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American settlers had little use for oil. In the 1840s, Americans began using kerosene to light lamps after the Canadian geologist Abraham Gesner discovered how to distill the fuel from oil or coal. It wasnât until 1859, however, when Edwin L. Drakesuccessfully used a steam engine to drill for oil near Titusville, Pennsylvania, that removing oil from beneath the earthâs surface became practical. This breakthrough started an oil boom that spread to Kentucky, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, and, later, Texas. Petroleum-reï¬ning industries arose in Cleveland and Pittsburgh as entrepreneurs rushed to transform the oil into kerosene. Gasoline, a byproduct of the reï¬ning process, originally was thrown away.
1 In 1698, English military engineer, Thomas Savery, invented and patented the first crude steam engine, based on Denis Papin's Digester (pressure cooker) of 1679. 2  English blacksmith Thomas Newcomen improved on Savery's invention, designing and building the atmospheric steam engine, with the help of John Calley, in 1712.