Spindletop is an oil field located in the southern portion of Beaumont, Texas, in the United States. The Spindletop dome was derived from the Louann Salt evaporite layer of the Jurassic geologic period. On January 10, 1901, a well at Spindletop struck oil; the Spindletop gusher blew for 9 days at a rate estimated at 100,000 barrels of oil per day. Gulf Oil and Texaco, now part of Chevron Corporation, were formed to develop production at Spindletop. According to Daniel Yergin, the Spindletop discovery led the United States into the oil age. Prior to Spindletop, oil was used for lighting and as a lubricant; because of the quantity of oil discovered, burning petroleum as a fuel for mass consumption became economically feasible. The frenzy of oil exploration and the economic development it generated in the state became known as the Texas oil boom; the United States soon became the world's leading oil producer. There had long been suspicions that oil might be under "Spindletop Hill." The area was bubbling gas seepages that would ignite if lit.

In August 1892, George W. O'Brien, George W. Carroll, Pattillo Higgins, others formed the Gladys City Oil and Manufacturing Company to do exploratory drilling on Spindletop Hill; the company drilled many dry holes and ran into trouble, as investors began to balk at pouring more money into drilling with no oil to show for it. Pattillo Higgins left the company and teamed with Captain Anthony F. Lucas, the leading expert in the U. S. on salt-dome formations. Lucas made a lease agreement in 1899 with the Gladys City Company and a subsequent agreement with Higgins. Lucas drilled to 575 feet before running out of money, he secured additional funding from John H. Galey and James M. Guffey of Pittsburgh, but the deal left Lucas with only an eighth share of the lease and Higgins with nothing. Lucas continued drilling, on January 10, 1901, at a depth of 1,139 ft, what is known as the Lucas Gusher or the Lucas Geyser blew oil over 150 feet in the air at a rate of 100,000 barrels per day. Nine days passed before the well was brought under control.

Spindletop was the largest gusher the world had seen and catapulted Beaumont into an oil-fueled boomtown. Beaumont's population of 10,000 tripled in 3 months and rose to 50,000. Speculation led land prices to increase rapidly. By the end of 1902, more than 500 companies had been formed and 285 wells were in operation. Spindletop was the first oilfield found on the US Gulf Coast, prompted further drilling, further oil-field discoveries. Oil drillers looking for another Spindletop sought out other salt domes, were successful; the Gulf Coast turned into a major oil region. Standard Oil, which had a monopoly or near-monopoly on the petroleum industry in the eastern states, was prevented from moving aggressively into the new oilfield by state antitrust laws. Populist sentiment against Standard Oil was strong at the time of the Spindletop discovery. In 1900, an oil-products marketing company affiliated with Standard Oil had been banned from the state for its cutthroat business practices. Although Standard built refineries in the area, it was unable to dominate the new Gulf Coast oil fields the way it had in the eastern states.

As a result, a number of startup oil companies at Spindletop, such as Texaco and Gulf Oil, grew into formidable competitors to Standard Oil. Among those drilling at Spindletop was W. Scott Heywood, a native of Cleveland, who in 1901 made the first oil discovery in nearby Jeff Davis Parish in southwestern Louisiana. In 1932, Heywood was elected to a single term in the Louisiana State Senate. Production at Spindletop began to decline after 1902, the wells produced only 10,000 barrels per day by 1904; the developers had signed a 20-year contract to sell 25,000 barrels per day at $0.25 per barrel to Shell Oil. When the price climbed above $0.35 per barrel, the operation was stressed and Mellon who had lent money for Spindle Top’s development took control of the company, won a lawsuit allowing Mellon to renege on the contract, created Gulf Oil. On November 14, 1925, the Yount-Lee Oil Company brought in its McFaddin No. 2 at a depth around 2,500 feet, sparking a second boom, which culminated in the field's peak production year of 1927, during which 21 million barrels were produced.

