Saturday, 30 April 2011
My Boxed Up Self
damn it....... Feels like its all for no reason but it sure has a root, a cause and a particular goal... Dear reader, been a while i poured out ma heart to someone who even cared to read.. Its been about 15 days of hard thoughts, crazy conversations and mind revealing occurences in my life.. So much hurt has been going on, just seems nothing is going good at the moment for me. Tried distractions, the longest sure didnt stay up to a week. Now, all these made me wonder; should i just retire and be a nun or confess my sins to God and go register in a covent or something? Do we even have covents in Nigeria? This life is nothing but a road filled with pieces of shattered glass and thorns for me. I wanna retire.. This week was worse, this weekend has surely been the worst. Making plans and everything failing at the very last minute has definitely not added to the list of fun things i've been in. Its even worse when one's account is way on the opposite side of flourishing. Too many thoughts and assumptions flying aroung in this head of mine, its not about making it up, can never be like the first time one thinks about it all. Signing out now but i gotta say, it sucks being where i am, living where i do, having the things i have and being in d box that i have been placed. Only time will tell for sure
Tuesday, 12 April 2011
My past 15 Hours
The past 15 hours have definitely been something of a memory for me to keep for a while. Didn't take me till now to understand that i can really be overbearing but i just never knew i could be quite annoying for tryna stand by my convictions and do what i feel is right.. In the past 15 hours, i actually came to find out who my real friends were to an extent, those who pretend to have my back and those who would flee at the slightest provocation.
I guess it really takes heated situations to really bring out the real side of people cos what you think definitely would reflect in your speech and actions.
Somehow, i feel a lil bit of everything.... Hate, disgust, remorse, funk, sadness, revenge, fulfilment, happiness even stupidity and betrayal. All these, all in one super body and brain.. MINE!!
In the past 15 hours, i have concluded unjustly, made irrational decisions, offended man and God, caused some people pain and hurt, made some extremely happy and achieved one or two things but that still doesnt change the fact that i'm not totally happy.. Everyone wants to be happy always but in life, sadness is very inevitable unless you operate on a very high level of christian spirituality cos according to the bible in Joel 1 vs 12, it says ''the vine is dried up and the fig tree wasteth, the pomegrante tree and the palm tree also. The apple tree and also all the trees of the field are withered because joy is withered from the heart of the sons of man''. So, once things go wrong, we humans are bound to get dampened in spirit, soul and body but if we can brace up and take steps to making the day better, we may just save all the other areas that seem weak and save us from total depression. Though my past 15 hours have been somewhat bad, i won't sit and let fate play its role, i refuse to be sad. Writing this is enough joy to me cos i know i'm speaking out to someone's situation. God help us all. Amen
I guess it really takes heated situations to really bring out the real side of people cos what you think definitely would reflect in your speech and actions.
Somehow, i feel a lil bit of everything.... Hate, disgust, remorse, funk, sadness, revenge, fulfilment, happiness even stupidity and betrayal. All these, all in one super body and brain.. MINE!!
In the past 15 hours, i have concluded unjustly, made irrational decisions, offended man and God, caused some people pain and hurt, made some extremely happy and achieved one or two things but that still doesnt change the fact that i'm not totally happy.. Everyone wants to be happy always but in life, sadness is very inevitable unless you operate on a very high level of christian spirituality cos according to the bible in Joel 1 vs 12, it says ''the vine is dried up and the fig tree wasteth, the pomegrante tree and the palm tree also. The apple tree and also all the trees of the field are withered because joy is withered from the heart of the sons of man''. So, once things go wrong, we humans are bound to get dampened in spirit, soul and body but if we can brace up and take steps to making the day better, we may just save all the other areas that seem weak and save us from total depression. Though my past 15 hours have been somewhat bad, i won't sit and let fate play its role, i refuse to be sad. Writing this is enough joy to me cos i know i'm speaking out to someone's situation. God help us all. Amen
Friday, 8 April 2011
ADEBAYO LAWSON (B-LAWZ)
I wanna celebrate a brother who not only has a passion for what he is doing but also has the heart of beauty for everything concerning images. Yes, he is a short black boy but you can sure tell that his works stand tall and speak for him.
Born October 26th, sometime in the late 80's, in his words to me and i quote, he says....
I am Bayo Lawson, you can call me 'B-Lawz'. I'm a Photographer and a Radio Personality. Through the lens, I've learned how to capture special moments and appreciate the beauty in all things. My Photography has allowed me to show what i love and how i view the world. My images have been described as energetic, fun, hauntingly beautiful,thought provoking, truly original, attractive and other adjectives i have not mentioned. What makes my style so special is the way i mix elements of passion for fashion, love for kids and personal insight. Every occassion is a new chance for me to share with people my passion for modern photojournalistic style Photography. I am passionate about creating photographs to be treasured and shared for years to come. Treat yourself to my wonderful Photography experience and you wonder why you waited too long to have a piece!
Yes, i have has a piece and all i can say is wow!!!! Here are a couple of his works from his just launched website www.iamblawz.com. ENJOY..........
a
No doubt, you can feel the touch of nature in these pictures
Basically, it's not about the money but whatever that is of good value like this has to come with a price.. Check out www.iamblawz.com for more info or you can always holla at me if you need to get through to him.. Bayo, i can like to be your manager o.... lolz!!
Thursday, 7 April 2011
Guard Your Heart
The human heart is very delicate, in it
is where you find the best feelings.
Your heart whether you like it or not is
always intune with your mind. Your
mind is the head factor of your heart.
When your heart is in accordance with
what you wanna do, your mind thinks
it and sets your personality to achieve
it. The Heart is the power house of the
body, without your heart, you can't be
a living beign.. And I know the bible
says guard your tongue cos in there
lies the power of life and death, true.
I'd say, guard heart, it leads to a
healthier mind and life. God bless you
is where you find the best feelings.
Your heart whether you like it or not is
always intune with your mind. Your
mind is the head factor of your heart.
When your heart is in accordance with
what you wanna do, your mind thinks
it and sets your personality to achieve
it. The Heart is the power house of the
body, without your heart, you can't be
a living beign.. And I know the bible
says guard your tongue cos in there
lies the power of life and death, true.
I'd say, guard heart, it leads to a
healthier mind and life. God bless you
Basic Thoughts on Old & New Music
Well, you may say since i was born in the late 80's, i'm a member of the 'New School'.. Well, thats kinda true. You really don't expect me on a normal day to be driving out and vibing to some musical piece from James Brown (R.I.P) or even watching an 007 movie that had Sean Connery or Roger Moore as its main acts.
Times change so does things that follow a trend like music, fashion, technology and even humans. Lol!! Its seriously stale gist if you are just knowing that men of the old days lived longer than men of today. How many people really live over 100 these days? I'm sure you can do the math easy if given the stats.
Back to the main idea, people like My father say there's nothing to be learnt in today's kinda music (well, i believe he's talking about rap music) and then he goes; can you even hear what they say? I was listening to a song off Chris Brown's album Fame; Look at me now featuring Busta Rhymes and Lil Wayne and he bumped into the room at Busta's verse. He simply just shook his head and walked away. Since that day, he has been looking at me funny like i'm crazy or something. But really, what was for their time was for their time and even the bible says, ''Give unto ceaser what belongs to ceaser''. Its our generation so let them seriously allow us be, rather, let me be and quit with the Old School music rocks tag because all that certainly doesn't suit me, i'm sure it doesn't suit you either.
But in the real sense, the main idea is to follow your heart. That your next buddie or co-worker likes jazz isn't a criteria for you to love it too, What suits me may certainly not suit you so if your heart belongs to the Old school, then rock with that and if you belong to the New school, kill it like i do everyday, move with the trend but overall, the trend exists in your heart
Times change so does things that follow a trend like music, fashion, technology and even humans. Lol!! Its seriously stale gist if you are just knowing that men of the old days lived longer than men of today. How many people really live over 100 these days? I'm sure you can do the math easy if given the stats.
Back to the main idea, people like My father say there's nothing to be learnt in today's kinda music (well, i believe he's talking about rap music) and then he goes; can you even hear what they say? I was listening to a song off Chris Brown's album Fame; Look at me now featuring Busta Rhymes and Lil Wayne and he bumped into the room at Busta's verse. He simply just shook his head and walked away. Since that day, he has been looking at me funny like i'm crazy or something. But really, what was for their time was for their time and even the bible says, ''Give unto ceaser what belongs to ceaser''. Its our generation so let them seriously allow us be, rather, let me be and quit with the Old School music rocks tag because all that certainly doesn't suit me, i'm sure it doesn't suit you either.
But in the real sense, the main idea is to follow your heart. That your next buddie or co-worker likes jazz isn't a criteria for you to love it too, What suits me may certainly not suit you so if your heart belongs to the Old school, then rock with that and if you belong to the New school, kill it like i do everyday, move with the trend but overall, the trend exists in your heart
Wednesday, 6 April 2011
Choose Wisely
People are either for you or against you in the race of life. They are either your friends or your enemies. The quality of friends you have will to a long way determine the quality of your destiny. When you surround yourself with mediocres, you will eventually become one. Proverbs 13 vs 20
“Choose your friends wisely. Your enemies will be the ones to choose you.” Yasser Arafat.
