John Henry Fairbank (July 21, 1831 - February 10, 1914) was variously a surveyor, oilman, inventor, banker, politician and fire chief in Lambton County, Ontario. Fairbank is best known for his invention of the jerker-line pumping system, which quickly spread across the world its introduction in the mid-1860s. Fairbank Oil, established by Fairbank in 1861, is the oldest continually operating petroleum company, and the company's property, known as the "First Commercial Oil Field", is included in the List of National Historic Sites of Canada in Ontario.
Biography
Early life
John Henry Fairbank was born near Rouse's Point, New York on July 21, 1831. He emigrated to Canada West in 1853, and two years later, he married Edna Chrysler in Niagara Falls. In 1861, Fairbank was hired by Julia Macklem to survey 100 acres of land in Oil Springs that she purchased from Charles Tripp and subdivide the property into 198 half-acre lots. After finishing the surveying job, Fairbank leased a half-acre plot of land from James Miller Williams and began to dig for oil, naming the well "Old Fairbank". Although the fluctuation in the price of oil in 1862-1863 nearly drove Fairbank to bankruptcy, his fortunes reversed in November 1863 when he netted $150 in profit in a single day. An upturn in the oil market in 1863-1864 further benefited Fairbank, and through steady reinvestment of his profits, he became the largest oil producer in Canada until the early 1900s. In 1865, Fairbank sold his half acre property at Oil Springs for $6000 and relocated to Petrolia, Ontario.
Jerker-line Pumping System
In the mid-1860s, Fairbank developed the jerker-line pumping system, which was ideally suited to the closely spaced, low-output oil wells in Lambton County. In this system, wooden rods connected to a single power source pumped dozens of wells at the same time. Before the invention of jerker-line system, a steam engine was required at each well. The resulting cost savings made it economically viable to pump hundreds of small oil wells that otherwise would have had to be abandoned and made it possible to work wells that were too deep and "too hard to work by manpower." Fairbank never patented the jerker-line system, thinking that the invention did not qualify for patent protection.
The jerker-line system quickly spread after its creation in Petrolia as Lambton oil drillers utilized the invention when opening up oil fields in Central Europe, Indonesia, Mexico, the Middle East and South America.
Career in Petrolia
After arriving in Petrolia in 1865, Fairbank opened a grocery and liquor store in partnership with Benjamin Van Tuyl. Quickly after its foundation, the store expanded into hardware and oil-well fittings. Above the store there was a room known as "Fairbank Hall", which served as a meeting place for oil producers before the construction of the Oil Exchange Hall in 1871. The store closed in November 2019.
In 1866, Fairbank led local efforts to build a spur line that would connect Petrolia to the Great Western Railway line at Wyoming. The producers sold the track to the railway company in late 1866 for the cost of construction and it quickly became one of the most profitable railway branches built in Canada due to the shipment of oil.
In 1869, Fairbank and Leonard Vaugh established Petrolia's first bank, known locally as "the little red bank" due to the colour of the building. Thirteen years later, Fairbank, Jacob Englehart and other businessmen from Petrolia formed the Crown Savings and Loan Company.
Throughout the 1870s, Fairbank took the lead in forming various producer groups that sought to limit production of oil to market demand and combat the growing power of oil refiners. Alongside 105 other oil producers, Fairbank joined the Lambton Crude Oil Partnership in June 1871, but the association was abandoned when the price of oil collapsed in 1873. Following the Lambton Crude Oil Partnerships' collapse, Fairbank and other oil producers formed the Home Oil Works Company. Fairbank was appointed President and Manager of Home Oil for eight years and the company constructed a refinery in Petrolia that was capable of refining 3,000 barrels of oil per week.
In 1892, Fairbank came into possession of a refinery in partnership with Samuel Rogers and Company of Toronto after its owners declared bankruptcy. The Fairbank, Rogers and Company refinery was valued at $50,000 and processed about 75,000 barrels of oil per year. In 1896, Fairbank and Rogers sold the refinery to the Bushnell Corporation, a Canadian subsidiary of Standard Oil.