The largest individual gas reserve in the United States covers much of the Oklahoma Panhandle and extends northward from Texas through this area into Kansas. This sprawling Hugoton-Panhandle field provides gas for human comfort, fuels the boilers of industry, and supports the nation's economy. It also provides the world's largest source of helium, from which the U.S. Government has drawn a 40 year supply stockpile while spacecraft and other industries obtain current needs. The Texas part of the field was discovered in 1918, based on the surface survey and recommendations of Oklahoma's covered wagon geologist Charles A. Gould in 1904-1905. Gas from the deep formation was discovered in southwestern Kansas in 1922. Step-out drilling northward from Texas and southward from Kansas revealed one huge tri-state field covering five million productive acres in parts of 20 counties. Development of these gas reserves was hampered by lack of market outlet, but this huge undeveloped reserve figured mightily in the birth of the world's natural gas industry. Completion of a 24 inch high pressure line from the field to Chicago area markets in 1931 ushered in the age of long distance pipeline transportation of energy and the widespread use of gas at points distant from gas sources.