OAKLAND TWP — Joe McCloskey can document his first haircut. It was given by a longtime barber in Petrolia, where McCloskey grew up in the 1940s and 50s.

"They called him Dad Jones," McCloskey said. "No one ever knew why."

"He gave me my first haircut," McCloskey added. "And I have the hair from it."

The beloved barber, who died in 1970, is among the many characters chronicled in a history of Petrolia that McCloskey has been assembling since 2006.

The lock of hair saved by his mother has been overshadowed by memorabilia submitted for the project.

"From December to April I put my feelers out," McCloskey said, describing an effort conducted largely by word-of-mouth.

"Almost invariably when I contacted someone, they said, 'Here. I have something.'"

Those items include ads, property deeds, newspaper stories and photographs — even a seven-volume scrapbook of clippings related to veterans, a strong component of the project, which also targets Karns City, Bruin and Parker, which make up what is known as the Petroleum Valley.

With help from a crew of Petrolia natives, McCloskey also has collected oil cans and other antiques that sometimes provide clues to unknown history.

One such item, a wooden pencil box with a built-in ruler, was given out free with school shoes from the E.P. Chesebro store on Jamieson Street where Freiters Hair Repair now operates.

Through his research McCloskey has pieced together the history of that site, which housed the shoe store from 1875 to 1928. Later businesses included Stewart's Nation-wide Store, which sold groceries; a body shop, gas station and attorney's office.

McCloskey said the drastic change in demographics was one reason he undertook the project. Although Petrolia's population was estimated at about 200 people in the 2000 census, McCloskey recalls the borough as a self-sustaining community, complete with a bowling alley, hotel, car dealership and skating rink.

"While we were growing up, the refinery employed 455 people," he said. "And Koppers, they had about 250 employees. The population was 650 during this time period."

"Basically, there were two big businesses," explained Terry Corbett of Chicora, a Petrolia native helping with the project.

"One was the refinery, and the other one was Koppers, now Indspec. ... (The refinery) itself hit its peak employment in about 1976."

The Koppers chemical plant was originally called Pennsylvania Coal Products Company, shortened to Penecol. That plant now operates as Indspec, producing Resorcinol, an industrial adhesive with many applications.

The refinery Corbett speaks of is the current Sonneborn refinery. That company, which began in the 1880s as the Daugherty Refinery, was bought in 1908 by the Sonneborn Corp.

Sonneborn merged with the Witco Chemical Corp. in 1960, selling to Crompton Corp. in 2000. In June 2006, the plant was purchased by the holding company Sun Capital, which chose to operate the refinery under the familiar name Sonneborn Inc.

"As far as we know, Sonneborn is down to about 160 (employees)," McCloskey said. "It's probably producing many, many times the quantity of products now because of technology."

Photographs taken in the late 1930s show a host of buildings at the refinery, but the landscape since then has changed.

"Ninety percent of these buildings are gone. The processes aren't needed anymore," McCloskey said.

Although his project documents that changing landscape, McCloskey touts its broader value.

"My philosophy on it is: The valley and its industries and people made a fantastic contribution to society and the history of the United States," he said, noting white oil refined in the region was used in the world's first effective polio vaccine, developed in 1952 by Jonas Salk at the University of Pittsburgh.

In addition to the Resorcinol still being manufactured by Indspec, McCloskey said the area's innovative products include a rust-proofing product used in the humid South Pacific during World War II and a motor oil that would flow at minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit.

Retired from his job as the director of Butler County Children and Youth Services, McCloskey works 40 hours a week on the project. He has already compiled text, photographs and documents stored on multiple CDs. His efforts have been aided by a grant awarded in December 2007 by the Pittsburgh 250 Community Connections and The Sprout Fund. That money was used to buy scanning equipment and to replace a computer already worn out by his efforts.

In addition to factual documents, he is still looking for memories and stories about business owners, veterans and other valley residents.

Because of its size and the cost of publishing books, McCloskey said the finished product initially will be distributed on CD or DVD. He hopes to complete his work this year.

Others contributing to the research include Corbett, Ken Rumbarger of Valencia and Pine City, Fla., Bob McCloskey of Fairview Township, Tom Barney of Bruin, Don Wigton of Phoenix, Ariz., and Betty Sheakley of Los Angeles, Calif.

Those who wish to contribute to the project should contact McCloskey at 724-287-1101 or Joeamishguy@aol.com.

"If there are people out there that have information about the past that we don't know about, we sure do want to hear from them," Corbett said.

"Don't discount any little piece of information," McCloskey added. "It could be very important."