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Willy Bruderer, adventurer geologist

By Stéphanie SOTTEAU, Iconographe

Published on June 08th 2017, modified on March 27th 2020

As I searched for new photographs in the Total Historical Archives, I came across several numbered files, each with a place name. I discovered Willy Bruderer's manuscripts. I knew this name because he appeared as the author of photographs, but I did not know that he was primarily a geologist for the PSC.

Born in 1899 to a French mother and a Swiss father, he began his career in 1924 for the French Premier Oil Company established in Boryslaw (present-day Ukraine) in Polish Galicia.

Author of several books, he also published an autobiographical brochure "Some dates that marked my life ... and the history of petroleum" from which these biographical information come. Here are excerpts from his manuscripts. The photographs are by Willy Bruderer and date from the 1920s.

Extract from one of his manuscripts, family portrait, on the left Willy Bruderer at 7
Portrait of Willy Bruderer from his autobiographical brochure
Extract from one of these manuscripts, view of the interior of a drilling tower at Boryslaw
Exploration drilling in Polish Galicia (Current Ukraine)

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