The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-06-12

There's a big boiler room, machine
shop, a storehouse, an office, a coalhouse
and three storage tanks, tanks that can
hold oil worth fortunes. Then there's a
pumphouse.
That place is rather impressive even to
the lay eye, for It's not often that one
sees bigger machinery at work. And it's
not often that one sees machinery so big
working so silently You scarcely can
hear the pulse of Standard Oil; you must
almost literally feel 1t.
The Brunswick station is one of a Sc
ries on the system owned by what Is
known as the Buckeye Pipe Line COM
pany. That is, Standard Oil doesn't own
those pipe lines the pumping station,
but 1t does own the Buckeye Pipe Line
company, just as 1t owns the other pipe
line companies which handle the output
of the fields on its way across the coun-
try You can't tell where the holdings
of the two companies are divided, but
the oil passes from the hands of the
Indiana to those of the Ohio. then to
the Buckeye, and so on to the Northern
Pine Line company And all are tribu-
tary to rs Broadway.
Here the men work IL hours day,
from noon to midnight or from midnight
to noon The pump men are proving
restlessly over their machines, keeping
up relentless vigilance that nothing may
occur to make them fall under the dis
pleasure of the corporations inexorable
system. There is on duty all the time
teiegra pher who reports every day to
his immediate headquarter in OIL City, Pa.
the details of the previous IL hours. There
are automatic recorders which count the
strokes of the pumps, which snow now
much the firemen have allowed the steam
to fuctuate, how many barrels an hour
each pump is forwarding and how many
barrels are In the tank every hour OH
City gets all that information, as well
as hourly readings of the temperature
at the tank, and eventually 26 broadway
gets 1t If 1t Is needed there
Others Walk Pipe Line
Still other men walk the pipe, lines.
Each man has a 30-mle beat. over Ii
miles of which he walks every day. His
duty Is to find leaks. which he can de-
tect easily by the petroleum which seeps
to the surface at every break. II he
finds a simple fracture he repairs 1t and
goes on his way. If it's bad case he
calls out a repair gang. Once in while
there's a break that costs Standard Oil
several thousand dollars. and then the
arteries of the corporation are crippled
until It Is healed The line walkers say
theirs Is a good. job in summer. but in
the winter they don't care for it.
| Standard OIL has set off to its own
use the little area around the pumping
| station 1t Is In effect an outer room
| of the offices of 26 Broadway. The men
who work in the station live by east
ern time an hour faster than Cleve-
lands. The sun rises later for them and
sets later for them than for anyone else
| In their vicinity. As a sample of the
farmers disregard of what the great cor
poration does 1t may be mentioned thai
they pay no attention to the whistle
which blows at the station. Some OF
them keep central time. but most strike
an average and run by the old-fashionet
sun time"
Just stones throw from the pumping
station is a group of houses, some o.
them owned by the Standard. in which
most Of the employees live. One or two
whose work is such that they can con
slider themselves established in Brunswick
for reasonably long time, have bough
homes. Most Of the men, however, ar,
holding themselves subject to transfer or
ders, for any of them Is likely at any
time to be shifted to any other point or
| the system.
These men work hard and they hav,