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Description:
Beautifully engraved RARE SPECIMEN certificate from the Union Oil Company of California dated 1911. This historic document was printed by the American Banknote Company and has an ornate border around it with a vignette of oil rig with oil exploding out the top. This item is over 92 years old. This is the earliest Union Oil Company of California Bond we have seen.
Certificate Vignette The first gasoline-powered automobile had not yet appeared in the West when Union Oil Company of California was founded on Oct. 17, 1890. The oil industry was barely 30 years old. Headquarters for the new company were established in Santa Paula, heart of the state's oil country. One hundred years later, when Unocal celebrated its centennial, the original two-story building was renovated and became the Unocal Oil Museum. To form Union Oil, co-founders Lyman Stewart, Thomas Bard, and Wallace Hardison merged their holdings. Although they could not then have foreseen the tremendous impact the automobile would soon have on oil demand, they were aware of oil's potential as an industrial and transportation fuel. Stewart and Hardison met in the Pennsylvania oil fields, which boomed after the country's first oil well was drilled near Titusville in 1859. The partners built up modest oil fortunes, then sold out and moved west in the 1880's to seek greater opportunities in California. In 1890, Stewart and Hardison combined their oil assets with those of Thomas Bard, a prominent businessman, to form the Union Oil Company of California. The company was incorporated on October 17, 1890, in the small town of Santa Paula, located about 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles. True entrepreneurs, the three men worked to expand the uses for fuel oil in factories, steamships, and railroads. The company often assigned its own mechanics and technicians to convert power or heating systems to use oil instead of coal in order to demonstrate fuel oil's superiority -- and earn the good will of future customers. In 1891, Union Oil opened the first petroleum research laboratory west of the Mississippi with the initial aim of developing a process to extract non-smoking kerosene from the heavy California crudes, much less suitable to such use than the lighter, cleaner eastern oils. While the goal eluded Union Oil chemists, that rudimentary lab began a long tradition of research that served the company well. By the turn of the century, only one of the three co-founders remained: Lyman Stewart. In 1901, the company moved its headquarters to Los Angeles -- which Stewart referred to as that "great city of the future." Stewart served as president until 1914, when his son Will stepped into the job. Lyman continued to play an active role as chairman until his death in 1923. Together, father and son guided Union to a position of prominence in the western United States. Recognizing the importance of building an integrated company, the Stewarts created an effective refining and marketing organization backed by a solid resource base. By 1913, there were nearly 123,000 automobiles in California, prompting the company to open its first service station -- or "gas stand" -- on the corner of Sixth and Mateo streets in downtown Los Angeles. As the number of automobiles mushroomed, the company worked hard to keep pace. By 1925, Union had more than 400 service stations on the West Coast In 1930, with the death of Will Stewart, leadership passed to Press St. Clair. As the Great Depression deepened, St. Clair drastically cut back company operations. The bright spots in that dark decade were the introductions of the first 76 gasoline and Triton motor oil. Both products helped motorists get better performance from their cars, welcome news to those who had to keep their old cars rolling until better times. The 76 marketing symbol was destined to become one of the most recognizable and enduring corporate symbols in the nation. As the world went to war in the late 1930s, Union -- with a dynamic new leader in former steel man Reese Taylor -- beefed up production and refining to pour out fuels to support the Allies. The company's growth continued into the booming postwar era as Union expanded in all directions: discovering the first natural gas in Alaska and the first oil in Australia; taking a lead position in offshore development in the Gulf of Mexico; building a thriving chemicals business; and developing a revolutionary refining technology -- Unicracking -- that became the most widely used in the world. When Reese Taylor died unexpectedly in 1962, Cy Rubel, who had led the expansion in oil and gas exploration and production, came out of retirement to take over. He named a successor, Fred Hartley, two years later. Hartley moved quickly to assure the company's future. In 1965, Union Oil merged with The Pure Oil Company of Illinois, lifting the company from regional to national status with operations in 37 states. The new Union Oil had the financial clout to expand its international petroleum search. In the next 25 years, Union became the major oil producer in southern Alaska and a major natural gas producer in the Gulf of Mexico. Overseas, the company discovered the huge Attaka oil field offshore Indonesia, developed fields in the rugged North Sea and became the world's largest geothermal energy producer. Union made the first commercial discoveries of natural gas in the Gulf of Thailand, helping create a hydrocarbon industry that played a major role in Thailand's economic revolution In 1983, Union Oil Company of California was reorganized, becoming an operating subsidiary of a new holding company, Unocal Corporation. Two years later, Union began doing business as Unocal. The name quickly gained headline status when the company was targeted for an unfriendly takeover. Unocal survived, but with a heavy burden of debt. When Dick Stegemeier was named president in late 1
| Status: For Sale |
Reference#: unoilcomofca |
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