Evening star., 1937-05-24

was put up at auction in 1865 ant
Mr.. Rockefeller bought 1t In a,
$72,50O. Thus began the firm o.
Rockefeller~ & Andrews, which grew
within 1ve years into the Standard
Oil Co. Of Ohio, incorporated In Jan.
uary. 1870, with capital Of 81 .oo0, ,00(
"a vast sum in those days. In the
meantime Mr.. Rockefeller's brothers
William and Frank, besides Henry M
Flagler, Stephen v. Harkness and sew.
eral others, had joined the enterprise
Less than 10 years he'd passed since
Mr.. Rockefeller entered the oil bust.
ness.
The year before Mr.. Ro.kefelle,
bought up the assets OF Andrews
Clark g. Co. he had entered another
partnership, destined to last half &
century. In the Cleveland High
School in 1853. one of his classmates
was Laura Celestia Spelman, daugh-
ter Of merchant Of Akron, Ohio
They were married September 8
1864, and for nearly 81 years shared
an ideal life.
Cared Little for Society.
Mrs. Rockefeller cared little for 80
cial activities outside the circle o1
family friends. She gave much atten.
ton to rearing and training her chill.
dren, to the work Of the church and
the Sunday school and to charities.
She died suddenly Of heart disease
on March IL, 1915, at Pocanticc
Hills, while her husband was In the
South. For several years she had
been unable to go to church, and II
was Mr.. Rockefeller's custom to bring
her notes Of the sermons.
Mr.. and Mrs. Rockefeller were the
parents Of five children. One died
in infancy. The others were Alta
who became Mrs. E. Parmlee Prentice
OF New York; Edith, who married
Harold Mccormick Of Chicago ir
1895 and divorced him in 1922; John
D.. jr., of New York, who married
Abby Greene Aldrich, daughter of the
late Nelson w. Aldrich, United States
Senator from Rhode Island, anc
Bessie, who died a number Of year.
ago. She was the wife OF Charles
A. Strong, formerly a professor OF
psychology Of Columbia University.
From the beginning the oil industry
was highly speculative. Thousands OF
men with all sorts of business ex-
perience and many more with no rea!
training dashed into the field to gel
rich quick. When a new we'll wa,
brought in with a big flow scores Of
men drove other wells with frantic
haste nearby. Often the petroleum.
had to be stored in pools on the
ground. The oil market alternated
violently between feast and famine
as new gushers came In or old wells
ran dry and prices varied accord
ingly. These sudden fluctuations In
the late sixties wrecked many re-
flners.
Forms Standard Oil Co.
But Rockefeller and his associates
though young men, were experienced
veterans In business, trained for years
IN ways Of economy and exact &C.
counting. They seemed to manage
better than any of their competitors
When they formed the Standard on
Co. OF Ohio they had the largest re-
f1ning business in Cleveland.
Nevertheless, they told their neigh.
bors that, unless some sort Of or.
ganization could be formed for mu.
tual protection, they could see that
they, as we'll as the others, would be
wiped out, one by one, as the market
f1uctuated. Accordingly, Mr.. Rookie
feller first asked the largest firm
among his competitors If it would
care to join forces with the Standard
Oh Co. The offer was accepted al
once. Other neighbors then came In
until, at the end of two years, nearly
all of the petroleum refiners of Cleve-
land were members of the Standard
Oil Co.
Cleveland became one OF the CHIEF
oil-reflning centers OF the country
taking the place previously occupied