As the immediate photo below shows, the Hamman Oil Company had a sizable operation going south of Bay City beginning in 1933.
That year, Hamman Exploration Company, headed by John Hamman Jr. and George F. Hamman, surveyed Matagorda County and found what they interpreted was an oil-bearing strata south of Bay City.
A seismograph was used in 1935 that outlined structure a structure to justify drilling a wildcat well late that year.
“For nearly six months, Bay Citians heard the snorting, clanking and rattling of the drill rig and on March 1, 1936, what was then the deepest oil well in the history of the state of Texas came in,” the Daily Tribune reported in its Aug. 26, 1937 edition.
“Two other successful. wells followed quickly and the field was dubbed Hamman Field.”
Soon after Bay City Gas Company was created in 1938, Mayor W.C. Loyd announced a contract with Hamman Exploration Company to provide natural gas from the Hamman Oil Field.
Little remains of the Hamman Oil Refinery shown in the photos.
Today, there are a few pump jacks still working the Hamman oilfield strata, particularly on properties on both sides of FM 2688 (Nichols Road) just south of Bay City.
While it no longer has a presence in Matagorda County, Hamman Oil is a major exploration company today.
