eyo, it's capitalism
4 stars
I read the Belt Revivals edition of this text. It's an abridged version of the 1904 original, with an introduction by Elizabeth Catte, whose What You're Getting Wrong About Appalachia I loved. The juicy details Catte gives in the introduction is that the writer, Ida Tarbell, is the son of an oil producer in addition to being an investigative reporter, which garnered much criticism at the time but Catte's suggestion is to read the text both as an investigation of monopolies and one in which the writer may have a personal stake—a personal grudge to bear. Excellent.
I picked up the book mostly because I wanted to understand the role that Standard Oil played in the area where I'm from. The area boomed with oil in the late 1800s, and my town was the birthplace of Marathon Oil (as Ohio Oil Company in 1887, purchased by Standard in 1889). I …
I read the Belt Revivals edition of this text. It's an abridged version of the 1904 original, with an introduction by Elizabeth Catte, whose What You're Getting Wrong About Appalachia I loved. The juicy details Catte gives in the introduction is that the writer, Ida Tarbell, is the son of an oil producer in addition to being an investigative reporter, which garnered much criticism at the time but Catte's suggestion is to read the text both as an investigation of monopolies and one in which the writer may have a personal stake—a personal grudge to bear. Excellent.
I picked up the book mostly because I wanted to understand the role that Standard Oil played in the area where I'm from. The area boomed with oil in the late 1800s, and my town was the birthplace of Marathon Oil (as Ohio Oil Company in 1887, purchased by Standard in 1889). I wrote my thesis in college of architecture that sprung from the financial hope that oil produced and the social history it left behind. I grew up next to an oil refinery and practiced softball in the refinery gym over winter.
I scratched some of that local history from this text (see my quote about Lima Oil), but also got a contemporary story of a monopoly forming and thriving. Law breaking, being admonished by the courts, still breaking those same laws. Seeking to receive special rates and kickbacks from railroads and later pipelines (as the technology developed to no longer transport oil in barrels on trains), then deciding just to go into the business themselves to control all traffic. Setting up a shady trust to control prices and evade responsibility. Creating a surveillance, or "business intelligence", network across the country to understand what other oil was being sold for, and undercut the independent producers. As the book says many times, Rockefeller wished to control oil—all of it—claiming it was better for consumers. And he mostly succeeded.
I found a lot of it kinda dull in a still interesting way (comparative oil prices aren't exactly thrilling). I enjoyed the historically obvious but thinklessly surprising details of: there are no cars yet! Gas stations keep horses! Gas is mainly used for lighting and lubrication! No pipelines; only oil by barrels and rail! But, it was more mindfully exciting to feel out where modern comparisons do or don't seem to fit (mind kept trying to fit to Amazon, Google, Facebook). The rationale for monopolization by Standard Oil was the same as now, even then: it's better for consumers. But in reality the whole enterprise was intended to control oil prices, with one company reaping the benefits.