Marathon Oil Company Discovery Well
Iraan, Pecos County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Opening one of greatest oil fields in the world, Mid-Kansas Oil and Gas Company (a subsidiary wholly owned by the Ohio Oil Company, whose name has now been changed to Marathon Oil Company) brought in the I. G. Yates "A" No. 1 well on October 29, 1926. The well at the shallow depth of 1,150 feet had a rated potential daily flow of 72,869 barrels. Previously oil men had said: "You won't find any oil west of the Pecos." This did not stop the work of Mid-Kansas Oil and Gas Company and its partner, Transcontinental Oil Company, later acquired by Marathon Oil Company. The strike was sensational. Scarcely more than a year later, the Yates field had 100 wells--two of which had higher yields than Yates No. 1. Under the 20,000-acres Ira G. Yates ranch and adjoining lands lay one of the largest oil reserves in the world. The many developers voluntarily adopted proration. Their plans for allocating and restricting Yates fields production were approved by the Texas Railroad Commission in 1928. This was the first complete commission in 1928. This was the first complete proration of an oil field in the state --and an important milestone in petroleum conservation. The Yates field now has 607 wells.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
On October 29, 1926, Mid-Kansas Oil and Gas Company brought in the I. G. Yates "A" No. 1 well at just 1,150 feet, with a rated potential of nearly 73,000 barrels a day—shattering the old wisdom that no oil lay west of the Pecos. Within a year the Yates field held a hundred wells over one of the world's largest reserves, and in 1928 its operators adopted the state's first complete proration under the Texas Railroad Commission.
Why it matters
The Yates discovery opened the vast Permian Basin and pioneered the conservation-minded regulation that would shape the American oil industry for generations.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
By the 1920s, oil had already transformed Texas. The great Spindletop gusher near Beaumont in 1901 set off a rush that spread across the state, and one boom after another turned small towns into crowded oil camps. America's appetite for petroleum was growing fast, driven above all by the automobile.
Far West Texas, though, was still mostly ranch country. It was dry, sparsely populated, and widely believed to be a poor bet for oil. The marker preserves the attitude of the time: many oilmen were convinced there was no oil to be found west of the Pecos River.
The 1920s changed that belief. Discoveries in the region began to reveal what became known as the Permian Basin, one of the richest oil-producing regions in the world. The Yates field was one of its most spectacular early finds.
People & events
The land belonged to rancher Ira G. Yates, whose ranch covered some 20,000 acres. Mid-Kansas Oil and Gas Company, a subsidiary of the Ohio Oil Company (later renamed Marathon Oil Company), drilled here with its partner, Transcontinental Oil Company. Ignoring the conventional wisdom, they kept at it.
On October 29, 1926, they brought in the I. G. Yates "A" No. 1. The oil was astonishingly shallow for a well of its power, just 1,150 feet down, and the well was rated at a potential flow of 72,869 barrels a day. The strike was a sensation. In little more than a year the field had 100 wells, and two of them outproduced the discovery well.
An enormous field raised a new problem: how to keep so much oil from flooding the market and wasting the reservoir. The many developers here voluntarily agreed to proration, a plan to allocate and limit production. In 1928 the Texas Railroad Commission approved their plan, making Yates the first oil field in Texas to be fully prorated. The nearby town of Iraan grew up with the boom. Its name is widely known to combine the names of Ira Yates and his wife, Ann.
Its place in the American story
The Yates discovery helped prove that West Texas held vast oil reserves. The Permian Basin went on to become one of the most important oil-producing regions in the United States, with effects on the national economy and on American energy supplies that continue today.
The field's biggest legacy may be regulatory. In the early oil booms, rival producers often drained a field as fast as they could. That crashed prices and wasted underground pressure, leaving oil behind for good. Proration at Yates, approved by the Texas Railroad Commission in 1928, showed that production could be coordinated to conserve a reservoir.
The marker calls this an important milestone in petroleum conservation, and it was. The Texas Railroad Commission went on to become a major force in regulating oil production. The idea that an oil field should be managed as a shared resource shaped how the American petroleum industry operated for decades.
If you visit
Stand at the site and picture this dry ranch country in 1926. There were no big towns and few roads, and then suddenly one of the most productive oil wells anyone had seen came in only about a thousand feet below the surface. Big discoveries in the Permian Basin could change a place that quickly.
The Iraan area is still oil country, and you'll likely see working pumpjacks and pipelines across the landscape. Treat active oilfield sites with caution: stay on public roads and don't enter leases or equipment areas.
Iraan sits in wide-open far West Texas, where distances between towns are long and services can be sparse, so plan fuel and supplies ahead. It pairs well with a longer drive through the Permian Basin and the Pecos River country, where you can follow the story of Texas oil from ranch land to boomtown.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Ira G. Yates
Related events
- · Yates oil field discovery, 1926
Themes & tags
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In 1922, three businessmen leased drilling rights on West Texas ranch land, and after two dry holes the I.G. Yates No. 1 well blew in on October 28, 1926, igniting a boom. Ira Yates surveyed a townsite that took its name — Iraan — from a contest-winning blend of his and his wife Ann's names, with the winner awarded a city lot. During the boom days a free-lance writer named V.T. Hamlin lived here and created the caveman comic strip "Alley Oop," now honored in a local park.
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