You don't have a choice over who becomes your enemy but you do have a choice over who becomes your friend.
In choosing your friends, always look out for these three qualities, the fear of the Almighty, similarity of purpose and responsibilty.
It is the presence or absence of these qualities that will determine if the friendship is a weight that will keep you down or a spring board that will lift you up.
Choose your friends wisely, God guide you
“Choose your friends wisely. Your enemies will be the ones to choose you.” Yasser Arafat.
You don't have a choice over who becomes your enemy but you do have a choice over who becomes your friend.
In choosing your friends, always look out for these three qualities, the fear of the Almighty, similarity of purpose and responsibilty.
It is the presence or absence of these qualities that will determine if the friendship is a weight that will keep you down or a spring board that will lift you up.
Choose your friends wisely, God guide you
Tuesday, 5 April 2011
Friendships
Jesus Christ. . . It's been a long, hot, tiresome and boring day. Had a couple of things i had to stay home and supervise so no going out today and that makes it day 2 on that path. It's been boring staying around artisans, tryna make sure they get it all done right so on the other end, i bore myself because whatever they do is none in my interest. Worsening it all, the last time i saw the lights come on in this house was 5am yesterday so that leaves me with just this tiny 6300 and i was so suprised when blogspot.com opened on it. So i'm writing you from my humble tiny mobile phone. . Isn't that awesome. . By the way, what do we think of friendships? Can one really survive without friends? Or can one strictly stick to having only same sex friends or the other way round? Which do you think is more appropriate? Personally, either sex is ok to me cos i sure don't buy the idea that one can survive without friends. Everyone needs a friend once in a while and thats what gradually results to relationships and marriages in most cases. I prefer friend of the opposite sex basically because there is more understanding and jealousy is very minimal. It's normal that your best friends probably have best friends so whatever you tell them, they tell others but we still have to understand that it's not everything that happens to us that we tell others. We have to be very calculated in our actions and the way we handle friendships even as simple as it seems, if not guided and watched closely, could bring a lot of harm and sadness. Recently, a good friend of mine told me she is laid back cos of how i spoke to her sometime ago when we had some issues pending. Well, i thought she'd have known my kinda person and understood me regardless of whatever mood i'm in but guess i was wrong. And efforts to make things right just seemed silly of me cos she had moved on to other things. You know, that point in time when a dear friend tells you ''it's d part of me that heals slow, you put me off and now we are cool, i can't seem to leave things that kept me solace while you were gone''. . Now, thats heart breaking but like i always say, life goes on, it's all good. So my dear reader, keep your friends closer. To hell with that saying of keeping enemies closer. In the real sense of life, it's those that know you that can bring you down. Be yourself and never be quick to jump into conclusions, i try not to. God bless you
Sunday, 3 April 2011
Learn the Hard Way
I am a living witness of God's faithfulness in the land of the living, many things which another random person could have gone through and not survived, I went through and I'm still standing today. Not just standing, alive and healthy. Reading through today's page in the Open Heavens daily devotional, the topic says "Simply Believe". "Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all things we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us" Ephesians 3 vs 20.
The heart of God is open to us all if only we would just believe.. I saw someone's update somewhere yesterday and it read; Don't tell God how big your problems are, tell your problems how big your God is. This is exactly what we should be doing.
The devil is on the prowl, looking for who to devour, it is even worse for christians who aren't so strong in faith because we are the same people who sing "satan don fall for gutter, match am match am".. When you are done matching him and you backslide from the kingdom of God and His ways, the devil resumes full time torment on your life with his agents and in most known cases, it starts with anger and frustration then to sickness then finally the loss of ones life. Christ keeps knocking, when we don't open up to Him, he sits at the door to our heart, waiting with His legs crossed like a man locked out his home all through the night by his kids who had gone partying. But the difference is, even when we finally open up, He doesn't yell at us or ground us or subject us to punishment for leaving Him in the cold, He embraces us.
Dear reader, we don't have to learn the hard way, lose something dear to us before we decide to go the right way. I'm sure no pastor but I realized it'd do no harm to pass on a few thoughts to someone who might need it out there. Hasten your steps, He is sitting, waiting for you.
By the way, I'm sure y'all heard about the postponement of the Senatorial elections slated for today.. All we can hope for is that it is free and fair cos with all this pushing, what are the masses really gonna think? That their votes are still gonna be relevant in securing a good leader to the seat? I really don't know but I urge you all to play your part. Clear your conscience. God loves you!!
The heart of God is open to us all if only we would just believe.. I saw someone's update somewhere yesterday and it read; Don't tell God how big your problems are, tell your problems how big your God is. This is exactly what we should be doing.
The devil is on the prowl, looking for who to devour, it is even worse for christians who aren't so strong in faith because we are the same people who sing "satan don fall for gutter, match am match am".. When you are done matching him and you backslide from the kingdom of God and His ways, the devil resumes full time torment on your life with his agents and in most known cases, it starts with anger and frustration then to sickness then finally the loss of ones life. Christ keeps knocking, when we don't open up to Him, he sits at the door to our heart, waiting with His legs crossed like a man locked out his home all through the night by his kids who had gone partying. But the difference is, even when we finally open up, He doesn't yell at us or ground us or subject us to punishment for leaving Him in the cold, He embraces us.
Dear reader, we don't have to learn the hard way, lose something dear to us before we decide to go the right way. I'm sure no pastor but I realized it'd do no harm to pass on a few thoughts to someone who might need it out there. Hasten your steps, He is sitting, waiting for you.
By the way, I'm sure y'all heard about the postponement of the Senatorial elections slated for today.. All we can hope for is that it is free and fair cos with all this pushing, what are the masses really gonna think? That their votes are still gonna be relevant in securing a good leader to the seat? I really don't know but I urge you all to play your part. Clear your conscience. God loves you!!
Menthor: John D. Rockefella
John Davison Rockefeller I
John D. Rockefeller in 1885
Born
July 8, 1839
Richford, New York, USA
Died
May 23, 1937 (aged 97)
The Casements, Ormond Beach, Florida,
USA
Resting place
Lake View Cemetery, Cleveland, Ohio
41.511°N 81.591°W
Nationality
American
Occupation
oil tycoon; Chairman of Standard Oil
Company; investor; philanthropist
Net worth
$663.4 billion in 2007 dollars,
according to List of wealthiest
historical figures, based on information
from Forbes – February 2008.
Religion
Baptist
John Davison Rockefeller I (July 8,
1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American
oil magnate. Rockefeller
revolutionized the petroleum industry
and defined the structure of modern
philanthropy. In 1870, he founded the
Standard Oil Company and aggressively
ran it until he officially retired in 1897.
[1] Standard Oil began as an Ohio
partnership formed by John D.
Rockefeller, his brother William
Rockefeller, Henry Flagler, Jabez
Bostwick, chemist Samuel Andrews,
and a silent partner, Stephen V.
Harkness. As kerosene and gasoline
grew in importance, Rockefeller's
wealth soared, and he became the
world's richest man and first American
worth more than a billion dollars.[2]
Adjusting for inflation, he is often
regarded as the richest person in
history.[3][4][5][6]
Rockefeller spent the last 40 years of
his life in retirement. His fortune was
mainly used to create the modern
systematic approach of targeted
philanthropy with foundations that
had a major effect on medicine,
education, and scientific research.[7]
His foundations pioneered the
development of medical research, and
were instrumental in the eradication
of hookworm and yellow fever. He is
also the founder of both the University
of Chicago and Rockefeller University.
He was a devoted Northern Baptist and
supported many church-based
institutions throughout his life.
Rockefeller adhered to total
abstinence from alcohol and tobacco
throughout his life.[8]
He had four daughters and one son;
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. "Junior" was
largely entrusted with the supervision
of the foundations.
Early life and business career
Rockefeller was the second of six
children born in Richford, New York, to
William Avery Rockefeller (November
13, 1810 – May 11, 1906) and Eliza
Davison (September 12, 1813 – March
28, 1889). Genealogists trace some of
his ancestors to French Huguenots who
fled to Germany in the 17th century.[9]
[10] His father, first a lumberman, then
a traveling salesman, billed himself as
a “botanic physician” and sold elixirs.
The locals referred to the mysterious
but fun-loving man as "Big Bill," and
"Devil Bill".[11] He was a sworn foe of
conventional morality, who had opted
for a vagabond existence and who
returned to his family infrequently.
Throughout his life, William Avery
Rockefeller expended considerable
energy on tricks and schemes and
avoided plain hard work.[12] Eliza, a
homemaker and devout Baptist,
struggled to maintain a semblance of
stability at home, as William was
frequently gone for extended periods.
