Healdton: Oklahoma's First State-Regulated Oil Field

Production of crude oil from the newly-discovered Healdton field surrounding this marker site flooded the market with an oversupply of petroleum. Protesting that pipeline purchases were inadequate, producers claimed they were being deprived of individual rights to produce and sell their share of the field's production.

In response, the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, in May, 1914, ordered the pipeline carrier to increase purchases of produced oil, provide facilities for rail shipment and build field tankage. The pipeline was further ordered to purchase oil ratably and equitably from Healdton producers.

This order resulting in proration of oil purchasing, nine months after the field's discovery in August, 1913, made Healdton the first field in the state to be regulated by a state commission. This early-day proration was a forerunner of petroleum conservation laws to prevent physical and economic waste of petroleum energy in most oil states.

By late 1915, prolific production at Healdton and other Oklahoma oil fields supplied energy for a burgeoning automotive age in the United States and the Allied war machine of World War I. As the Healdton field boomed, the influx of oilmen overtaxed the community's facilities.

Hastily-built stores, rooming and boarding houses and entertainment places turned the community into a typical oil boom town. The principal boom town area was called Ragtown.

Oklahoma Historical Society, with Oklahoma Petroleum Council, 1974