October 23 - The History of Crude Oil

Alan Hunton's talk will take us from the Mesopotamian Origins  of Crude Oil to Colonel Drake.
The discovery of crude oil and bitumen can be traced back to the Neanderthals but more widespread use started in Mesopotamia around 8000 BP. Ziggurats were made secure by oil bitumen mortar and Nebuchadnezzar allegedly waterproofed his hanging gardens with bitumen. Unlikely medicinal uses were found and it was not long before the flammable properties of crude were exploited the Byzantines who made oil grenades as a naval warfare weapon. We will see that in North America the native Indians were using crude oil as an insecticide and for skin treatments long before the famous sinking of ‘Drake’s Well in Pennsylvania in 1861.

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