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Books > History > American history
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Voices from the Oil Fields (Paperback, Reissue ed.)
Loot Price: R764
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Voices from the Oil Fields (Paperback, Reissue ed.)
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During the oil-boom days of the early twentieth century, a few
lucky or shrewd individuals made millions of dollars virtually
overnight. It is a familiar theme in the romantic mythology that
sprang up about the era. But the people who produced those millions
are the real story, told in these word-for-word recollections of
early-day workers in the ""oil patch."" In vivid, often poignant
detail these men and women recall the grueling toil, primitive
living and working conditions, and ever-present danger in a time
when life was cheap and oil was gold. In the late 1930s employees
of the Federal Writers Project, a branch of the New Deal Workers
Progress Administration, recorded the voices of these pioneers as
they offered their memories, sometimes wryly humorous and sometimes
bitter, of the turmoil that was the daily lot of the oilfielders.
We meet colorful, tough-talking ""Manila Kate,"" who took over her
husband's drilling outfit after he died in an explosion. A welder
vividly recalls the death of his closest pal, a skilled hand who
loved to take chances. In an oil-field shantytown the support of
good-hearted neighbors assuages the pain of a bereaved and
impoverished family. A ""shooter"" recalls the deadly danger of the
""soup wagon"" the buckboard that delivered the nitroglycerin to
the well - or blew up on the way. While many of the individuals
witnessed bizarre accidents that became almost routine in the early
oil fields, their personal stories also show how uncertain job
security and wages could be, even before the Depression, when dry
holes and plummeting oil prices left thousands of workers broke and
homeless. Many of the interviewers provide valuable technical
details about early oilfield operations. Yet it is the stories of
the people, the workers themselves, that endure. The early oil
industry was built upon their toil, their pain, and their courage,
all of which are evident in every word recorded here.
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