Oilman (ePub)

Through stories of gathering water from a hand-dug well, using bones found in the fields for toys, and running a farm powered by horses, it would be easy to categorize Oilman as a story about farm life in the early 1900s. But it is more than that. The stories of speaking German at home, but being punished at school for doing so may make it seem like this is a story of immigrants working to make their way in America, but it is far more than that as well. Oilman is the story of an entire community that settled the areas around Hays, Kansas at the turn of the century. Rich in history, culture, and tradition to this day, being Volga German means something. And it was that community that helped to form Walter into the man that he became.

Oilman is the story of love. Love of family. Love of religion. Love of the land.

Beginning with the first date with his future wife, Marie, Oilman chronicles the young couple as they move onto a naked plot of land, and struggle to build it into the farm that would be their home for decades. As the farm grew, so did their family, and so did Walter's desire for something more. For a future that his small plot of land simply could not offer. Or could it?

Walter may have begun his life as a farmer and even began his own family on a farm, but what was beneath his land would guide his future. For a time Kansas was one of the top oil-producing states in the country, and it was during that time that Walter moved from farmer to oilman. For sixty years he supported his family by pumping oil for others, until finally, he could move from pumper to owner. He became a producer.

Through all of his years and all of his stories, it was his family and his faith that guided him. Oilman is the story of it all.