilling of the Turney well near an ancient "seep", a traditional local source of oil for lubricating and medicinal purposes. A short-lived boom in 1921 caused by the discovery of the "Miracle Well" heralded the arrival of the fabulous Yates oil field (1926), indicating the area's great potential oil wealth. Since that year over 710 million barrels of oil have been produced from the Yates, Fort Stockton and other county fields. The presence of natural gas, known for years, was slow to be exploited because gas was considered an undesirable by-product of the oil business. The first commercial use of gas here was inspired after it was found by workers drilling a water well, in 1925. The discovery, about 1948, of Santa Rosa field spurred exploration that brought in the Puckett field in 1952. Subsequent deep drilling tapped many extensive pools, including in 1963 the prolific Gomez Field, which had produced over 478 billion cubic feet of gas as of 1970. Today petroleum is the single most important economic asset of Pecos County. (1973)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Historic Fort Stockton — 0.4 mi
  The Ninth Cavalry's post at Comanche Springs from 1867 to 1886, with its 1868 stone guardhouse, three adobe officers' quarters and barracks rebuilt from the original plans.
• Annie Riggs Memorial Museum — 0.7 mi
  An 1899 adobe hotel on Main Street that a twice-married frontier woman bought with her gunfighter husband's estate and ran as a boarding house until she died in 1931.
• Comanche Springs — 0.9 mi
  Once the sixth largest spring in Texas and a campground on the Comanche Trail to Mexico, pumped dry by 1961 under the rule of capture and now flowing again some winters.

More markers nearby

• Old Fort Cemetery — steps away
• Hovey School — 0.5 mi
• O. W. Williams — 0.6 mi
• Site of Comanche Springs — 0.6 mi