"The Great Oil Octopus."

Maoriland Worker, Volume 3, Issue 44, 12 January 1912, Page 5

"The Great Oil Octopus."

Story of the Development, Methods, fc/len, and Results of " Standard Oil."

By London "Truth's" Investigator.

(Copy rigid. All

Ki.jhU Rwvtd.)

CHAPTER VIII

THE STANOARO'S "INVENTIONS."

"From controlling the production and sale of oils, it was but a natural progression to rise to the; control of legislatures, judges, and the executives of the State and Federal Governments. Members, or servants, of this modern industrial Camorra have been Cabinet ministers of the Supremo Administration in Washington. They have bad Presidents' of the Republic' at their beck and call"—"lnvestors' Review," 1897."

The Standard achieved other ends by its system of creating bogus competitors, besides avoiding public odium. It was enabled by their operation to carry on a competitive warfare cheaply, the "bogus independents" bought oil from the genuine independents, amd proceeded to retail it at the wholesale price. As the genuine independents then came down a "pcs or two in their retail priceto meet this competition, and lowered their wholesale price correspondingly, the bogus concerns bought more at the new wholesale level, and then retailed it at that, and so ad infinitum—or, rather, ;ul infimum—till the bottom was reached, without losing a cent in the .Meantime the Standard virtuous] v kept its prices up to its own customers in that particular district, and protested against the ruin that was being brought upon the trade b) underselling. Thus the function of the "bogus independent," whether company or pedlar,- was not to make money for'the Standard.-, but to !kill, off ,its., competitors., It was an instrument of assassination pure and simple. And just as a particularly diabolical- mur-i deirer arranges the time and manner oi his .victim's:death/ so .that it shall seem to be self-inflicted, so the Standard arranged by the working of these bogus concerns that the genuine y independent firms outside its own charmed circle should seem to the public to be perishing as the result oi their own "cut-throat competition." .It was a subtle game, and played with devilish cunning and persistency for many years before it was definitely shown up 'in its true light. And it :was helped by the fact that many of the bogurconcerns worked in this way had once been genuinely independent concerns which the Standard had secretly bought up. The Tank Waggon. Charles E. Farrell testified as a Government witness at tho Missouri trial —and no attempt was made to rebut his evidence—that he had been a tank waggon driver for tho Standard Oil Company until events took place as follows:' About March, 1899, he was approached at his home at night by the Standard's agent at Troy, N.Y., who told him that McMillan, the standard s manager at Albany, had some important work for him to do, which must be kept entirely secret even from Farrell's own family. At his instance Farrell met McMillan and Mason, the Standard manager at Binghamton, N.Y., who told him that the Standard had competition at Oneonta, N.Y., from the Tiona Oil Company, which had got the bulk of tho trade, and that they wanted to get it back, and for that purpose to set the storekeepers fighting with one another. He was directed to go to tho Tiona Oil Company at Binghampton, N.Y., and buy 25 barrels of oil, and have it shipped to Worcester, as tho Tiona would not sell him oil to sell at Oneonta, whero it was already doing business. He was then to reship it from Worcester to Oneonta, whero he was to peddle it about, putting the sign "Tiona Oil" on his waggon, at 8 cents (id) a gallon, the same price he had to pay the Tiona for it at Binghamton. Strict socrccywas enjoined as to whom he was working for. Farrell carried out the manoeuvre till the merchants cut against one another down to 2 cents a gallon retail, arid one even put out a sign: "Free oil; come and get your cans filled." Later Farrell could not succeed in gotting any more Tiona oil; then the Standard supplied him with its own oil, cautioning him not to sell too much of it, but only to bell the low price about. Farrell was suspected at last by the Tiona people of being sent by th© Standard, but, acting on instructions, denied it through thick and thin.

This nefarious game went on for six months, during which time Farrell carried on his correspondence with Mason at Binghamton by addressing the letters to a man named George Craven at a certain post-office box in Albany, and Craven forwarded them to Mason. Most of tho letters sent by Mason in reply woro on plain paper and unsigned, but not all. In one which is signed, and which was exhibited in court, Mason says:—

I have your various letters. . . . Our salesman who visits Oneonta knows nothing whatever of who you aro, nor does any ono except you saw in our office, and under no circumstances whatever do wo want any one to get tho slightest hint that wo are in, any concerned in this matter. Tho Tiona psoplo are denying that they have anything to do with it, and claiming that wo started you there. Of course, wo are denying tin's, and you must bo very cautious, and not allow any one to try to pump you. . . .

