Rensselaer Journal, Volume 11, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 June 1901 — THE TEXAS OIL BOOM [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE TEXAS OIL BOOM

No political convention, not even a world’s fair, ever produced the condition that today exist in Beaumont, the head center seat of the oil industry in Texas, so far as food and lodging are concerned. There are no hotel runners here, says a correspondent, writing from the scene of quick money making. If the newcomer, with tenderfoot Innocence, forces his way through the crowds that eddy around the two hotels, and asks for a room, the overworked clerks will laugh at him, and advise him to hustle for the outskirts of the town if he expects to stop in Beaumont over night. There are no rooms to be had. A cot in the hallway of the hotel will bring its |5 per day, and would bring $lO if the hotel pro-

prletors asked it Nearly all the houses in the town have been turned into boarding houses, and they all are overflowing. The new arrival's only hope is in some one of the tents which are springing up in every vacant lot, and whire he may, If he is fortunate, negotiate a cot or a blanket spread on the ground. Every night crowded special trains leave Beaumont for Sabino Paas, Port Arthur, and Houston, carrying the overflow population that cannot find even these accommodations. Houston ft a three-hour run from Beaumont, but one can find a bed at the end of it, and hundreds make the trip twice a day. Not, only is a bed a treasure of great price in Beaumont, it Is equally dlf-

flcult to obtald anything to eat The practical-minded. do not even dream of such a luxury 'as a square meal. A newcomer who can secure an option on a seat at the fifth table of a thirdrate boarding house la the envy of his fellows, and is credited with possessing a pull. There are a number of restaurants in the town, but guards are stationed at the doors of each one to see that only those who can give the countersign shall pass inside. The places t>n which the tenderfoot must rely for food are those where sandwiches and cups of coffee are handed from the remind of a covered wagon. But when oil Is In the nostrils and fortunes In the air, the lack of food and shelter is not felt so seriously aa It' might be under other conditions. The demand for hotel and restauranta is being supplied very rapidly, especially since the fact ts evident that the oil boom is no temporary affair—that it Is merely the beginning, of never ending prosperity for the regions affected.