Wellsville ? It was a balmy Friday afternoon, or at least it seemed so, stacked up against the unrelenting heat of the past few weeks.

But an old utility fan still whirred at full blast overhead, keeping the temperature at a cool 80 degrees inside the pale yellow garage that houses Oil Patch Pump and Supply.

Part coffee shop, part corner bar, the Oil Patch is a place to grab a cup of joe before heading out into the field, and later a spot to swig a cool Keystone longneck after a hard day at work for those in the oil trade.

“We get an awful lot of coffee drinkers in the winter,” said Jim Scott, manager and sole employee. “It’s a good way to start the day.

He brews three, sometimes four, pots a day when the air is cold. But this summer’s sticky air calls for a different kind of refreshment. An orange cooler full of Gatorade gets refilled regularly. Customers-turned-good-friends regularly stop by to fill up water jugs for the day ahead.

“A lot of these guys go out into the field as early as 5 a.m.,” Scott said. “Anything so they can call it quits by 2 or so, when it really gets miserable.”

The Oil Patch is one of six Kansas oil supply stores owned by two men in Chanute. Since 1988, it’s been book-ending Wellsville’s three downtown blocks with the help of the Casey’s General Store gasoline station to the north. Sandwiched in between is Mel’s barbershop, Betty’s Foot Care, Roseys Rags to Riches, and — one of the taller buildings around — the blood-red painted Smokey’s BBQ. It’s a town, it seems, that likes to take possession of its businesses.

When Scott isn’t playing host to the oil field workers who come from miles around for cool drinks and companionship, he has plenty on his plate selling them the parts they need to keep the area’s oil pumps working.

The place is meticulously organized. Carefully arranged shelves of pipe fittings, water filters, gas pumps, lead lines, brass valves and steel pulleys fill the garage. Piles of white pipe lay organized by size outside among waist-deep weeds.

Richard Hermann, of Wellsville, an oil well service man, seeks relief from Monday's 104-degree heat at Oil Patch Pump and Supply in Wellsville. The Oil Patch is a favorite haunt of oil workers, who buy supplies there and gather to sip coffee in the morning and cool drinks in the evening.

A good oil pump will last up to a year, but Scott said he’s seen them need to be fixed in half that.

“It’s a seven-day-a-week job,” Scott said.

It’s a hard job, keeping oil pumps from deteriorating. There’s no lack of elements working against those who do it.

The weather has a lot to do with that. Rain brings electrical problems, short circuiting, slipping fan belts and the like. Dry weather has trials of its own. The ground cracks, breaking lines, hoses and metal fittings.

“It’ll pop a plastic line like a straw,” Scott said.

Jim Scott, owner of Oil Patch Pump and Supply of Wellsville, records another curious weather fact on the wall of his business.

While working in an industry so influenced by the weather, Scott has picked up an odd habit of marking unusual temperature records along the molding outside the office door. Curiosity is what got Scott’s record keeping started in 1995.

“You know, when it’s 85 in January you just kind of want to write that unusual stuff down.”

Richard Hermann, of Wellsville, an oil well service man, takes a break from the heat at Oil Patch and Pump Supply of Wellsville.

The most recent date is this past month’s stint of 100-degree topping days. Any curious weather fact he hears on the radio or reads in the papers gets scrawled on the dingy wood with permanent marker. It’s a weather history all their own.

“It’s just something I do,” Scott said. “Never thought much of it. Maybe when it actually cools down this fall, I’ll mark that up there too.”