Standard Oil Standard Oil Standard Oil Co. Inc. was an American oil producing, transporting, refining, and marketing company. Established in 1870 by John D. Rockefeller and Henry Flagler as a corporation in Ohio, it was the largest oil refinery in the world of its time. Its history as one of the world's first and largest multinational corporations ended in 1911, when the United States Supreme Court, in a landmark case, ruled that Standard Oil was an illegal monopoly. Standard Oil dominated the oil products market initially through horizontal integration in the refining sector, then, in later years vertical integration; the company was
The History of the Standard Oil Company of Standard Oil's unfair and business strategies of questionable legality. One review from the "Economic Journal" fixated on the monumental nature of Tarbell's work, stating that "it is difficult to write about Miss Tarbell's remarkable achievement without using language approaching the edge of hyperbole. So careful is she in her facts, so sane in her judgements, that she seems to have reached the high-water mark of industrial history." Though Standard Oil Company accrued more cumulative value after it was broken up, the exposure of immoral and illegal business practices at the hands of Ida Tarbell became a striking symbol of