History
A Brief History of Equitable Gas
Founded in 1888, Equitable Gas Company provides natural gas distribution services to over 275,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers located mainly in the city of Pittsburgh and surrounding municipalities in seven counties in southwestern Pennsylvania, plus a few municipalities in northern West Virginia and field line sales in eastern Kentucky.
The Birth of Equitable Gas and the Natural Gas Industry
The story of Equitable Gas really begins ten years before the company was founded -- in 1878, when Obediah and Michael Haymaker struck natural gas while drilling for oil in Murrysville, Pa. It could not have happened at a more convenient place; nearby Pittsburgh was rapidly becoming the industrial center of the United States, and natural gas was the perfect fuel for industrial applications. And so, a new industry was born -- the natural gas industry.
Among the crowd of new businesses formed to service this new industry was Equitable Gas Company. Shortly thereafter, the company was acquired by industrialist George Westinghouse to become part of his Philadelphia Company. In the years that followed, the company prospered, extending its operations into the production, transportation and distribution of natural gas.
By 1910, it had 440,000 acres under lease in Pennsylvania and West Virginia and was operating 902 wells. The company also proved to be an innovator in the energy industry with the development of the first underground gas storage fields during the 1930s. The energy provided by Equitable Gas helped fuel the growth of the Pittsburgh area -- an area known as the steel capital of the world.