She also put up with his philandering
and his double life, which included
bigamy.[13] Thrifty by nature and
necessity, she taught her son that
"willful waste makes woeful
want."[14] Young Rockefeller did his
share of the regular household chores,
and earned extra money raising
turkeys, selling potatoes and candy,
and eventually loaning small sums of
money to neighbors. He followed his
father ’s advice to "trade dishes for
platters", and always get the better
part of any deal. Big Bill once bragged,
"I cheat my boys every chance I get. I
want to make ‘em sharp."[15]
In spite of his father’s absences and
frequent family moves, young
Rockefeller was a well-behaved,
serious and studious boy. His
contemporaries described him as
reserved, earnest, religious,
methodical, and discreet. He was an
excellent debater, and expressed
himself precisely. He also had a deep
love of music, and dreamed of it as a
possible career.[16] Early on, he
displayed an excellent mind for
numbers and detailed accounting.
Rockefeller age 18, circa 1857
When he was a boy, his family moved
to Moravia, New York and, in 1851, to
Owego, where he attended Owego
Academy. In 1853, his family moved to
Strongsville, a suburb of Cleveland.
Rockefeller attended Cleveland's
Central High School and then took a ten
week business course at Folsom's
Commercial College where he studied
bookkeeping.[17] In September 1855,
when Rockefeller was sixteen, he got
his first job as an assistant bookkeeper,
working for a small produce
commission firm called Hewitt &
Tuttle. He worked long hours and
delighted, as he later recalled, in“all
the methods and systems of the
office”.[18] He was particularly adept
at calculating transportation costs,
which served him well later in his
career. The full salary for his first three
months' work was $50 (50 cents a day).
[19] From the beginning, he donated
about 6% of his earnings to charity,
which increased to 10% by the age of
twenty, when he tithed to his Baptist
church.[20]
In 1859, Rockefeller went into the
produce commission business with a
partner, Maurice B. Clark, and they
raised $4,000 in capital. Rockefeller
went steadily ahead in business from
there, making money each year of his
career.[21] After wholesale foodstuffs,
the partners built an oil refinery in
1863 in "The Flats", then Cleveland's
burgeoning industrial area. The
refinery was directly owned by
Andrews, Clark & Company, which was
composed of Clark & Rockefeller,
chemist Samuel Andrews, and M. B.
Clark's two brothers. The commercial
oil business was in its infancy. Whale
oil had become too expensive for the
masses, and a cheaper, general-
purpose lighting fuel was needed.[22]
While his brother Frank fought in the
Civil War, Rockefeller tended his
business and hired substitute soldiers.
He gave money to the Union cause, as
did many rich Northerners who
avoided combat.[23] In February 1865,
in what was later described by oil
industry historian Daniel Yergin as a
"critical" action, Rockefeller bought
out the Clark brothers for $72,500 at
auction, and established the firm of
Rockefeller & Andrews. Rockefeller
said, "It was the day that determined
my career."[24] He was well-
positioned to take advantage of post-
war prosperity and the great
expansion westward, fostered by the
growth of railroads and an oil-fueled
economy. He borrowed heavily,
reinvested profits, adapted rapidly to
changing markets, and fielded
observers to track the quickly
expanding industry.[25]
Marriage and family
In 1864, Rockefeller married Laura
Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. They had
four daughters and one son together.
He said later, "Her judgment was
always better than mine. Without her
keen advice, I would be a poor
man."[21]
Beliefs
Rockefeller became a lifelong member
of the then-new Republican Party, and
a strong supporter of Abraham Lincoln
and the party’s abolitionist wing. He
was a faithful congregant of the Erie
Street Baptist Mission Church, where he
taught Sunday school, and served as a
trustee, clerk, and occasional janitor.
[26] Religion was a guiding force
throughout his life, and Rockefeller
believed it to be the source of his
success. As he said, "God gave me
money", and he did not apologize for
it. He felt at ease and righteous
following John Wesley’s dictum, "gain
all you can, save all you can, and give
all you can."[27]
Oil
In 1866, his brother William
Rockefeller built another refinery in
Cleveland and brought John into the
partnership. In 1867, Henry M. Flagler
became a partner, and the firm of
Rockefeller, Andrews & Flagler was
established. By 1868, with Rockefeller
continuing practices of borrowing and
reinvesting profits, controlling cost and
using refineries' waste, the company
owned two Cleveland refineries and a
marketing subsidiary in New York; it
was the largest oil refinery in the
world.[28][29] Rockefeller, Andrews &
Flagler was the predecessor of the
Standard Oil Company.
Standard Oil
Main article: Standard Oil
John D. Rockefeller ca. 1875
By the end of the American Civil War,
Cleveland was one of the five main
refining centers in the U.S. (besides
Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New York,
and the region in northwestern
Pennsylvania where most of the oil
originated). In June 1870, Rockefeller
formed Standard Oil of Ohio, which
rapidly became the most profitable
refiner in Ohio. Standard Oil grew to
become one of the largest shippers of
oil and kerosene in the country. The
railroads were fighting fiercely for
traffic and, in an attempt to create a
cartel to control freight rates, formed
the South Improvement Company, in
collusion with Standard and other oil
men outside the main oil centers.[30]
The cartel received preferential
treatment as a high-volume shipper,
which included not just steep rebates
of up to 50% for their product, but also
rebates for the shipment of competing
products.[30] Part of this scheme was
the announcement of sharply
increased freight charges. This touched
off a firestorm of protest from
independent oil well owners,
including boycotts and vandalism,
which eventually led to the discovery
of Standard Oil's part in the deal. A
major New York refiner, Charles Pratt
and Company, headed by Charles Pratt
and Henry H. Rogers, led the
opposition to this plan, and railroads
soon backed off. Pennsylvania revoked
the cartel ’s charter and equal rates
were restored for the time being.[31]
Undeterred, though vilified for the first
time by the press, Rockefeller
continued with his self-reinforcing
cycle of buying competing refiners,
improving the efficiency of his
operations, pressing for discounts on
oil shipments, undercutting his
competition, making secret deals,
raising investment pools, and buying
rivals out. In less than four months in
1872, in what was later known as the
"Cleveland Conquest" or "Cleveland
Massacre", Standard Oil had absorbed
22 of its 26 Cleveland competitors.[32]
Eventually, even his former
antagonists, Pratt and Rogers, saw the
futility of continuing to compete
against Standard Oil: in 1874, they
made a secret agreement with their
old nemesis to be acquired. Pratt and
Rogers became Rockefeller's partners.
Rogers, in particular, became one of
Rockefeller's key men in the formation
of the Standard Oil Trust. Pratt's son,
Charles Millard Pratt became Secretary
of Standard Oil. For many of his
competitors, Rockefeller had merely to
show them his books so they could see
what they were up against, then make
them a decent offer. If they refused his
offer, he told them he would run them
into bankruptcy, then cheaply buy up
their assets at auction. He saw himself
as the industry ’s savior, "an angel of
mercy", absorbing the weak and
making the industry as a whole
stronger, more efficient, and more
competitive.[33] Standard was
growing horizontally and vertically. It
added its own pipelines, tank cars, and
home delivery network. It kept oil
prices low to stave off competitors,
made its products affordable to the
average household, and to increase
market penetration, sometimes sold
below cost if necessary. It developed
over 300 oil-based products from tar to
paint to Vaseline to chewing gum. By
the end of the 1870s, Standard was
refining over 90% of the oil in the U.S.
[34] Rockefeller had already become a
millionaire.[35]
Standard Oil Trust Certificate 1896
In 1877, Standard clashed with the
Pennsylvania Railroad, its chief hauler.
Rockefeller had envisioned the use of
pipelines as an alternative transport
system for oil and began a campaign to
build and acquire them.[36] The
railroad, seeing Standard’s incursion
into the transportation and pipeline
fields, struck back and formed a
subsidiary to buy and build oil
refineries and pipelines.[37] Standard
countered and held back its shipments,
and with the help of other railroads,
started a price war that dramatically
reduced freight payments and caused
labor unrest as well. Rockefeller
eventually prevailed and the railroad
sold all its oil interests to Standard. But
in the aftermath of that battle, in 1879
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
indicted Rockefeller on charges of
monopolizing the oil trade, starting an
avalanche of similar court proceedings
in other states and making a national
issue of Standard Oil ’s business
practices.[38]
Monopoly
Standard Oil gradually gained almost
complete control of oil refining and
marketing in the United States through
horizontal integration. In the kerosene
industry, Standard Oil replaced the old
distribution system with its own
vertical system. It supplied kerosene
by tank cars that brought the fuel to
local markets and tank wagons then
delivered to retail customers, thus
bypassing the existing network of
wholesale jobbers.[39] Despite
improving the quality and availability
of kerosene products while greatly
reducing their cost to the public (the
price of kerosene dropped by nearly
80% over the life of the company),
Standard Oil's business practices
created intense controversy. Standard’s
most potent weapons against
competitors were underselling,
differential pricing, and secret
transportation rebates.[40] The firm
was attacked by journalists and
politicians throughout its existence, in
part for these monopolistic methods,
giving momentum to the anti-trust
movement. By 1880, according to the
New York World, Standard Oil was "the
most cruel, impudent, pitiless, and
grasping monopoly that ever fastened
upon a country."[41] To the critics
Rockefeller replied, "In a business so
large as ours...some things are likely to
be done which we cannot approve.
