South Penn Oil Company, Mallory Lot 6 Lease, Watsonville Field, Klondike, McKean County, PA

Significance: Pennsylvania is the birthplace of the petroleum industry, signified by the drilling of Edwin Drake's well near Titusville in 1859. Many widely used techniques of drilling and pumping oil were first developed here in the effort to recover the high-quality "Pennsylvania Grade" oil. One particularly important, and successful, technique perfected in Pennsylvania was "central power" pumping of numerous low-production wells to economically recover small amounts of oil. This method of production flourished between ca. 1890 and ca. 1950, and today there are only scattered remains of the once common pumping technique. The South Penn Oil Company, Mallory Lot 6 Lease is an excellent, rare, intact example of the mature, highly capitalized era of central powers.

Survey number: HAER PA-437
Building/structure dates: ca. 1939 Initial Construction
Building/structure dates: 1989 Subsequent Work