The American Oil Company, or Amoco, also known as Standard Oil of Indiana, was a global chemical and oil company, founded in Baltimore in 1910 and incorporated in 1922 by Louis Blaustein and his son Jacob, but is now part of BP. The firm's innovations included two essential parts of the modern industry- the gasoline tanker truck and the drive-through filling station.

Overview

In 1923 the Blausteins sold a half interest in Amoco to the Pan American Petroleum & Transport company in exchange for a guaranteed supply of oil. Before this deal, Amoco was forced to depend on Standard Oil of New Jersey, a competitor, for its supplies. Standard Oil of Indiana acquired Pan American in 1925, beginning John Rockefeller's association with the Amoco name.

Standard Oil (Indiana) was formed in 1889 by John D. Rockefeller as part of the Standard Oil trust. In 1910, with the rise in popularity of the automobile, Amoco decided to specialize in providing gasoline to everyday families and their cars. In 1911, the year it became independent from the Standard Oil trust, the company sold 88% of the gasoline and kerosene sold in the midwest. In 1912 it opened its first gas service station in Minneapolis, Minnesota

In the 1920s and 30s Amoco opened up dozens more refining and oil-drilling facilities. Combined with a new oil-refining process, Amoco created its exploration and production business, Stanolind, in 1931. In the following years, a period of intense exploration and search for oil-rich fields ensued; the company drilled over 1000 wells in 1937 alone.

Lead-free gasoline

While most oil companies were switching to leaded gasolines en masse during the mid-to-late 1920s, American Oil chose to continue marketing its premium-grade "Amoco-Gas" (later Amoco Super-Premium) as a lead-free gasoline by using aromatics rather than tetraethyl lead to increase octane levels - decades before the environmental movement of the early 1970s led to more stringent auto emission controls which ultimately mandated the universal phase out of leaded gasoline. The "Amoco" lead-free gasoline was sold at American's stations in the eastern and southern U.S. alongside American Regular gasoline, which was a leaded fuel. The Red Crown Regular and White Crown Premium gasolines marketed by parent company Standard Oil (Indiana) in its prime marketing area in the Midwest also contained lead.

World War II

World War II followed this period of exploration; Amoco participated in the war effort, discovering new means of refinement and even a way of producing TNT more quickly and easily. In addition, Amoco significantly contributed to the aviation and land gasoline needed for the Allied armies. Also, during the war Amoco created its chemical division, formed from the merger of the Pan American Chemicals Company and the Indoil Chemical Company.

Post-war

In the late 1940s, after World War II, Amoco returned to focusing on domestic oil refinement and advancement. In 1947 Amoco was the first company to drill off-shore, in the Gulf of Mexico, and in 1948 Amoco invented Hydrafrac, a hydraulic well fracturing process that increased oil production worldwide. Initially the Hydrafrac process was licensed exclusively to Halliburton.