We correct them as soon as they come
to our knowledge.”[41]
At that time, many legislatures had
made it difficult to incorporate in one
state and operate in another. As a
result, Rockefeller and his associates
owned separate corporations across
dozens of states, making their
management of the whole enterprise
rather unwieldy. In 1882, Rockefeller's
lawyers created an innovative form of
corporation to centralize their
holdings, giving birth to the Standard
Oil Trust.[42] The "trust" was a
corporation of corporations, and the
entity's size and wealth drew much
attention. Nine trustees, including
Rockefeller, ran the 41 companies in
the trust.[42] The public and the press
were immediately suspicious of this
new legal entity, but other businesses
seized upon the idea and emulated it,
further inflaming public sentiment.
Standard Oil had gained an aura of
invincibility, always prevailing against
competitors, critics, and political
enemies. It had become the richest,
biggest, most feared business in the
world, seemingly immune to the boom
and bust of the business cycle,
consistently racking up profits year
after year.[43]
Its vast American empire included
20,000 domestic wells, 4,000 miles of
pipeline, 5,000 tank cars, and over
100,000 employees.[43] Its share of
world oil refining topped out above
90% but slowly dropped to about 80%
for the rest of the century.[44] In spite
of the formation of the trust and its
perceived immunity from all
competition, by the 1880s Standard Oil
had passed its peak of power over the
world oil market. Rockefeller finally
gave up his dream of controlling all the
world’s oil refining, he admitted later,
“We realized that public sentiment
would be against us if we actually
refined all the oil.”[44] Over time
foreign competition and new finds
abroad eroded his dominance. In the
early 1880s, Rockefeller created one of
his most important innovations. Rather
than try to influence the price of crude
oil directly, Standard Oil had been
exercising indirect control by altering
oil storage charges to suit market
conditions. Rockefeller then decided
to order the issuance of certificates
against oil stored in its pipelines. These
certificates became traded by
speculators, thus creating the first oil-
futures market which effectively set
spot market prices from then on. The
National Petroleum Exchange opened
in Manhattan in late 1882 to facilitate
the oil futures trading.[45]
Even though 85% of world crude
production was still coming from
Pennsylvania wells in the 1880s,
overseas drilling in Russia and Asia
began to reach the world market.[46]
Robert Nobel had established his own
refining enterprise in the abundant
and cheaper Russian oil fields,
including the region ’s first pipeline
and the world’s first oil tanker. The
Paris Rothschilds jumped into the fray
providing financing.[47] Additional
fields were discovered in Burma and
Java. Even more critical, the invention
of the light bulb gradually began to
erode the dominance of kerosene for
illumination. But Standard Oil adapted,
developing its own European
presence, expanding into natural gas
production in the U.S. then into
gasoline for automobiles, which until
then had been considered a waste
product.[48]
Standard Oil moved its headquarters to
New York City at 26 Broadway and
Rockefeller became a central figure in
the city ’s business community. He
bought a personal residence in 1884
on 54th street near the mansions of
other magnates such as William
Vanderbilt. Despite personal threats
and constant pleas for charity,
Rockefeller took the new elevated
train to his downtown office daily.[49]
In 1887, Congress created the
Interstate Commerce Commission
which was tasked with enforcing
equal rates for all railroad freight, but
by then Standard was depending more
on pipeline transport.[citation needed]
More threatening to Standard’s power
was the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890,
originally used to control unions, but
later central to the breakup of the
Standard Oil trust.[50] Ohio was
especially vigorous in applying its state
anti-trust laws, and finally forced a
separation of Standard Oil of Ohio from
the rest of the company in 1892, the
first step in the dissolution of the trust.
[50]
In the 1890s, Rockefeller expanded
into iron ore and ore transportation,
forcing a collision with steel magnate
Andrew Carnegie, and their
competition became a major subject of
the newspapers and the cartoonists.
[51] Rockefeller also went on a
massive buying spree acquiring land
for crude oil production in Ohio,
Indiana, and West Virginia, as the
original Pennsylvania oil fields began
to play out.[52] Amidst the frenetic
expansion, Rockefeller began to think
of retirement. The daily management
of the trust was turned over to John
Dustin Archbold and Rockefeller
bought a new estate, Pocantico Hills,
north of New York City, turning more
time to leisure activities including the
new sports of bicycling and golf.[53]
Upon his ascent to the presidency,
Theodore Roosevelt initiated dozens
of suits under the Sherman Antitrust
Act and coaxed reforms out of
Congress. In 1901, U.S. Steel, now
controlled by J. Pierpont Morgan,
having bought Andrew Carnegie’s steel
assets, offered to buy Standard’s iron
interests as well. A deal brokered by
Henry Clay Frick exchanged Standard’s
iron interests for U.S. Steel stock and
gave Rockefeller and his son
membership on the company ’s board
of directors. In full retirement at age
63, Rockefeller earned over $58
million in investments in 1902.[54]
One of the most effective attacks on
Rockefeller and his firm was the 1904
publication of The History of the
Standard Oil Company, by Ida Tarbell, a
leading muckraker. She documented
the company’s espionage, price wars,
heavy-handed marketing tactics, and
courtroom evasions.[55] Although her
work prompted a huge backlash
against the company, Tarbell claims to
have been surprised at its magnitude.
“ I never had an animus against their
size and wealth, never objected to
their corporate form. I was willing that
they should combine and grow as big
and wealthy as they could, but only by
legitimate means. But they had never
played fair, and that ruined their
greatness for me.” (Tarbell's father had
been driven out of the oil business
during the South Improvement
Company affair.)
Rockefeller responded by calling her
“ Miss Tarbarrel” in private but held
back in public saying only, “not a word
about that misguided woman.”[55]
Instead Rockefeller began a publicity
campaign to put his company and
himself in a better light. Though he
had long maintained a policy of active
silence with the press, he decided to
make himself more accessible and
responded with conciliatory comments
such as, “capital and labor are both
wild forces which require intelligent
legislation to hold them in
restriction.”[56] He wrote and
published his memoirs beginning in
1908.
Rockefeller as an industrial emperor,
1901 cartoon from Puck magazine
Critics found his writing to be sanitized
and disingenuous and thought that
statements such as “the underlying,
essential element of success in
business is to follow the established
laws of high-class dealing ” seemed to
be at odds with his true business
methods.[56]
Rockefeller and his son continued to
consolidate their oil interests as best as
they could until New Jersey, in 1909,
changed its incorporation laws to
effectively allow a re-creation of the
trust in the form of a single holding
company. Rockefeller retained his
nominal title as president until 1911
and he kept his stock. At last in 1911,
the Supreme Court of the United States
found Standard Oil Company of New
Jersey in violation of the Sherman
Antitrust Act. By then the trust still had
a 70% market share of the refined oil
market but only 14% of the U.S. crude
oil supply.[57] The court ruled that the
trust originated in illegal monopoly
practices and ordered it to be broken
up into 34 new companies. These
included, among many others,
Continental Oil, which became Conoco,
now part of ConocoPhillips; Standard of
Indiana, which became Amoco, now
part of BP; Standard of California,
which became Chevron; Standard of
New Jersey, which became Esso (and
later, Exxon), now part of ExxonMobil;
Standard of New York, which became
Mobil, now part of ExxonMobil; and
Standard of Ohio, which became Sohio,
now part of BP. Pennzoil and Chevron
have remained independent.[58]
Rockefeller, who had rarely sold
shares, held over 25% of Standard’s
stock at the time of the breakup.[59]
He, as well as all stockholders,
received proportionate shares in each
of the 34 companies. In the aftermath,
Rockefeller ’s control over the oil
industry was somewhat reduced but
over the next ten years, the breakup
also proved immensely profitable for
him. The companies ’ combined net
worth rose fivefold and Rockefeller’s
personal wealth jumped to $
900,000,000.[57]
Philanthropy
From his very first paycheck,
Rockefeller tithed ten percent of his
earnings to his church. His church was
later affiliated with the Northern
Baptist Convention, which formed from
American Baptists in the North with
ties to their historic missions to
establish schools and colleges for
freedmen in the South after the
American Civil War. As Rockefeller's
wealth grew, so did his giving,
primarily to educational and public
health causes, but also for basic
science and the arts. He was advised
primarily by Frederick Taylor Gates
after 1891, and, after 1897, also by his
son.
Rockefeller believed in the Efficiency
Movement, arguing that: "To help an
inefficient, ill-located, unnecessary
school is a waste...it is highly probable
that enough money has been
squandered on unwise educational
projects to have built up a national
system of higher education adequate
to our needs, if the money had been
properly directed to that end."
