Seeking black gold.

• Author: Tyson, Ray
• Position: William Stewart

Seeking Black Gold

A third-generation oilman who grew up on drilling rigs from Oklahoma to the Middle East, William Stewart managed to guide his small exploration and production company through some difficult economic times in Alaska. After five years of careful planning and deal-making, the independent oilman from Anchorage returns to the Cook Inlet Basin in August to do a little prospecting for black gold.

The inlet is ripe for a discovery, Stewart believes. It's an ideal location for the independent operator who often lacks the financial resources to compete with the majors or to explore for oil and gas in Alaska's more remote areas.

Says Stewart, "Cook Inlet is the place where independents need to be, because I think there are some fine prospects. The infrastructure is here. The market is here. Independents can't afford to wait years and years to build a pipeline. In the case of Prudhoe Bay, it took 10 years. Independents can't wait 10 minutes. We have to be able to get to market."

For Stewart, 42, the oil business is a family tradition dating back to the 1920s; his grandfather, Ray, worked as a driller on oil rigs in Kansas and Oklahoma. Stewart's father, Don, began roughnecking at age 14 and worked his way through oil fields in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Mexico, Canada and eventually Alaska.

"I was an oil field brat and grew up all over the world, and I recall that in the fourth grade, I was in four different schools on two different continents. I grew up on drilling rigs. I climbed derricks instead of trees," Stewart says.

The family moved to Anchorage in 1961. Stewart recollects, "We stayed in Alaska as a family longer than anywhere else."

After he graduated from West High School in 1965, Stewart attended the University of Alaska Fairbanks, roughnecking in Cook Inlet during summers and vacations. "There weren't too many platforms then, mostly exploratory rigs," he recalls. "I've always been interested in Cook Inlet."

Stewart transferred to the University of Tulsa in 1967, where he attained a business degree "with a heavy emphasis on petroleum." While in college, he worked part-time in various administrative positions for Reading and Bates Drilling Co., the same oil field service company for which his father worked. He also married the daughter of now-retired Alaska Superior Court Judge Tom Stewart. The couple's daughter, Audra, will be a sophomore at West High next fall.

Returning to Anchorage in 1969, Stewart worked as...