Los Angeles County
Biographies
HERBERT
GEORGE WYLIE
WYLIE, HERBERT GEORGE, General Manager, Mexican Petroleum Company, Los Angeles, Cal., and Mexico, was born at Dublin, Ireland, Oct. 20, 1867, the son of Rev. J. B. Wylie and Jane (McBride) Wylie. The father has been a preacher for a half century at Belfast, Ireland, and is one of the most respected divines in the United Kingdom, who left a successful business to take up the work of religion. Mr. Wylie married Nellie F. Mills at San Diego, July 2, 1895.
Mr. Wylie was sent to the Royal Belfast Institute, Ireland, and studied there until nineteen years old, when (about 1886) he came to the United States.
He first located at St. Louis, and entered the real estate firm of William C. Wilson & Co., but moved to San Diego, Cal., in 1887, where he planted 160 acres to lemons and oranges, disposing of the property after six years and moving to Los Angeles. Mr. Wylie then formed a partnership with J. S. Maltman for the purpose of doing contract drilling in the Los Angeles oil fields, but shortly after (1893) conducted the business alone.
He drilled for Turner Bros. for a time and then began operations for himself, bringing in several producers. He later sold his interests to George Squires and again contracted alone until 1898, when the Bakersfield discoveries attracted his attention.
He entered, as one of the partners, the Petroleum Development Company, which was the first to interest the railroads of the Pacific Coast in oil as a source of fuel for locomotives. In 1902 the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe purchased the company and its properties, and in August of that year Mr. Wylie went with the Mexican Petroleum Company of Los Angeles and Mexico as general superintendent of all their properties. In the fall of that year he began the active supervision of a development without a parallel even in that most remarkable of all industries.
The oil fields of the Mexican Petroleum Co., and of the Huasteca Petroleum Co., a subsidiary corporation, are located on the eastern slope of Mexico, in the territory adjacent to the Port of Tampico, on the Gulf of Mexico. The Mexican Petroleum Co. and its affiliated interests constitute one of the most tremendous oil enterprises in the world. The extent of the proved territory and the scale on which the property is being developed, promise a future almost beyond imagination.
Herbert G. Wylie is the veritable developer of the property. He did not furnish the vast capital, but in every detail of the practical work of developing he has been the directing figure. The part that he has played has not been that of a mere master of men, but of a master of the forces of nature as well.
There were only three wells on the properties of the company when he took charge. Backed by the almost unlimited capital of the Doheny group of operators, he was soon bringing in one big well after another. He was shortly made general manager of the entire company.
In 1906 the Huasteca Petroleum Company was organized and he was made vice president and general manager while still holding his office in the parent concern. Later he was given power of attorney over all the Doheny interests in Mexico, which, according to conservative estimate, represent more than $80,000,000.
He drilled the great No. 7 well, at Casiano, Mexico, the fame of which is due not only to the immensity of production, but because of the fact that this production has been mastered and confined. The force of this well was almost equal to the one on the shores of the Tuxpan River, out of which six million barrels of oil have been lost, and which, when it caught fire, offered a spectacle rivaling that of a volcanic eruption.
Well No. 7, Huasteca Petroleum Co. Came in at 60,000 barrels a day, a quantity rivaling that of the Tuxpan well, but Mr. Wylie devised a capping and valve that confined the gusher so that its flow could be perfectly controlled in spite of its pressure of more than 280 pounds to the square inch. Its flow has been cut down to 25,000 barrels a day. He also brought in Well No. 6, almost rivaling the famous No. 7, and again it was done without wasting a barrel.
After these stupendous producers had been mastered there came the problems of storage and marketing. To master these problems required operations on a gigantic scale, and in one of the most difficult countries on earth, but the way in which Mr. Wylie has accomplished the task has been one of the most spectacular details of the enterprise.
Thousands of men were thrown into the work of construction. Two parallel pipe lines were laid from the fields to the Port of Tampico, where an oil city has been built for the handling and shipping of the product. One of the lines was laid while wells Nos. 6 and 7 were being drilled and was finished in time to save the oil. The company, under his management, is now engaged in building additional storage capacity of ten million barrels at Tampico.
Mr. Wylie’s work can be reckoned one of the great industrial achievements of the American continent. The following, clipped from an article in a daily paper, on the Mexican Petroleum Company, is worthy of quotation:
“Within the shadow of the crumbling temples and pyramids of a former civilization, whose relics down there in Vera Cruz today offer a fascinating puzzle to archaeologists, a new chapter in the history of Mexico has been started. In a way, the story of modern Egypt, with its ruined temples and pyramids, fits that particular part of Mexico where Los Angeles men are directing the country’s awakening and bring about a revival of the industry and thrift, intelligence and enterprise, represented by the architectural triumphs, the ruins of which are now the monuments of that civilization that perished hundreds and perhaps thousands of years ago.
“More effective than treaty or standing army is preserving the peace and tranquility of Mexico and such enterprises as that of the Mexican Petroleum Company, Ltd. Steady employment, fair compensation and regular pay days appeal just as strongly to the native Mexican as to the native of the United States.
Insurrections thrive on discontent and during the recent revolution in Mexico it was demonstrated that, thanks to the development activities of the Mexican Petroleum, Ltd., there was no discontent among the native population in the zone of the company’s operations. During
the revolution, the only army in that district was a peaceful army, commanded by that great industrial general, Herbert G. Wylie. That army, equipped with the weapons of industry, fought with the jungle for a right of way for the company’s railroad and pipelines, fought and conquered the great oil gushers until they were made captive, and peaceful factors in the new life of the region.”
In addition to his interests with the corporations mentioned, he is a stockholder in the National Gas Company of Mexico, American Oil Fields Company of Los Angeles, of which he is a director, and the American Petroleum Company of Los Angeles.
Mr. Wylie has his principal residence in Los Angeles, but maintains several places of residence in the Mexican fields.
Transcribed 7-7-10
Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: Press
Reference Library, Western Edition Notables of the West, Vol. I, Page 481, International News Service, New York, Chicago, San
Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Atlanta.
1913.
© 2010 Marilyn R. Pankey.
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