He and his advisers invented the
conditional grant, which required the
recipient to "root the institution in the
affections of as many people as
possible who, as contributors, become
personally concerned, and thereafter
may be counted on to give to the
institution their watchful interest and
cooperation."[60]
In 1884, Rockefeller provided major
funding for a college in Atlanta for
African-American women, which
became Spelman College (named for
Rockefeller's in-laws who were ardent
abolitionists before the Civil War). The
oldest existing building on Spelman's
campus, Rockefeller Hall, is named
after him. Rockefeller also gave
considerable donations to Denison
University and other Baptist colleges.
Rockefeller gave $80 million to the
University of Chicago under William
Rainey Harper, turning a small Baptist
college into a world-class institution
by 1900.
His General Education Board, founded
in 1902, was established to promote
education at all levels everywhere in
the country. In keeping with the
historic missions of the Baptists, it was
especially active in supporting black
schools in the South.
His General Education Board made a
dramatic impact by funding the
recommendations of the Flexner
Report of 1910. The study had been
undertaken by the Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching
; it revolutionized the study of
medicine in the United States.
Rockefeller also provided financial
support to such " Ivy League"
institutions as Yale, Harvard, Columbia,
Brown, Bryn Mawr, Wellesley and
Vassar.
Rockefeller and his son John D.
Rockefeller, Jr. in 1915
Despite his personal preference for
homeopathy, Rockefeller, on Gates's
advice, became one of the first great
benefactors of medical science. In
1901, he founded the Rockefeller
Institute for Medical Research in New
York City. It changed its name to
Rockefeller University in 1965, after
expanding its mission to include
graduate education. It claims a
connection to 23 Nobel laureates. He
founded the Rockefeller Sanitary
Commission in 1909, an organization
that eventually eradicated the
hookworm disease, which had long
plagued rural areas of the American
South.
He created the Rockefeller Foundation
in 1913 to continue and expand the
scope of the work of the Sanitary
Commission, which was closed in 1915.
He gave nearly $250 million to the
foundation, which focused on public
health, medical training, and the arts. It
endowed Johns Hopkins School of
Hygiene and Public Health
, the first of its kind. It also built the
Peking Union Medical College in China
into a great institution. The foundation
helped in World War I war relief, and it
employed William Lyon Mackenzie
King of Canada to study industrial
relations.
Rockefeller's fourth main philanthropy,
the Laura Spelman Rockefeller
Memorial Foundation, was created in
1918. Through this, he supported work
in the social studies; this was later
absorbed into the Rockefeller
Foundation. In total Rockefeller
donated about $550 million.
Rockefeller became well known in his
later life for the practice of giving
dimes to adults and nickels to children
wherever he went. He even gave
dimes as a playful gesture to wealthy
men, such as tire mogul Harvey
Firestone.[61]
John D. Rockefeller's painting by John
Singer Sargent in 1917
As a youth, Rockefeller reportedly said
that his two great ambitions were to
make $100,000 and to live 100 years.
Death
Rockefeller died of arteriosclerosis on
May 23, 1937, two months shy of his
98th birthday,[62][63] at the
Casements, his home in Ormond Beach,
Florida. He was buried in Lake View
Cemetery in Cleveland.
Legacy
Rockefeller had a long and
controversial career in the industry
followed by a long career in
philanthropy. His image is an amalgam
of all of these experiences and the
many ways he was viewed by his
contemporaries. These contemporaries
include his former competitors, many
of whom were driven to ruin, but
many others of whom sold out at a
profit (or a profitable stake in Standard
Oil, as Rockefeller often offered his
shares as payment for a business), and
quite a few of whom became very
wealthy as managers as well as
owners in Standard Oil. They also
include politicians and writers, some of
whom served Rockefeller's interests,
and some of whom built their careers
by fighting Rockefeller and the " robber
barons".
Biographer Allan Nevins, answering
Rockefeller's enemies, concluded:
“
The rise of the Standard Oil men to
great wealth was not from poverty. It
was not meteor-like, but accomplished
over a quarter of a century by
courageous venturing in a field so risky
that most large capitalists avoided it,
by arduous labors, and by more
sagacious and farsighted planning than
had been applied to any other
American industry. The oil fortunes of
1894 were not larger than steel
fortunes, banking fortunes, and
railroad fortunes made in similar
periods. But it is the assertion that the
Standard magnates gained their
wealth by appropriating "the property
of others" that most challenges our
attention. We have abundant evidence
that Rockefeller's consistent policy was
to offer fair terms to competitors and
to buy them out, for cash, stock, or
both, at fair appraisals; we have the
statement of one impartial historian
that Rockefeller was decidedly "more
humane toward competitors" than
Carnegie; we have the conclusion of
another that his wealth was "the least
tainted of all the great fortunes of his
day."[64]
”
Biographer Ron Chernow wrote of
Rockefeller:
“
What makes him problematic—and
why he continues to inspire
ambivalent reactions —is that his good
side was every bit as good as his bad
side was bad. Seldom has history
produced such a contradictory figure.
[65]
”
Notwithstanding these varied aspects
of his public life, Rockefeller may
ultimately be remembered simply for
the raw size of his wealth. In 1902, an
audit showed Rockefeller was worth
about $200 million —compared to the
total national GDP of $24 billion then.
[66] His wealth continued to grow
significantly (in line with U.S.
economic growth) after as the demand
for gasoline soared, eventually
reaching about $900 million on the
eve of the First World War, including
significant interests in banking,
shipping, mining, railroads, and other
industries. According to the New York
Times obituary, “it was estimated after
Mr. Rockefeller retired from business
that he had accumulated close to $
1,500,000,000 out of the earnings of
the Standard Oil trust and out of his
other investments. This was probably
the greatest amount of wealth that any
private citizen had ever been able to
accumulate by his own efforts.”[67] By
the time of his death in 1937,
Rockefeller's remaining fortune,
largely tied up in permanent family
trusts, was estimated at $1.4 billion,
while the total national GDP was $92
billion.[68] According to some
methods of wealth calculation,
Rockefeller's net worth over the last
decades of his life would easily place
him as the wealthiest known person in
recent history. As a percentage of the
United States' GDP, no other American
fortune — including those of Bill Gates
or Sam Walton — would even come
close
John D. Rockefeller in 1885
Born
July 8, 1839
Richford, New York, USA
Died
May 23, 1937 (aged 97)
The Casements, Ormond Beach, Florida,
USA
Resting place
Lake View Cemetery, Cleveland, Ohio
41.511°N 81.591°W
Nationality
American
Occupation
oil tycoon; Chairman of Standard Oil
Company; investor; philanthropist
Net worth
$663.4 billion in 2007 dollars,
according to List of wealthiest
historical figures, based on information
from Forbes – February 2008.
Religion
Baptist
John Davison Rockefeller I (July 8,
1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American
oil magnate. Rockefeller
revolutionized the petroleum industry
and defined the structure of modern
philanthropy. In 1870, he founded the
Standard Oil Company and aggressively
ran it until he officially retired in 1897.
[1] Standard Oil began as an Ohio
partnership formed by John D.
Rockefeller, his brother William
Rockefeller, Henry Flagler, Jabez
Bostwick, chemist Samuel Andrews,
and a silent partner, Stephen V.
Harkness. As kerosene and gasoline
grew in importance, Rockefeller's
wealth soared, and he became the
world's richest man and first American
worth more than a billion dollars.[2]
Adjusting for inflation, he is often
regarded as the richest person in
history.[3][4][5][6]
Rockefeller spent the last 40 years of
his life in retirement. His fortune was
mainly used to create the modern
systematic approach of targeted
philanthropy with foundations that
had a major effect on medicine,
education, and scientific research.[7]
His foundations pioneered the
development of medical research, and
were instrumental in the eradication
of hookworm and yellow fever. He is
also the founder of both the University
of Chicago and Rockefeller University.
He was a devoted Northern Baptist and
supported many church-based
institutions throughout his life.
Rockefeller adhered to total
abstinence from alcohol and tobacco
throughout his life.[8]
He had four daughters and one son;
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. "Junior" was
largely entrusted with the supervision
of the foundations.
Early life and business career
Rockefeller was the second of six
children born in Richford, New York, to
William Avery Rockefeller (November
13, 1810 – May 11, 1906) and Eliza
Davison (September 12, 1813 – March
28, 1889). Genealogists trace some of
his ancestors to French Huguenots who
fled to Germany in the 17th century.[9]
[10] His father, first a lumberman, then
a traveling salesman, billed himself as
a “botanic physician” and sold elixirs.
The locals referred to the mysterious
but fun-loving man as "Big Bill," and
"Devil Bill".[11] He was a sworn foe of
conventional morality, who had opted
for a vagabond existence and who
returned to his family infrequently.
