RIYADH- Exactly 80 years ago, in March of 1938, a Saudi Bedouin namedKhamis bin Rimthan helped an American petroleum geologist to find thekingdom’s first oil well, known as ‘Dammam No. 7’.

Max Steineke is largely credited for making the first discovery of oil incommercial quantities in Saudi Arabia. But Rathman played a major role inthis discovery. He was an expert in desert navigation, using stars to findhis way, and knew where the best locations were to find oil.

Steineke became the chief geologist at California-Arabian Standard Oil Co.(CASOC), now known as Aramco, from 1936 until 1950. He graduated fromStanford University in 1921 with a degree in geology. Before going to SaudiArabia, Steineke worked in oil exploration in California, Alaska, Canada,Columbia and New Zealand. He died in 1952.

The kingdom granted the country’s first oil exploration concession in 1933to the American company, Standard Oil of California, which later opened itssubsidiary company CASOC.

Rimthan was chosen to be the official guide for American geologists whenthe American company asked the Emir of the eastern region, Abdullah binJalawi, to provide them with a skilled desert guide.

At the time, Rimthan was living with his tribe in the ad-Dahna desert, butbegan working with the company in 1934.

On March 4, 1938, Steineke and Rimthan discovered oil well ‘Dammam No. 7’.The Americans were impressed with Rimthan’s talent, to the point where inhis book, ‘Out in the Blue’, American geologist Thomas Barger wrote: “Afterwe left the well, Khamis said he had never been there before. I asked himif that was the case how did he know where it was? Pointing to a couple ofsand hills twelve miles away he said, “Do you see that hill over there? Doyou see that one over there? One day I was on the first hill and a man toldme that Ain al-Abd was this side of the other sand hill.”

“It is very simple. You have someone point out a sand hill about 15 milesaway and then you return some years later and recognize a round, low, sandhill by approaching it from the opposite side and, of course, anyone wouldknow where the well was.”

Rimthan died in the Aramco hospital in 1959, after which an oilfield wasnamed after him in 1974 in recognition of his efforts to help in thediscovery of oil. Al Arabia