April the 8th, 2025 – The first oil field in the world can be found among the green rolling hills and quaint villages of Međimurje in Croatia?
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, you likely didn’t realise that the first oil field in the world to have oil extracted in any organised manner is actually in Croatia? You can still visit the location where it was located today, amid the rolling green hills of Međimurje. You can even tour the arranged Memorial Park of the Peklenica Oil Industry (Spomen park naftaštva), as revealed by Putni kofer.
Natural oil sources and the first oil field in the world, opened in 1856, were located in continental Croatia in the Međimurje town of Peklenica. Peklenica was named after the word “pekla”, a thick black liquid that came out of the ground, or oil. As part of the Međimurje Ecomuseum, a Memorial Park has been arranged to inform the public about it all. It includes a reconstructed oil well, an oil museum, interactive exhibitions and educational content for children.
“Peklenica oil was initially used to lubricate tools and implements, and later to make lamps and other products. In the nineteenth century, there were several oil wells across the area of Peklenica, and oil production continued here until the 1950s,” the website of the Međimurje Ecomuseum states.
Historical sources state that oil was extracted in Peklenica until 1967. From 1932 to 1940, oil production in the whole of Yugoslavia amounted to 5,884 tonnes, of which 4,098 tonnes were extracted at this location alone.
Official world data cites 1859 and Pennsylvania in the USA as the beginning of industrial oil extraction, but as we can see that isn’t entirely true, and it’s evidenced clearly by the first organised oil field being right here in Croatia. Across the pond in America, an open oil well pumped oil from a depth of between 19 and 23 metres. Organised oil extraction had actually begun in Peklenica three whole years earlier. However, there was no well at that time, and the oil was extracted from a shaft about four metres deep. Drilling in Međimurje began about thirty years later.