Throughout his life, William Avery
Rockefeller expended considerable
energy on tricks and schemes and
avoided plain hard work.[12] Eliza, a
homemaker and devout Baptist,
struggled to maintain a semblance of
stability at home, as William was
frequently gone for extended periods.
She also put up with his philandering
and his double life, which included
bigamy.[13] Thrifty by nature and
necessity, she taught her son that
"willful waste makes woeful
want."[14] Young Rockefeller did his
share of the regular household chores,
and earned extra money raising
turkeys, selling potatoes and candy,
and eventually loaning small sums of
money to neighbors. He followed his
father ’s advice to "trade dishes for
platters", and always get the better
part of any deal. Big Bill once bragged,
"I cheat my boys every chance I get. I
want to make ‘em sharp."[15]
In spite of his father’s absences and
frequent family moves, young
Rockefeller was a well-behaved,
serious and studious boy. His
contemporaries described him as
reserved, earnest, religious,
methodical, and discreet. He was an
excellent debater, and expressed
himself precisely. He also had a deep
love of music, and dreamed of it as a
possible career.[16] Early on, he
displayed an excellent mind for
numbers and detailed accounting.
Rockefeller age 18, circa 1857
When he was a boy, his family moved
to Moravia, New York and, in 1851, to
Owego, where he attended Owego
Academy. In 1853, his family moved to
Strongsville, a suburb of Cleveland.
Rockefeller attended Cleveland's
Central High School and then took a ten
week business course at Folsom's
Commercial College where he studied
bookkeeping.[17] In September 1855,
when Rockefeller was sixteen, he got
his first job as an assistant bookkeeper,
working for a small produce
commission firm called Hewitt &
Tuttle. He worked long hours and
delighted, as he later recalled, in“all
the methods and systems of the
office”.[18] He was particularly adept
at calculating transportation costs,
which served him well later in his
career. The full salary for his first three
months' work was $50 (50 cents a day).
[19] From the beginning, he donated
about 6% of his earnings to charity,
which increased to 10% by the age of
twenty, when he tithed to his Baptist
church.[20]
In 1859, Rockefeller went into the
produce commission business with a
partner, Maurice B. Clark, and they
raised $4,000 in capital. Rockefeller
went steadily ahead in business from
there, making money each year of his
career.[21] After wholesale foodstuffs,
the partners built an oil refinery in
1863 in "The Flats", then Cleveland's
burgeoning industrial area. The
refinery was directly owned by
Andrews, Clark & Company, which was
composed of Clark & Rockefeller,
chemist Samuel Andrews, and M. B.
Clark's two brothers. The commercial
oil business was in its infancy. Whale
oil had become too expensive for the
masses, and a cheaper, general-
purpose lighting fuel was needed.[22]
While his brother Frank fought in the
Civil War, Rockefeller tended his
business and hired substitute soldiers.
He gave money to the Union cause, as
did many rich Northerners who
avoided combat.[23] In February 1865,
in what was later described by oil
industry historian Daniel Yergin as a
"critical" action, Rockefeller bought
out the Clark brothers for $72,500 at
auction, and established the firm of
Rockefeller & Andrews. Rockefeller
said, "It was the day that determined
my career."[24] He was well-
positioned to take advantage of post-
war prosperity and the great
expansion westward, fostered by the
growth of railroads and an oil-fueled
economy. He borrowed heavily,
reinvested profits, adapted rapidly to
changing markets, and fielded
observers to track the quickly
expanding industry.[25]
Marriage and family
In 1864, Rockefeller married Laura
Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. They had
four daughters and one son together.
He said later, "Her judgment was
always better than mine. Without her
keen advice, I would be a poor
man."[21]
Beliefs
Rockefeller became a lifelong member
of the then-new Republican Party, and
a strong supporter of Abraham Lincoln
and the party’s abolitionist wing. He
was a faithful congregant of the Erie
Street Baptist Mission Church, where he
taught Sunday school, and served as a
trustee, clerk, and occasional janitor.
[26] Religion was a guiding force
throughout his life, and Rockefeller
believed it to be the source of his
success. As he said, "God gave me
money", and he did not apologize for
it. He felt at ease and righteous
following John Wesley’s dictum, "gain
all you can, save all you can, and give
all you can."[27]
Oil
In 1866, his brother William
Rockefeller built another refinery in
Cleveland and brought John into the
partnership. In 1867, Henry M. Flagler
became a partner, and the firm of
Rockefeller, Andrews & Flagler was
established. By 1868, with Rockefeller
continuing practices of borrowing and
reinvesting profits, controlling cost and
using refineries' waste, the company
owned two Cleveland refineries and a
marketing subsidiary in New York; it
was the largest oil refinery in the
world.[28][29] Rockefeller, Andrews &
Flagler was the predecessor of the
Standard Oil Company.
Standard Oil
Main article: Standard Oil
John D. Rockefeller ca. 1875
By the end of the American Civil War,
Cleveland was one of the five main
refining centers in the U.S. (besides
Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New York,
and the region in northwestern
Pennsylvania where most of the oil
originated). In June 1870, Rockefeller
formed Standard Oil of Ohio, which
rapidly became the most profitable
refiner in Ohio. Standard Oil grew to
become one of the largest shippers of
oil and kerosene in the country. The
railroads were fighting fiercely for
traffic and, in an attempt to create a
cartel to control freight rates, formed
the South Improvement Company, in
collusion with Standard and other oil
men outside the main oil centers.[30]
The cartel received preferential
treatment as a high-volume shipper,
which included not just steep rebates
of up to 50% for their product, but also
rebates for the shipment of competing
products.[30] Part of this scheme was
the announcement of sharply
increased freight charges. This touched
off a firestorm of protest from
independent oil well owners,
including boycotts and vandalism,
which eventually led to the discovery
of Standard Oil's part in the deal. A
major New York refiner, Charles Pratt
and Company, headed by Charles Pratt
and Henry H. Rogers, led the
opposition to this plan, and railroads
soon backed off. Pennsylvania revoked
the cartel ’s charter and equal rates
were restored for the time being.[31]
Undeterred, though vilified for the first
time by the press, Rockefeller
continued with his self-reinforcing
cycle of buying competing refiners,
improving the efficiency of his
operations, pressing for discounts on
oil shipments, undercutting his
competition, making secret deals,
raising investment pools, and buying
rivals out. In less than four months in
1872, in what was later known as the
"Cleveland Conquest" or "Cleveland
Massacre", Standard Oil had absorbed
22 of its 26 Cleveland competitors.[32]
Eventually, even his former
antagonists, Pratt and Rogers, saw the
futility of continuing to compete
against Standard Oil: in 1874, they
made a secret agreement with their
old nemesis to be acquired. Pratt and
Rogers became Rockefeller's partners.
Rogers, in particular, became one of
Rockefeller's key men in the formation
of the Standard Oil Trust. Pratt's son,
Charles Millard Pratt became Secretary
of Standard Oil. For many of his
competitors, Rockefeller had merely to
show them his books so they could see
what they were up against, then make
them a decent offer. If they refused his
offer, he told them he would run them
into bankruptcy, then cheaply buy up
their assets at auction. He saw himself
as the industry ’s savior, "an angel of
mercy", absorbing the weak and
making the industry as a whole
stronger, more efficient, and more
competitive.[33] Standard was
growing horizontally and vertically. It
added its own pipelines, tank cars, and
home delivery network. It kept oil
prices low to stave off competitors,
made its products affordable to the
average household, and to increase
market penetration, sometimes sold
below cost if necessary. It developed
over 300 oil-based products from tar to
paint to Vaseline to chewing gum. By
the end of the 1870s, Standard was
refining over 90% of the oil in the U.S.
[34] Rockefeller had already become a
millionaire.[35]
Standard Oil Trust Certificate 1896
In 1877, Standard clashed with the
Pennsylvania Railroad, its chief hauler.
Rockefeller had envisioned the use of
pipelines as an alternative transport
system for oil and began a campaign to
build and acquire them.[36] The
railroad, seeing Standard’s incursion
into the transportation and pipeline
fields, struck back and formed a
subsidiary to buy and build oil
refineries and pipelines.[37] Standard
countered and held back its shipments,
and with the help of other railroads,
started a price war that dramatically
reduced freight payments and caused
labor unrest as well. Rockefeller
eventually prevailed and the railroad
sold all its oil interests to Standard. But
in the aftermath of that battle, in 1879
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
indicted Rockefeller on charges of
monopolizing the oil trade, starting an
avalanche of similar court proceedings
in other states and making a national
issue of Standard Oil ’s business
practices.[38]
Monopoly
Standard Oil gradually gained almost
complete control of oil refining and
marketing in the United States through
horizontal integration. In the kerosene
industry, Standard Oil replaced the old
distribution system with its own
vertical system. It supplied kerosene
by tank cars that brought the fuel to
local markets and tank wagons then
delivered to retail customers, thus
bypassing the existing network of
wholesale jobbers.[39] Despite
improving the quality and availability
of kerosene products while greatly
reducing their cost to the public (the
price of kerosene dropped by nearly
80% over the life of the company),
Standard Oil's business practices
created intense controversy. Standard’s
most potent weapons against
competitors were underselling,
differential pricing, and secret
transportation rebates.[40] The firm
was attacked by journalists and
politicians throughout its existence, in
part for these monopolistic methods,
giving momentum to the anti-trust
movement. By 1880, according to the
New York World, Standard Oil was "the
most cruel, impudent, pitiless, and
grasping monopoly that ever fastened
upon a country."[41] To the critics
Rockefeller replied, "In a business so
large as ours...some things are likely to
be done which we cannot approve.
