In 1808, David and Joseph Ruffner completed near here on the bank of the Kanawha a well into solid rock to a depth of 59 feet by a method and with drilling tools they devised, which they and Billye Morris further developed in this valley into what is now known as the cable tool method of drilling. Drilling tools and drillers from the Kanawha Valley later drilled the first well for oil at Titusville, Pennsylvania.