In the footsteps of Łukasiewicz- Harklowa
Harklowa
Harklowa is located in south-eastern Poland on the border of the Gorlice and Jasielskie Foothills in the Carpathian Foothills, in the Podkarpackie Province, in the Jasło county, in the Skołyszyn commune. Harklowa gained the right to locate the village in 1363. There is a 19th-century Roman Catholic Church of Saint Dorothy.
The crude oil mine in Harklowa was established in the second half of the 19th century. In 1871 the extraction work in the village was started by the company Dzwonkowski Copartnership, digging oil wells by hand. In the same year, the mining rights were acquired by the Harklowska company. At the beginning of the 20th century, crude oil in Harklowa was mined by: Edward Dzwonkowski and the company, Galicia Oil Association of Harklowa, "Ropita" Oil Company, the "Premier" Company, and from 1929 the Małopolska Group. In the 1970s, the production of natural gas associated with crude oil was discontinued. At the end of the twentieth century, due to the depletion of crude oil, the gradual liquidation of the mine began. Currently, in the centre of Harklowa, there is a square where you can see the remains of the old-time mine.
Trivia
Traces of crude oil were discovered in Harklowa in 1861. In 1863 the first oil wells were made by hand. Those were the beginnings of the mine. After 1865, Zborowski, the heir of the nearby Skołyszyn, became interested in oil extraction, and the extraction works were continued by the Harklowska Company, established with his participation in 1871. At that time, the enterprise had eight mineshafts with a depth ranging from 19 to 55 meters on 34 hectares of land. In 1889, a 5-kilometre pipeline was built from the mine to the railway station in Skołyszyn, from where crude oil was transported by rail to the new refinery in Jasło.