We correct them as soon as they come
to our knowledge.”[41]
At that time, many legislatures had
made it difficult to incorporate in one
state and operate in another. As a
result, Rockefeller and his associates
owned separate corporations across
dozens of states, making their
management of the whole enterprise
rather unwieldy. In 1882, Rockefeller's
lawyers created an innovative form of
corporation to centralize their
holdings, giving birth to the Standard
Oil Trust.[42] The "trust" was a
corporation of corporations, and the
entity's size and wealth drew much
attention. Nine trustees, including
Rockefeller, ran the 41 companies in
the trust.[42] The public and the press
were immediately suspicious of this
new legal entity, but other businesses
seized upon the idea and emulated it,
further inflaming public sentiment.
Standard Oil had gained an aura of
invincibility, always prevailing against
competitors, critics, and political
enemies. It had become the richest,
biggest, most feared business in the
world, seemingly immune to the boom
and bust of the business cycle,
consistently racking up profits year
after year.[43]
Its vast American empire included
20,000 domestic wells, 4,000 miles of
pipeline, 5,000 tank cars, and over
100,000 employees.[43] Its share of
world oil refining topped out above
90% but slowly dropped to about 80%
for the rest of the century.[44] In spite
of the formation of the trust and its
perceived immunity from all
competition, by the 1880s Standard Oil
had passed its peak of power over the
world oil market. Rockefeller finally
gave up his dream of controlling all the
world’s oil refining, he admitted later,
“We realized that public sentiment
would be against us if we actually
refined all the oil.”[44] Over time
foreign competition and new finds
abroad eroded his dominance. In the
early 1880s, Rockefeller created one of
his most important innovations. Rather
than try to influence the price of crude
oil directly, Standard Oil had been
exercising indirect control by altering
oil storage charges to suit market
conditions. Rockefeller then decided
to order the issuance of certificates
against oil stored in its pipelines. These
certificates became traded by
speculators, thus creating the first oil-
futures market which effectively set
spot market prices from then on. The
National Petroleum Exchange opened
in Manhattan in late 1882 to facilitate
the oil futures trading.[45]
Even though 85% of world crude
production was still coming from
Pennsylvania wells in the 1880s,
overseas drilling in Russia and Asia
began to reach the world market.[46]
Robert Nobel had established his own
refining enterprise in the abundant
and cheaper Russian oil fields,
including the region ’s first pipeline
and the world’s first oil tanker. The
Paris Rothschilds jumped into the fray
providing financing.[47] Additional
fields were discovered in Burma and
Java. Even more critical, the invention
of the light bulb gradually began to
erode the dominance of kerosene for
illumination. But Standard Oil adapted,
developing its own European
presence, expanding into natural gas
production in the U.S. then into
gasoline for automobiles, which until
then had been considered a waste
product.[48]
Standard Oil moved its headquarters to
New York City at 26 Broadway and
Rockefeller became a central figure in
the city ’s business community. He
bought a personal residence in 1884
on 54th street near the mansions of
other magnates such as William
Vanderbilt. Despite personal threats
and constant pleas for charity,
Rockefeller took the new elevated
train to his downtown office daily.[49]
In 1887, Congress created the
Interstate Commerce Commission
which was tasked with enforcing
equal rates for all railroad freight, but
by then Standard was depending more
on pipeline transport.[citation needed]
More threatening to Standard’s power
was the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890,
originally used to control unions, but
later central to the breakup of the
Standard Oil trust.[50] Ohio was
especially vigorous in applying its state
anti-trust laws, and finally forced a
separation of Standard Oil of Ohio from
the rest of the company in 1892, the
first step in the dissolution of the trust.
[50]
In the 1890s, Rockefeller expanded
into iron ore and ore transportation,
forcing a collision with steel magnate
Andrew Carnegie, and their
competition became a major subject of
the newspapers and the cartoonists.
[51] Rockefeller also went on a
massive buying spree acquiring land
for crude oil production in Ohio,
Indiana, and West Virginia, as the
original Pennsylvania oil fields began
to play out.[52] Amidst the frenetic
expansion, Rockefeller began to think
of retirement. The daily management
of the trust was turned over to John
Dustin Archbold and Rockefeller
bought a new estate, Pocantico Hills,
north of New York City, turning more
time to leisure activities including the
new sports of bicycling and golf.[53]
Upon his ascent to the presidency,
Theodore Roosevelt initiated dozens
of suits under the Sherman Antitrust
Act and coaxed reforms out of
Congress. In 1901, U.S. Steel, now
controlled by J. Pierpont Morgan,
having bought Andrew Carnegie’s steel
assets, offered to buy Standard’s iron
interests as well. A deal brokered by
Henry Clay Frick exchanged Standard’s
iron interests for U.S. Steel stock and
gave Rockefeller and his son
membership on the company ’s board
of directors. In full retirement at age
63, Rockefeller earned over $58
million in investments in 1902.[54]
One of the most effective attacks on
Rockefeller and his firm was the 1904
publication of The History of the
Standard Oil Company, by Ida Tarbell, a
leading muckraker. She documented
the company’s espionage, price wars,
heavy-handed marketing tactics, and
courtroom evasions.[55] Although her
work prompted a huge backlash
against the company, Tarbell claims to
have been surprised at its magnitude.
“ I never had an animus against their
size and wealth, never objected to
their corporate form. I was willing that
they should combine and grow as big
and wealthy as they could, but only by
legitimate means. But they had never
played fair, and that ruined their
greatness for me.” (Tarbell's father had
been driven out of the oil business
during the South Improvement
Company affair.)
Rockefeller responded by calling her
“ Miss Tarbarrel” in private but held
back in public saying only, “not a word
about that misguided woman.”[55]
Instead Rockefeller began a publicity
campaign to put his company and
himself in a better light. Though he
had long maintained a policy of active
silence with the press, he decided to
make himself more accessible and
responded with conciliatory comments
such as, “capital and labor are both
wild forces which require intelligent
legislation to hold them in
restriction.”[56] He wrote and
published his memoirs beginning in
1908.
Rockefeller as an industrial emperor,
1901 cartoon from Puck magazine
Critics found his writing to be sanitized
and disingenuous and thought that
statements such as “the underlying,
essential element of success in
business is to follow the established
laws of high-class dealing ” seemed to
be at odds with his true business
methods.[56]
Rockefeller and his son continued to
consolidate their oil interests as best as
they could until New Jersey, in 1909,
changed its incorporation laws to
effectively allow a re-creation of the
trust in the form of a single holding
company. Rockefeller retained his
nominal title as president until 1911
and he kept his stock. At last in 1911,
the Supreme Court of the United States
found Standard Oil Company of New
Jersey in violation of the Sherman
Antitrust Act. By then the trust still had
a 70% market share of the refined oil
market but only 14% of the U.S. crude
oil supply.[57] The court ruled that the
trust originated in illegal monopoly
practices and ordered it to be broken
up into 34 new companies. These
included, among many others,
Continental Oil, which became Conoco,
now part of ConocoPhillips; Standard of
Indiana, which became Amoco, now
part of BP; Standard of California,
which became Chevron; Standard of
New Jersey, which became Esso (and
later, Exxon), now part of ExxonMobil;
Standard of New York, which became
Mobil, now part of ExxonMobil; and
Standard of Ohio, which became Sohio,
now part of BP. Pennzoil and Chevron
have remained independent.[58]
Rockefeller, who had rarely sold
shares, held over 25% of Standard’s
stock at the time of the breakup.[59]
He, as well as all stockholders,
received proportionate shares in each
of the 34 companies. In the aftermath,
Rockefeller ’s control over the oil
industry was somewhat reduced but
over the next ten years, the breakup
also proved immensely profitable for
him. The companies ’ combined net
worth rose fivefold and Rockefeller’s
personal wealth jumped to $
900,000,000.[57]
Philanthropy
From his very first paycheck,
Rockefeller tithed ten percent of his
earnings to his church. His church was
later affiliated with the Northern
Baptist Convention, which formed from
American Baptists in the North with
ties to their historic missions to
establish schools and colleges for
freedmen in the South after the
American Civil War. As Rockefeller's
wealth grew, so did his giving,
primarily to educational and public
health causes, but also for basic
science and the arts. He was advised
primarily by Frederick Taylor Gates
after 1891, and, after 1897, also by his
son.
