Ligonier Valley Rail Road Newspaper Articles
We have compiled over 1,400 newspaper articles that mention the Ligonier Valley Railroad, or related subjects. The articles were originally published starting in 1873 and our collection runs through 1995. Enjoy!
Pittsburgh Press
Friday, March 5, 1920
Chestnut Ridge Find May Reveal New Gas Field
Special to The Press
Greensburg, Pa., March 5 The striking of a big flow of gas at a depth of 6,900 feet in the experimental well which the Peoples Natural Gas Co. is drilling in Chestnut Ridge, between McCance and Kellys Hollow, will probably result in the finding of a new and valuable gas field and it will give the mountain sections of Westmoreland county a greatly enhanced value. Furthermore, the great depth which drillers were obliged to go before striking the gas sand will restrict drilling and thus conserve the supply, gas men claim.
Forty years ago a promoter who had spent his apprenticeship up in the oil regions in northwestern Pennsylvania, organized a company among the farmers two miles from McCance and proposed testing for oil or gas. This promoter, it is claimed, scattered crude petroleum in swamps and then he would point out to the land owners the surface indications. Blocks of stock were purchased ranging from $100 to $500 each. The promoter left the Ligonier valley with a good-sized bank roll to purchase drilling machinery to make a test of the territory. He never returned.
The new will was started nearly a year ago. None of the gas sands found in other fields were in evidence in the drilling of this well in Chestnut Ridge and the sand in which the big flow was struck will probably become known as the McCance sand.