You are doint' first-rate and carrying

oial. the plan exeelleully,- and very much to my sutisiuctiuu. . . . As soon as you. rave read this., sot a match to it and bum it up. . . . Don't tear it up, for some person might get hold of the pieces of paper and -put tiiom together, but if you hum it with a match, then it 'is out oi the way wholly. ... Pretended Standard inventions. A further advance, in Farrell's cominereia.l education and moral edification took place six mouths alter the onoon ta episode. The jioor.t'cilovv,-selected no doubt for his blind fidelity, was told by his employer at Albany, McMillan, that a man called Stacks, at Troy, who had formerly been buying oil from the Standard, was then buying from Dauehy, an independent wholesale dealoi\ and that he must buy oil from Dauehy too, and cart it round after Stark's waggon and sell it at the wholesale price of 8 cents. In this way Farrell got about half of Starks's trade away from liini, When the latter repented of his ways and reoonimoneed buying from tho'Standard. On the prodigal's return, Farrell was called orf. 1 select a peddling case of this sort to justify my assertion" that no low trick is too dirty or mean for the Standard's agents ; to use a Transatlantic expression, they would take its candy from a 'two-year-old'kid. The idea of the "bogus independent" worked as a system is a most ingenious, one, and could hardly have been invented by 'minds of any ordinary calibre. ' Here, however, the r 'inventive 'genius of the Trust seems : to end. It L has been argued on behalf of the Trust that its commercial success has been in part duo to the'various new technical processes and other improvements which it has introduced—to the benefit alike of the trade and the consumer. For this theory there is no visible foundation, though it constitutes the staple material of the ordinary Standard Oil apologist. ' Long articles have appeared in American and English magazines, illustrated by pictures of the Standard's wonderful processes, and filled with majestic figures of the pipe lines and tank steamers and tank cars that it owns. The impression is adroitly left that the Rockefellers found a world of crude oil and made their millions by showing ignorant and backward competitors how to turn it into kerosene, lubricants, vaseline, and petroleum wax. The truth about this imaginative literature is gradually leaking: out.

Pipe lines for oil transport are described as if they were a Standard invention. As a fact, as early as 18b/ a company was incorporated in Pennr svlvania for carrying oil in pipes or tubes from and point on Oil Creek to its month or to any station on the Philadelphia and Erie Railroad—the first record we have of the idea, which thus suggested itself within a reasonably short time after oil was first struck—namclv in 1859. Now, as we have seen. Mr. Rockefeller only went into the oil trade as his sole business in 1865, though he put money into it as early as 1862. Threo short pipe lines were working in 1863 (Tarbell, vol. i., p 17), and they were first made an undoubted success by a man named Samuel van Syckel, who completely revolutionised the oil business in 1864, the year beforo Mr. Rockefeller definitely took to it. by first pumping oil from the well to the railroad through a 2-inch pipe at the rate of 80 barrels an hour. Tank Cars and Ships. The tank car has also been claimed as a Standard invention. Wooden oil tanks were first built (Tarbell, vol. 1., p. 12) by a young lowa school teacher almost immediately after oil was first struck, and they continued to be built by him for about ten years, when, finding that iron tanks were bound to supersede him, he retired from that business. Wooden and iron tanks, whether stationary or set on cars, wore consequently a very natural development to meet the necessities of the oilcarrying trade, and, as far as I can make out, were probqably running in 1869. Tank ships were an English invention, and their adoption for the Suez Canal was strongly opposed by the Standard in 1891. Lubricating oil, also claimed as a Standard invention, is due to Mr. Joshua Merrill, a chemist, of the Downer Works. In 18G9 ho discovered a process for deodorising petroleum, and thus rendering it fit for lubricating purposes. Ho patented his process, and by it increased the sale of the Downer Works lubricating oil by several hundred per cent, in a single year (Tarbell, vol. 1., p. 22). A whole batch of these shadowy claims was disposed of once and for ail by Mr. J. D. Archbold's admissions under cross-examination in the Missouri oase. Hero is the official record of evidence on these points:— Q.: Tho Standard Oil Company did not discover tho process at all, did it?