Over the 10 years following the McFaddin discovery, more than 72 million barrels of oil were produced from the newer areas of the field. Spindletop continued as a productive source of oil until about 1936, it was mined for sulfur from the 1950s to about 1975. In 1976, Lamar University dedicated the Spindletop-Gladys City Boomtown Museum to preserve the history of the Spindletop oil gusher era in Beaumont; the museum features an oil derrick and many reconstructed Gladys City building interiors furnished with authentic artifacts from the Spindletop boomtown period. The Lucas Gusher Monument is located at the museum; the monument, erected at the wellhead in July, 1941, was moved to the Spindletop-Gladys City Museum after it became unstable due to ground subsidence. According to an article by Nedra Foster, LS in the July/August, 2000 issue of the Professional Surveyor Magazine, the monument was located within 4 ft of the site of the Spindletop well. Today, the wellhead is marked at Spindletop Park by a flagpole flying the Texas flag.

It is located about 1.5 miles southwest of the museum, off West Port Arthur Road/Spur 93. The site includes a viewing platform with information placards, about a quarter mile from the flagpole; the wellhead site is not accessible. Directions to the park

Tonge is a village near Sittingbourne in Kent, England. The hamlet is north of Bapchild, close to Murston Marshes beside the Swale, it is farmland with one road passing through it towards Blacketts Farm. In 1798, Edward Hasted records that it was once called'Thwang'. Vortigern, King of Saxon Britain reward two saxon chiefs Hengist and Horsa after his victory over the Scots and Picts. Hengist requested, as a pledge of the king's affection, only as much land as on ox-hide could surround; this was granted, he cut the whole hide into small thongs, inclosed within them a space of ground, this was large enough to contain a castle, which he accordingly built on it, named it Thwang-ceastre. The castle became a ruin in the years of the saxon age; some writers record it at Thong Castle, near Grimsby, in Lincolnshire, others place it at Doncaster. Leland, Richard Kilburne and John Philipott all record it near Sittigbourne; these events happened in 461, Bede and Gildas mention nothing of it in their writings, Malmsbury tells it only as a report.

Leland records a poor hospital called Pokeshaulle. In 1662, during Queen Mary's reign it became the hospital of Puckleshall, it was given to Sir John Parrot. After the Domesday Survey, the village belonged to Earl of Kent. After Odo's trial for fraud, the lands were granted to'Hugh de Port' for the defence of Dover castle. In 1306 Bartholomew de Badlesmere became the owner of the manor, it passed to Giles de Badlesmere, 2nd Baron Badlesmere, to Elizabeth de Badlesmere, Countess of Northampton to Roger Mortimer, 2nd Earl of March to Richard, Duke of York. When he died at the Battle of Wakefield in 1460, the manor was granted by King Henry VI. to Thomas Browne, esquire of Beechworth Castle. His son sir George Brown in 1472, surrendered the manor to Cecily Neville, Duchess of York. In 1547, it passed to Sir Ralph Fane, he transferred it in 1558, to Sir Rowland Clerke (whose wife was Grisold the 3rd daughter of William Paget. Who passed it on through various private hands. In the parish is the estate of Cheeks Court.

One owner in 1444, Sir William Cromer This survives. The estate of Newburgh called Newbarrow (which was on the southern portion of the parish. Before 1524, John Roper, esq. of Eltham had possession of it. He was attorney-general to King Henry VIII. In 1616, another owner, Sir John Roper became Lord Teynham; the village has a parish church. The Church of St Giles, in the diocese of Canterbury, deanery of Sittingbourne; this is Grade I listed

Anatoly Lamanov was one of the central figures of the 1921 Kronstadt rebellion in the RSFSR. As student in 1917 he became Chairman of the Kronstadt Soviet of Worker's Deputies. Little is known of his early life; as a third-year student in 1917, he had a significant part in the Kronstadt Uprising of 1921 and served as the Chairman of the Kronstadt Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, as well as on the editorial board of its newspaper, Izvestiya. Not from Kronstadt, Anatoly Lamanov was a third year technology student at the Institute of Technology who lectured workers and soldiers on topics such as geography or natural history, he was the younger brother of the officer Piotr Lamanov, revolutionary commander of Kronstadt Naval Forces. Lamanov served as chairman of the Kornstadt soviet and was chief editor of its leading newspaper Izvestiia, he led the Non-Party faction, a worker conscious movement, wary of the representative model. The Non Party faction was renamed as the Union of Socialist Revolutionaries Maximalists.

