One Well, One Millionaire, June 29, 2008 -- Posted May 1, 2021

The story:

• link at the JournalStar here. One well, June 29, 2008 -- the Bakken in North Dakota was a year old.
  

Oscar Stohler was raised in a sod house in western North Dakota and ranched there for nearly seven decades. He never gave much thought to what lay below the grass that fattened his cattle.

When oilmen wanted to drill there last year, Stohler, 83, doubted oil would be found two miles underground on his property. He even joked about it.

“I told them if they hit oil, I was going to buy a Cadillac convertible and put those big horns on the front and wear a 10-gallon hat,” Stohler recalled.

He still drives his old pickup and wears a mesh farm cap — but it’s by choice.

In less than a year, Stohler and his wife, Lorene, 82, have become millionaires from the production of one well on their land near Dunn Center, a mile or so from the sod home where Oscar grew up. A second well has begun producing on their property and another is being drilled — all aimed at the Bakken shale formation, a rich deposit that the U.S. Geological Survey calls the largest continuous oil accumulation it has ever assessed.

Obituary: December 5, 2013. Not one mention of his "oil." Not unexpected. Life is too short.

The graphics:

The Stohler wells:

• 16333, see below,
  
• 22341, 1,520, MRO, Lorene Stohler 11-3H, Bailey, t10/12; cum 376K 2/21;
  
• 22342, 1,142, MRO, Lorene Stohler 11-3TFH, Bailey, t9/12; cum 92K 2/21;
  
• 16459, 457, MRO, Oscar Stohler 41-4H, Bailey, t10/08; cum 602K 2/21;
  
• 16860, 348, MRO, Stohler 41-3H, Bailey, t2/08; cum 505K 2/21;
  

Other wells of interest:

• 37994, loc, MRO, Konstantin 11-3H, Bailey,
• 37995, loc, MRO, Fredericka 41-4TFH, Bailey,

The initial well:

• 16333, 235/AB, MRO, Stohler 21-3H, Bailey, t2/07; t--; cum 442K 2/18

Early production:

BAKKEN	10-2007	31	8473	8589	684	3290	3135	0
BAKKEN	9-2007	30	9038	8217	749	3910	3760	0
BAKKEN	8-2007	31	10575	11242	949	6137	5982	0
BAKKEN	7-2007	31	10291	9615	1069	6335	6182	0
BAKKEN	6-2007	26	9201	9628	658	5991	5863	0
BAKKEN	5-2007	31	13195	13319	1165	8576	8424	0
BAKKEN	4-2007	30	12681	12891	1069	7548	7398	0
BAKKEN	3-2007	31	15356	15090	1332	9376	9376	0
BAKKEN	2-2007	28	7912	7354	580	4546	4546	0
BAKKEN	1-2007	30	5680	5595	1291	3540	3540	0
BAKKEN	12-2006	11	1530	1295	655	253	253	0