East Texas Oil Museum - Kilgore, Texas - Oil Town Museum

East Texas Oil Museum is located on the campus of Kilgore College on Highway 259 at Ross Street in Kilgore, Texas and is approximately 25 minutes drive from East Texas Regional Airport in Longview. It is essentially a museum recreating a 1930's thriving oil town emphasized by the use of dioramas, films, photos and other artifacts. The museum is open from 9am to 4pm Tuesday to Saturday and 2pm to 5pm on Sundays, but remains closed on Mondays as well as at Easter and Thanksgiving, whilst between April and September the attraction closes at 5pm.

The museum shows how oil was discovered in East Texas in 1930 by Columbus Marion Joiner on the Daisy Bradford farm in Rusk County. When the Bateman Oil Company found another huge supply at the Crim family farm just nine miles from the Daisy Bradford farm it eventually became apparent that there was a huge geological phenomenon in the area. This was to become the East Texas Oil field with production rapidly increasing from seven wells every other week, to seven wells daily, to more than 100 wells put into production each day.

Production reached as high as one million barrels per day in 1931, and the wells at the oil field are still pumping. The East Texas Oil Field has produced over 4.5 billion barrels of oil, some of which helped the allies during World War II by providing them with the petroleum-reserve stability needed to defeat the enemy. The museum shows how the discovery of oil in the area also brought about the creation of new towns, as well as jobs for thousands of East Texas citizens after a period of deep economic depression in the country.

The whole experience provided at the East Texas Oil Museum is a history lesson on how people lived, worked and entertained themselves in the area back in the 1930s. One of the major exhibits here is the full scale Boomtown, which contains stores, dummies dressed in the attire of the day, animals and machinery, which serves to recreate how the town functioned with its new found wealth following the discovery of oil. Visitors can also learn more about the local schools and transportation from this era.

Along the old rutted street, there are old style stores stocked with memorabilia and where refreshments can be taken at the drugstore. Music also forms part of the experience with 1930s big band music being played on the jukebox, whilst children can get their picture taken with a wildcatter. Recreated here are also a newspaper office, barbershop and of course a gas station.

The movie theater shows historical footage of the boom period and how oil was discovered, and there is film footage on drilling an oil well. Geographical exhibits and an elevator ride to the center of the earth are also an interesting part of the tour, where guides explain more about the oil deposits 3,800 feet below the earth's surface. All tours must be booked in advance of the visit to the museum.