Along the valley of Oil Creek are clear traces of ancient oil
operations. Over sections embracing hundreds of acres in extent, the
entire surface of the land has, at some remote period of time, been
excavated in the form of oblong pits, from four by six to six by eight
feet in size. These pits are oftentimes from four to five feet still
in depth, notwithstanding the action of rain and frost during the lapse
of so many years. They are found in the oil region, and over the oil
deposits, and in no other locality, affording unmistakable evidence of
their design and use. The deeper pits appear to have been cribbed up at
the sides with rough timber, in order to preserve their form and render
them more available for the design in view. Upon the septa that divide
them, and even in the pits themselves, trees have grown up more than one
and a half feet in diameter, indicating an antiquity antedating the
earliest records of civilized life in this region. For centuries has
this treasure been affording intimations of its presence. Before
Columbus had touched these western shores was it gathered here, in this
valley, as an article of utility or luxury, by the processes of design
and labor, and with the idea of traffic and emolument.

By whom were these excavations planned and these pits fashioned, that
tell of the pursuit of wealth so many centuries ago? Let the mighty
dead, that are slumbering in our valleys, and the remains of whose
fortifications and cities are spread out all over the great West, in
magnificence as vast and gorgeous as the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon,
arise and speak, for they alone of mortals can tell!

From the fact that some of these pits have been cribbed with timber
bearing marks of the axe in its adjustment, many have supposed that
their construction was due to the French, who at one time occupied, to a
certain extent, the Venango oil region. But this theory is scarcely