The discovery of oil in the Augusta field in 1914 presaged the entry of Kansas into the ranks of the important oil-producing states. Located on the Nemaha Granite Ridge, it preceded the discovery of the similarly located but more spectacular Eldorado field by more than a year. Anticlinal folding afforded a reservoir in the rocks of both the Pennsylvanian and Ordovician systems. Most of the oil produced has come from the Simpson sand and Arbuckle limestone of the Ordovician, and the production of gas has been limited wholly to the Pennsylvanian. The field is actually made up of two anticlines with a narrow intervening saddle dividing the producing area into the North Augusta pool and the South Augusta pool.

With an accumulative production estimated at 50 to 60 million barrels of oil at the end of the year 1946, the Augusta field ranked fourth among Kansas fields in number of barrels produced.