Archbald in Lackawanna County has the pothole. Titusville in Crawford County has the pithole. Pithole City, to be exact. It's January of 1865 and the nation's newspapers are reporting far and wide on the successful drilling of Frazier Well along pithole creek. Practically overnight, a city grew around it. Hotels, businesses, you name it. Later that summer, more big wells were struck.
By that fall, Some 15,000 people lived in Pithole City. But the boom would not last long. Oil prices quickly fell. Fires were common, causing damage and injury. People fled to new oil fields. By the fall of 1870, according to historical records, only 43 households remained. Pithole City’s charter was revoked and sold at Sheriff Sale. Today, you can walk the grounds at a museum there and imagine historic Pithole City, an oil region boomtown that vanished about as quickly as it appeared.