(To bo continued.)

A.: Oh, no. Q.: The process of making paraffin wax was in existence as early as 30 years ago, wasn't it? A.: Oh, it has been, in existence for a long time from the coal shales. Q.: Now, in tlio matter of a great many of these by-products, tho independent refineries, so-called, have dono Uut aamo v you. haven't they?

I A.: Oh, they have, undoubtedly. I Q.: Take many of those that you lesi titled to the other daj—for instance, J cylinder oil. The earliest manufaoturI era of cylinder oil were at Binghanipton, N.Y., wore they--not—a Mr. Brill? A. : There was a very early concern I there —a small concern. j 0-: And he is still in business, isn't ! he, in Philadelphia? j A.: I don't know, j Q.: hernia rd and F.llis were, very j early, .mannfwturers of cylinder oil; i isn't that true? \ A.: They were —yes. '.-.'' ; Q. : Then,, lubricating ■ oil T -rit was made from the ; •petroleum: stock before 1870, wasn't it?.-:. A.: It was to an .extent —yes. Q.: Spindle oil, 1 think;, is one thing. you testified about the other . day. Wasn't that first introduced by., the. Downer Manufacturing Company, of Boston? A.: I think it likely. I do not know definitely. It probably was. | Q.; Wool, oil--wasn't that sold or manufactured by Paino,. Ablett and Co., long before .the Standard Oil Company combination or interests-got hold' of it? . A.: It may,have been... I could not say. Q.: Was not vaseline made as early as 1860 by chemists in Cincinnati, Ohio, from petroleum products? A.: If it was I never heard of; it. f did not know of it. The Trust in. the Dock. Such being the Standard Oil people's methods of dealing 'with their neighbours,: how have their neighbours dealt with them? The plain' answer to this is that their neighbours have simply "howled for their blood" for tho past 39 years, sinoo the time, in fact, when the beginnings of tho great conspiracy came to light in the detection of the South Improvement Company scheme in 1872. Sirice-»then the Standard Oil j concern has had to face-olio public proI sedition after another to witness a long series of hostile -demonstrations ' on the part of the public and of public inquiries directed bytho, legislature tthat would havo.shamed'4'iy concern capable of ordinary: decent'feeling out -of existence long ' ago. In 1879 the Standard: Oil Trust was indicted for, fraudulent conspiracy in Pennsylvania at tho suit of the Petroleum Producers' ■Union, .who .wfire, thick-headed aiid 'wflak-k'neod enmtgh to accept a settlement out of court. In 1887 the Standard Oil Company of Ohio was prosecuted by the State Attorney-General— Mr. David X.. Watson—for belonging to the Standard Oil Trust, an .illegal combination m of trade, and in 1892 judgment was rendered prohk biting it from being a party to any such Trust agreement. Ostensibly the liquidation of the Standard Oil Trust followed; hi' reality, it pursued the even tenor, of its way. In 1898 tho Standard Oil Company of Ohio was again prosecuted by the State Attor-ney-General, this time Mr. Frank S. Moimett,' for, failing to obey the 1892 judgment, arid the suit,. or series of suits, was prolonged by. every device on the part of the Standard till his term of office came to an end in January, 1900. His successor, John ]\l. Sheets, suppressed "the suits, but matters had been made so hot for the Standard Oil Trust that it took advantage of the lax cpmpany law existing in the State of New Jersey to change its style and title (including all its subsidiaries) into that of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey. As such it carries on its old conspiracy against public law and the common weal just as before. In 1907 it was again prosecuted in the person of one of its subsidiaries, the Standard Oil Company of Indiana., for the same old charges "of unjust and illegal railway discriminations, and condemned on August 3, 1907, to. pay a fine of 29,----240,000 dollars (£5,848,000). This fine was set aside on appeal on the ground that it had been assessed on the capital of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey instead of on that of the Standard Oil Company of Indiana. On Nov. 15, 1906, the prosecution, already more than once referred to, of tho Standard Oil Company of New Jersey by the United States Government was commenced in tho Eastern Judicial District of Missouri Circuit Court. Tho company was convicted of conspiracy; it appealed, and tho appeal was fixed for bearing in tho Supremo Court of the United States during the October term of 1909. It was further postponed, however, by the death of Judge Brewer, of.'the Supremo Court, and is now expected to be decided in a few weeks.