Rockefeller believed in the Efficiency
Movement, arguing that: "To help an
inefficient, ill-located, unnecessary
school is a waste...it is highly probable
that enough money has been
squandered on unwise educational
projects to have built up a national
system of higher education adequate
to our needs, if the money had been
properly directed to that end."
He and his advisers invented the
conditional grant, which required the
recipient to "root the institution in the
affections of as many people as
possible who, as contributors, become
personally concerned, and thereafter
may be counted on to give to the
institution their watchful interest and
cooperation."[60]
In 1884, Rockefeller provided major
funding for a college in Atlanta for
African-American women, which
became Spelman College (named for
Rockefeller's in-laws who were ardent
abolitionists before the Civil War). The
oldest existing building on Spelman's
campus, Rockefeller Hall, is named
after him. Rockefeller also gave
considerable donations to Denison
University and other Baptist colleges.
Rockefeller gave $80 million to the
University of Chicago under William
Rainey Harper, turning a small Baptist
college into a world-class institution
by 1900.
His General Education Board, founded
in 1902, was established to promote
education at all levels everywhere in
the country. In keeping with the
historic missions of the Baptists, it was
especially active in supporting black
schools in the South.
His General Education Board made a
dramatic impact by funding the
recommendations of the Flexner
Report of 1910. The study had been
undertaken by the Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching
; it revolutionized the study of
medicine in the United States.
Rockefeller also provided financial
support to such " Ivy League"
institutions as Yale, Harvard, Columbia,
Brown, Bryn Mawr, Wellesley and
Vassar.
Rockefeller and his son John D.
Rockefeller, Jr. in 1915
Despite his personal preference for
homeopathy, Rockefeller, on Gates's
advice, became one of the first great
benefactors of medical science. In
1901, he founded the Rockefeller
Institute for Medical Research in New
York City. It changed its name to
Rockefeller University in 1965, after
expanding its mission to include
graduate education. It claims a
connection to 23 Nobel laureates. He
founded the Rockefeller Sanitary
Commission in 1909, an organization
that eventually eradicated the
hookworm disease, which had long
plagued rural areas of the American
South.
He created the Rockefeller Foundation
in 1913 to continue and expand the
scope of the work of the Sanitary
Commission, which was closed in 1915.
He gave nearly $250 million to the
foundation, which focused on public
health, medical training, and the arts. It
endowed Johns Hopkins School of
Hygiene and Public Health
, the first of its kind. It also built the
Peking Union Medical College in China
into a great institution. The foundation
helped in World War I war relief, and it
employed William Lyon Mackenzie
King of Canada to study industrial
relations.
Rockefeller's fourth main philanthropy,
the Laura Spelman Rockefeller
Memorial Foundation, was created in
1918. Through this, he supported work
in the social studies; this was later
absorbed into the Rockefeller
Foundation. In total Rockefeller
donated about $550 million.
Rockefeller became well known in his
later life for the practice of giving
dimes to adults and nickels to children
wherever he went. He even gave
dimes as a playful gesture to wealthy
men, such as tire mogul Harvey
Firestone.[61]
John D. Rockefeller's painting by John
Singer Sargent in 1917
As a youth, Rockefeller reportedly said
that his two great ambitions were to
make $100,000 and to live 100 years.
Death
Rockefeller died of arteriosclerosis on
May 23, 1937, two months shy of his
98th birthday,[62][63] at the
Casements, his home in Ormond Beach,
Florida. He was buried in Lake View
Cemetery in Cleveland.
Legacy
Rockefeller had a long and
controversial career in the industry
followed by a long career in
philanthropy. His image is an amalgam
of all of these experiences and the
many ways he was viewed by his
contemporaries. These contemporaries
include his former competitors, many
of whom were driven to ruin, but
many others of whom sold out at a
profit (or a profitable stake in Standard
Oil, as Rockefeller often offered his
shares as payment for a business), and
quite a few of whom became very
wealthy as managers as well as
owners in Standard Oil. They also
include politicians and writers, some of
whom served Rockefeller's interests,
and some of whom built their careers
by fighting Rockefeller and the " robber
barons".
Biographer Allan Nevins, answering
Rockefeller's enemies, concluded:
“
The rise of the Standard Oil men to
great wealth was not from poverty. It
was not meteor-like, but accomplished
over a quarter of a century by
courageous venturing in a field so risky
that most large capitalists avoided it,
by arduous labors, and by more
sagacious and farsighted planning than
had been applied to any other
American industry. The oil fortunes of
1894 were not larger than steel
fortunes, banking fortunes, and
railroad fortunes made in similar
periods. But it is the assertion that the
Standard magnates gained their
wealth by appropriating "the property
of others" that most challenges our
attention. We have abundant evidence
that Rockefeller's consistent policy was
to offer fair terms to competitors and
to buy them out, for cash, stock, or
both, at fair appraisals; we have the
statement of one impartial historian
that Rockefeller was decidedly "more
humane toward competitors" than
Carnegie; we have the conclusion of
another that his wealth was "the least
tainted of all the great fortunes of his
day."[64]
”
Biographer Ron Chernow wrote of
Rockefeller:
“
What makes him problematic—and
why he continues to inspire
ambivalent reactions —is that his good
side was every bit as good as his bad
side was bad. Seldom has history
produced such a contradictory figure.
[65]
”
Notwithstanding these varied aspects
of his public life, Rockefeller may
ultimately be remembered simply for
the raw size of his wealth. In 1902, an
audit showed Rockefeller was worth
about $200 million —compared to the
total national GDP of $24 billion then.
[66] His wealth continued to grow
significantly (in line with U.S.
economic growth) after as the demand
for gasoline soared, eventually
reaching about $900 million on the
eve of the First World War, including
significant interests in banking,
shipping, mining, railroads, and other
industries. According to the New York
Times obituary, “it was estimated after
Mr. Rockefeller retired from business
that he had accumulated close to $
1,500,000,000 out of the earnings of
the Standard Oil trust and out of his
other investments. This was probably
the greatest amount of wealth that any
private citizen had ever been able to
accumulate by his own efforts.”[67] By
the time of his death in 1937,
Rockefeller's remaining fortune,
largely tied up in permanent family
trusts, was estimated at $1.4 billion,
while the total national GDP was $92
billion.[68] According to some
methods of wealth calculation,
Rockefeller's net worth over the last
decades of his life would easily place
him as the wealthiest known person in
recent history. As a percentage of the
United States' GDP, no other American
fortune — including those of Bill Gates
or Sam Walton — would even come
close
Guide to Victory
A certain wise man once said "Don’t let your victories go to your head, or your failures go to your heart." For every victory you get in life, there are still more battles to fight and win. Likewise for every failure you get in life, there are also still more battles to fight and more opportunities for you win.
Whatever your experience is right now, victory or defeat, winning or losing, don't quit.
For the Winner, you can still improve on your winning formula and for the loser, you can still learn how not to lose. Proverbs 4:18
In every situation, just make sure that you are making progress because that's the only true way to make an impact in the already crowded world of today.. God bless you and remember, say a quick prayer for Nigeria, she needs it.
Whatever your experience is right now, victory or defeat, winning or losing, don't quit.
For the Winner, you can still improve on your winning formula and for the loser, you can still learn how not to lose. Proverbs 4:18
In every situation, just make sure that you are making progress because that's the only true way to make an impact in the already crowded world of today.. God bless you and remember, say a quick prayer for Nigeria, she needs it.
Saturday, 2 April 2011
Understanding
One of your greatest possessions in life is Understanding. At the root of Greatness in life is Understanding. No matter how wealthy a man is, if he lacks understanding, he sure is finished. The Almighty is the sole Custodian of Understanding. Job 32:8. Somewhere else in His book, He says, "my people perish for lack of Understanding" He also said "Above everything, get Wisdom".
Nebuchadnezzer was the greatest King of all time. He was what you would call the World President until he became proud and God had to humble him.
God simply took away his understanding and he became a beast and lived like one. Daniel 4:34
Man that is in honour and does not understand it is like the beasts that perish. Psalms 49:20. So when you see a man behaving contrary to nature or accepted norms, he simply lacks understanding. Look in our world of today, I'm sure you'd find many examples. Desire more understanding today and you will become outstanding. By the way, Voters don't decide issues, we decide who will decide the issues. Wisely vote your National Assembly representative today and remain blessed.. God loves you
Nebuchadnezzer was the greatest King of all time. He was what you would call the World President until he became proud and God had to humble him.
God simply took away his understanding and he became a beast and lived like one. Daniel 4:34
Man that is in honour and does not understand it is like the beasts that perish. Psalms 49:20. So when you see a man behaving contrary to nature or accepted norms, he simply lacks understanding. Look in our world of today, I'm sure you'd find many examples. Desire more understanding today and you will become outstanding. By the way, Voters don't decide issues, we decide who will decide the issues. Wisely vote your National Assembly representative today and remain blessed.. God loves you
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