(Wireline 11) Goodbye Bakersfield. Hello Sacramento. (Log Remarks)

Jackie and I, Nancy Ann 6 and Christopher David 5, packed up for the trip. 300 miles. It was the first time that we had enjoyed the luxury of having movers pack all of our stuff. We had enjoyed our stay in Bakersfield. My sister Donna lived in Bakersfield, my sister Thelma lived in Taft. Our dog Lucky was a gift from Donna. I had spent some time in Kern County during my preteens and early teens. Thelma's husband Marion worked for Standard Oil and lived in company houses. I learned to swim in the pool at the Standard Oil Camp at 1C in Taft. (C is the name of a township and range, 1 stands for section 1 in that township and range) When Marion was transferred to Weedpatch I visited them there.

Kern County was familiar but Sacramento was new and exciting. Nancy and Chris had started kindergarten in Oildale. We were ready for the move.

The petroleum in Kern County was oil and some very heavy oil. It was time for me to work in gas wells. The production in the Sacramento Valley was all gas. Regular electric logs were run there but the Neutron Log was used a lot. (not so much in Kern County)

I worked for 35 years running, using, and looking at well logs. Why do we call them logs? When the oil industry started, the whaling industry severely declined. Many of the early roughnecks were ex sailors. Many nautical terms were used in oil well drilling such as rig, catwalk, and log.

Early sailors used wood shingles to note the day's sailing, distance, etc. The shingles would be attached to each other and were called a log book. Even after paper was invented they were called a log book. They dropped book and it became a log. Early drilling was with cable tools (a bucket on the end of a line) and the driller could see the formations drilled through and note them on a driller's log. When the Schlumberger Brothers invented electrical readings in a well it was a natural to call it an electrical log. The first electric log was made in a well in France in 1927.

An early and very important use of logs is for correlation. Precisely determine depth of formations and make maps of the geology of an area.

Very soon many different logs were perfected. Much synergy!