Standard Oil an "unreasonable" monopoly under the Sherman Antitrust Act, Section II. It ordered Standard to break up into 34 independent companies with different boards of directors, the biggest two of the companies were Standard Oil of New Jersey (which became Exxon) and Standard Oil of New York (which became Mobil). Standard's president, John D. Rockefeller, had long since retired from any management role. But, as he owned a quarter of the shares of the resultant companies, and those share values mostly doubled, he emerged from the dissolution as the richest man in the world. The dissolution had actually propelled Rockefeller's personal
Standard Vacuum Oil Company in the region. This led to the beginning of the petroleum industry in China: Before 1937, Chinese oil production was measured in quarts and, in its crude condition, was used solely as a lubricant. This first well, developed under the most primitive of conditions and with relatively untrained personnel, began to produce over twenty barrels of oil a day. In time, with equipment brought in from Szechuan and elsewhere and the development of several distillation plants, nine more wells were drilled in the immediate area. A letter from my father to T. E. Mobley of Standard Vacuum in June 1942