IN THE WELL OF
EMPTINESS
The
remnants of my family face a calculated threat that has existed since
1870. The land then was cheap and any
one with connections could purchase if they had the money. “This is where we
make our home and pass this land on to the future generations: this is our land
sons and daughters.” who would believe that a black woman could have so much
vision. The U.S. census listed her
mulatto in 1890 along with her children in Gladewater, Texas, a town that would
play in the great East Texas Oil field discovery in 1931. The records show many of the descendants of
Rebecca Allen left the land, either selling are being forced out by the law or
Klan. The land was last auctioned by the
sheriff in Gladewater in 2008 as a show of disregard and contempt for our
rights as citizens of the U.S.A. But I don’t want to get ahead of myself
because time is key piece of evidence in what has happened in this former slave
stronghold.
We
had heard from cousins that natural gas had been discovered in what is now
Gladewater Field and it was from what they knew, on our land. My great grandmother had passed in 1912 and
the land she inherited from her father, Aaron Allen, had gone unnoticed until
Exxon drilled a discovery well on eighty acres across from Gladewater and Lake
Gladewater that came in prolifically.
This created a commotion in Gilmer at the title office for Upshur County
where all the records of deeds were stored dating back to 1850’s. Many produced deeds and titles at Exxon’s
office to claim ownership of the land which prompted it to clear the title;
this produced in this slave and Klan stronghold a surprise they never foresaw. Essie, A.D., and Kizzie, Hattie Allen’s
children were alive and well in Texas, a landsman contacted them in Wichita
Falls and their lawyer contacted Exxon.
They were offered an oil and gas lease which they agreed to sign in
1980. I was calling us, “The Black
Beverley Hillbillies”, the world of resources we had been without for
so long as black people would finally be at our disposal. The dream of America will be ours, the
promise of freedom, the pursuit of happiness as guaranteed to us so long ago
could be fulfilled; we had so much hope.
It was 1989.
Exxon had been producing gas and oil from the lease, Gladewater Gas Unit
#5, #1 and informed us in 1981 that it would probably never pay out which meant
we had a worthless lease; it now wanted to know if my granny was alive. The first move in a scheme that has left our
hope and rights as American citizens in a shattered nightmare; we were as the
slaves had been in Gladewater insubordinate if they even thought of being free
or owning anything of value. That hand
of dehumanization, oppression, had reached up from hell to torture our very
destiny as though we were still on its slave roll. I knew we were in trouble. The contact in the Exxon royalty office had
stopped responding to questions, another well was drilled in 1993 at the lease,
Well #2. It was even more prolific than
well #1 and would produce billions of cubic feet’s of natural gas until
2006. The unidentified tax payers were
piping the gas to the Gladewater Gas Refinery and telling us that gas was
selling too low for there to be a profit.
Exxon was running a high-cost gas and oil pipeline, the only regulatory
was the Texas Railroad Commission which approved its request for rule changes
that made it possible for new leases or old ones for that matter to have three
wells on a 640 acre lease. The oil was flowing.
Gas
production was off the scales but we were not to share in those many years of
profit at Gladewater Gas Unit #5, Wells #1 and #2, it, Exxon, jumped on our
destiny, then played us for all it was worth.
The atmosphere of slavery pervaded any thought I had as I researched the
database for production, 1981 to 2014, to see a flaw in this complex game we
found ourselves in and realized the stakes were very high. It showed the
Haynesville (Gladewater) field had produced hundreds of millions of barrels of
sweet oil and hundreds of billions of cubic feet’s of natural just since
1980. The oil and gas was deep, 12,000+
feet, to the pay zone that was hit on our lease in 1980. There was no increase in the royalty
interest, no delay rentals when the lease was closed to adjust the flow of the
reservoir in the Cotton Valley Lime play in the Glen Rose formation. Experts
speak on terms of gas in quadrillions since it is part of the lucrative
Haynesville Shale and after gas there is oil.
The price of oil peaked in 2008 the Well #2 that was reclassified in
2006 as an oil well and prepared to produce oil in paying quantities was
shut-in, turned off. This spoke volumes on what the scheme had been the entire
history of the oil and gas lease: deny us our fair share of the profits off the
commodities: oil, condensates and gas. The plan is to keep us forever broke
with us sitting on an oil well, sounds like new slavery to me. We have been deemed unworthy to be paid
because we are black by what is now ExxonMobil, while the white royalty owners
shared in the profits. So I must take
this as an attack on me and my family for 33 years to show us our place and
that we have no rights in America. I
will assail this ExxonMobil to the highest reaches of our nation, put this on
the Web, and call it out for what it is: slave breaker. It might be asked why we but like in Russia
and Saudi Arabia the citizens have no mineral rights when it comes to oil, that
is what a government can do: ExxonMobil is not our government! Who is in
control?
This
malicious enterprise is not beyond laws for the citizens but it can spoil our
harbors, rivers, and ground waters. It can tell states and their courts to kiss
its ass with no comeback or legal remedy affronting its position. No law suit has stopped its relentless
strategic pursuit for control of gas and oil worldwide. Yet it can still find time to subjugate me
and my people 33 years as though we are on their slave roll and nothing can
ever be done in America. This scheme is
wrought with the justification of slavery and contempt for freedom in the
U.S.A...
