Oil in statu nascendi. The state of the oil industry in Galicia in 1853

Abstract

In the autumn of 1853, the Krakow Chamber of Commerce entrusted its member Antoni Szwarz with the task of conducting a personal survey of industrial and commercial facilities in Western Galicia. His mission was to gather statistical data from these economic sectors. The official surveyor’s findings provided a credible picture of the material state, industrial infrastructure, and economic awareness regarding the oil deposits in Galicia. Interestingly, these oil reserves were often underappreciated and remained largely untapped. Antoni Szwarz’s report also offers a parallel perspective on the experiences of Ignacy Łukasiewicz, who explored the oil-bearing regions of Eastern Galicia around the same time (between 1852 and 1853). It was during this period that the symbolic era of oil began, marked by the discovery and patenting of fractional distillation methods by Polish pharmacists Ignacy Łukasiewicz and Jan Zeh, as well as the development of a prototype oil lamp. This lamp was intended to consciously create and popularize demand for a superior illuminating fuel—namely, the oil fraction.The events of 1853 laid the foundation for professional oil mining, refinery industry, and mass distribution of petroleum products. Łukasiewicz continued this journey by establishing a pioneering oil mine in Bóbrka near Krosno in 1854. An official economic report published in the press a few months before these groundbreaking steps serves as a testament to the state of official knowledge at the national level during the transition years of 1853 and 1854. It also reflects the economic innovation driven by oil and Łukasiewicz’s discoveries in the region and beyond. Key words: oil industry, Western Galicia industry, Ignacy Łukasiewicz, 19th-century oil mining, Bóbrka 1854, “Czas” 1854, Kobylanka