Albertite Sample from the New Brunswick Museum Collection - Photo Credit NBM
It is always difficult to pick the first of three hundred and sixty-six pictures (2020 is a leap year!), so we decided to go with the one thing found only in Albert County and nowhere else in the world. Albertite.
Albertite is a type of asphalt in the Albert Formation found only in Albert County, New Brunswick. It is a type of solid hydrocarbon. It is a deep black and lustrous variety, and is less soluble in turpentine than the usual type of asphalt. It was from a mixture of Albertite and pitch that kerosene was first distilled in 1846 by Abraham Gesner.
It was from Albertite that Gesner developed kerosene, and ushered in the Petroleum Age. Kerosene was initially manufactured from Albertite, however, following the drilling of the first oil well in Pennsylvania by E.L. Drake in 1859, petroleum quickly became the major source of kerosene. Because of its use in lamps, kerosene was the major refinery product for several decades until the advent of the electric lamp reduced its value for lighting. Production further declined as the rise of the automobile established gasoline as an important petroleum product. Nevertheless, in many parts of the world, kerosene is still a common heating and cooking fuel as well as a fuel for lamps. Standard commercial jet fuel is essentially a high-quality straight-run kerosene, and many military jet fuels are blends based on kerosene.
An interesting story can be told, that until Gesner developed kerosene, the major source of the world’s lighting came from whale oil, and the reason for whaling industry was to obtain this oil for lighting. Kerosene rapidly overtook whale oil as the major form of lighting in the world due to its clean burn, which reduced the demand for whale oil, and eventually saved the whales from extinction. So congratulations Albert County – we saved the whales!