Photo Record
Images
Metadata
Object Name |
Photograph |
Collection |
Oil Museum of Canada Collection |
Catalog Number |
OMC 2003.005.007 |
Other Number |
FD.001.004.008.p |
Date |
15 Sep 1911 |
Description |
Black and white photograph taken September 19, 1911 in Egypt while William Gillespie was on contract as an International Driller. Two rows of seven international drillers. Four are seated and three are standing behind. The drillers are all dressed in white and wearing various hats. They are posing in front of a stone building which was their living quarters. Written on the back: Reading from left to right. Front sitting down: James Polley, William Gillespie, James Candhish, James Sanson. Standing up left to right: James McCrie, William Campbell, Elmer Kerby. Christmas Greetings from Jubal. (Black paper remnants are attached to the back where it had been glued into an album, so it is not entirely legible) Thoughts are with you once again to you this happy day, Greet you in the same old strain thus to you to say: (?) Christmas- a glad New Year, (?) of friends with hearts (?). With sincere good wishes (?) happy Christmas and ? Dec. 25/911 Note: James McCrie may be Robert McCrie |
Provenance |
The donor is the great niece of International Driller, William O. Gillespie who worked in Cuba, Egypt, Burma, Australia, Borneo, Sumatra and Java. William Oliver Gillespie was born in Petrolia in 1878 and attended the first wooden school in the east end. He was the son of Joseph Gillespie, a livery stable operator who was killed while erecting an oil rig. Young Bill learned his drilling trade in Petrolia then left for foreign fields. He went to Cuba at 18, where he packed a mule train to the interior, returning via a railway that once ran through the Florida Keys. After his second Cuban expedition, he joined Fred Edward, another early Petrolia driller, on Jubal Island in the Red Sea. They made their own rafts, swung boilers and gear off ships and taught the native labour to use such elementary tools as hammers and wrenches. Next he opened a big field in Burma, near Rangoon. In subsequent years he drilled in Borneo, Sarawak, Java and Sumatra and punched down artesian wells in Australia. While returning home from Borneo in 1926, he met a young lady from Leeds, England, while immigrating to Canada. Her name was Dorothy Cromeweeke and after a shipboard romance they married and settled in Petrolia. Bill never travelled far from home again. They had two daughters, Olive (Mrs. Bennett) of Klienburg, and Kathleen Gillespie of Toronto. The Gillespie's first lived in the old Grant House next to the Fairbank House on Petrolia Street. Mr. Gillespie operated the wells on the Gray estate just east of Tank Street until the early war years when the labour supply dwindled. He worked at the Canadian Oil refinery until his retirement. Mrs. Gillespie died in 1964. Mr. Gillespie was predeceased by two brothers, Joe and Gordon and a sister Edith. He attended Christ Anglican Church and was a member of the Masonic Lodge. He died at the age of 97 in 1975. The funeral was held at Bradley Funeral Home with interment at Hillsdale Cemetery, Petrolia. |
Print Size |
14.7cm x 9cm |
Search Terms |
Drillers, Oil Egypt International Driller Jubal Island Photo, Group Photograph White Muslin Suit |
People |
Campbell, William Candhish, James Gillespie, Bill Gillespie, Will Gillespie, William Kerby, Elmer McCrie, James Polley, James Sanson, James |
Place |
Jubal Island, Egypt |