Death of an Oil Torpedo King.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XVI, Issue 5623, 19 November 1889, Page 2

Death of an Oil Torpedo King.

A conspicuous career has just been closed by the death, at Titusville, Pennsylvania, of Dr W. B. Roberts, known as the " Torpedo King" of the Oil Country. The strange industry which he and his brother, Colonel A. E. Roberts, built up was peculiar only to the oil regions of Pennsylvania, Dr Roberts went to the oil country in the early days of the petroleum excitement, and he and his brother soon obtained a patent for a system of exploding nitroglycerine at the bottom of oil wells to increase the now. The apparatus was ex tremely simple, but it proved one of the most valuable inventions of the age. A tube made of tin to hold the explosive was supplied with a cap for exploding the substance. This was lowered into the well by means of a cord, and when at the desired depth, a small iron weight, called a " go-devil," was dropped down along the cord, and, this striking the tube containing the nitroglycerine, an explosion followed, shattering the oil-bearing rock, the result in nearly every case being an increase in the yield of the well. The demand for these torpedoes was enormous. There were from 13,000 to 25,000 wells in the region, and nearly all of them were torpedoed at regular intervals. The two brothers got their own price, and their fortunes were rapidly made. It is estimated that they acquired from 2,000,00-') dols. to 4,000,000d015. each. Every oil producer had to pay tribute to them, and finally the oil interest endeavoured to break the monopoly by attacking the validity of the patent. But the patentees were ultimately successful in maintaining their exclusive right to manufacture and use the torpedo for seventeen years— th« life of the patent.

The London police seem to recognise "Jack the Ripper " as a permanent institution. To save as much time as possible, an order has for some weeks been in force that whenever a murder is discovered in tlu- F.ast End the telegraphic code .should simpJy be " Another V, 'hiteehapcl. "