ABSTRACT
The first US oil well was drilled in 1859 near seepages along Oil Creek, Venango County, Pennsylvania. Petroleum from oil seepages had been used since ancient times for practical purposes by people in many areas. The Indonesians used a kind of "earth oil" for bamboo torches and also used it as a weapon in warfare, especially naval warfare, as early as the eighth century. The discovery of commercially exploitable oil in the Netherlands East Indies (N.E.I.), now Indonesia, was accidentally made by a Dutchman, Aeilko Jans Zijlker, in 1883. When overtaken by monsoon rains as he was inspecting the tobacco fields that he managed near Langkat, North Sumatra, his curiosity was aroused upon seeing a watchman light a bamboo torch that had been dipped in a nearby pond. In 1907, with the official reception of the East Indies Mining Law of 1899 into the colony by the governor general, the first general mining legislation was introduced into the N.E.I.
