We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember "The Medway Handyman"
saying something like:

James "Paraffin" Young developed the first commerical production of
petroleum in the 1850s, working largely from oil shale. It was he
who was largely responsible for defining the point on the fractional
distillation product should be taken off and paraffin was the point
for the standard product he marketed most enthusiastically. The
company also had a large business manufactuing new designs of lamps
specially made to burn the new product to best advantage.

It replaced expensive whale oil in lamps. Heating shale to extract
paraffin was very expensive, but the lamp oil produced was being sold at
a premium, albeit cheaper than whale oil.

So, Rudolph Diesel sorted the engine in 1893, seems like Young sorted
paraffin in 1850, I wonder when commercial diesel fuel became available?

When refining tech made it possible, I'd guess building on Young's work
and others like him. Bear in mind, for example, in the early days of the
motor car petrol was already in existence as a solvent and dry cleaning
fluid and was commonly found in chemists. I'm uncertain what later
became known as diesel oil would have been used for, if anything at all
- perhaps as a light lubricating or penetrating oil. Maybe even a
purgative. It may not have been cracked off from the feedstock until
there was a perceived need for it.
Istr reading somewhere that early oil refineries were aswamp with
products they had no use for - a lot of it would have been simply burned
off or left in with the sludge. Diesel oil isn't a very attractive
liquid at all, and it's hard to see it being in much demand for anything
until Rudolph came along.
--
Dave
GS850x2 XS650 SE6a

"It's a moron working with power tools.
How much more suspenseful can you get?"
- House