In 1921, he was denounced as the leading ideologist of the Kronstadt uprising, was executed as a ‘counter revolutionary’. Lamanov had a central role in shaping the egalitarian radical socialist ideology of Kronstadt; as leader of the Non Party group, Lamanov consolidated the ideas of the many different portions of the Kronstadt Soviet. One Menshevik observer is noted to say that his ideology was neither “Leninist nor Anarchist’, he called for restraint, close ties with the Petrograd Soviet and an avoidance of ‘disunity and party discord’ which had ‘ruined the revolution of france’. He held up the mantra of “If only so far” in his idea of the relationship between Kronstadt and the Provisional Government. Like many Kronstadters, Lamanov felt that the relationship with the provisional Government shouldn’t be severed if they fail to uphold the revolutionary spirit of the February revolutions, but that they must be pressured into aligning themselves with the Kronstadt soviet. Up until the April Crisis, Lamanov had avoided discussing the question of power in relation to Russia at large.

With the Foreign Minister reaffirming Russia’s commitment to continuing their involvement in World War I --, a major trigger for the February revolutions—Kronstaders feeling betrayed, turned away from their creative endeavours to focusing on how they would maintain their radical democracy in relation to the decisions made by the provisional government. Lamanov, as chairman of the Executive Committee of the Kronstadt Soviet, was the subject of hostility from the Bolsheviks after denouncing Raskolnikov and the July Days. However, the Bolsheviks were not able to blunt Lamanov’s political influence, for Lamanov was elected as chairman of the newspaper Izvetsiia’s editorial commission. In the Aftermath of the July Days, opposition to the Bolsheviks resulted in swelling support for the Non-Partyists, or, as it would come to be called, the Union of Socialist Revolutionaries-Maximalists; as chairman of Izvetsiia, Lamanov “was in a favourable position to give ample newspaper coverage to their views though they had to be passed by three major Soviet factions represented on the editorial board.”

On 21 April, Lamanov denounced the declarations of the provisional government and turned the debate away from the power question, to affirming a solidarity with the struggles of the petrograd soviet. He urged the soviet to avoid moving the power to the revolutionary government, instead he argued that “full support” should be given to the petrograd soviet. In addition, he helped set a motion that would have the soviet ‘fully support revolutionary pressure on the provisional government and its continuous and relentless control over it in the interests of the revolution’; this motion was unique to Kronstadt in its contrast with the bolshevik resolution that called for the complete overthrow of the provisional government. Lamanov’s approach to the April Crisis was instrumental in maintaining an antagonistic relationship with the Provisional Government without calling for its complete overthrow; this stance sent shockwaves into the Petrograd Soviet, as it showed that the bolsheviks didn’t have the influence in Kronstadt that they purported to have when sending their delegates to Petrograd.

The Bolsheviks were going to gain support, as they opposed Lamanov’s insistence on joining into a coalition government with the bourgeoisie. This would culminate in the July days, he was head of Kronstadt's'Non-Party Group', which in August 1917 merged with the Union of Socialist-Revolutionaries Maximalists. Lamanov subsequently resigned during the 1921 uprising, he was the editor of the anti-Bolshevik rebels' Izvestia newsletter of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee. Shortly after the uprising, Lamanov was executed as a counter-revolutionary by the Bolsheviks. Library of Congress summary of Kronstadt History 1917-1921, What was the Kronstadt Rebellion? from Info Shop, Pravda o Kronshtadte includes a number of Lamanov's articles from Izvestiya, his declaration of departure from the Communist Party and a discussion of his participation in the 1921 uprising