Wayne fuel dispensers, Cities Service and Pure Oil Companies

Wayne Dial face with computedf metering 

Pure Oil Company

There have been three companies that have operated in the US that have used the Pure Oil name. The first Pure Oil began as a group of independent oil refiners, producers, and pipeline operators, from Butler, Pennsylvania headquartered in Pittsburgh, even though the company was incorporated in New Jersey in fall 1895. The Pure Oil Company came about because of the dominance of the Standard Oil Company in the Pennsylvania oil fields and it was organized by independent interests to counter the dominance. Pure Oil was the second vertically integrated oil company (after Standard) in the region. The operations were based in Oil City, Pennsylvania. In 1896 David Kirk would be elected as the first president but was succeeded by James W. Lee in 1896.

 In 1900, Pure Oil would become a holding company for three independent pipeline companies. Pure Oil Producing Co. was incorporated into the company in1902 and by 1904 pure had finished a refinery which had been built on the Delaware River and would receive 600 barrels a day from the United States Pipe Line, Which would increase to 1800 barrels a day by 1906. When Pure Oil would ship their oil to Europe they would use Penn oil tanker to deliver their product.

One of the products that Pure Oil sold to Philadelphia and to New York City was illuminating oil (kerosene) and Standard Oil was their major competitor on the east coast. Pure Oil also built bulk terminals in Amsterdam and Hamburg; they wanted to compete with Standard Oil in Europe. By 1917 Pure Oil had over extended its operations in Europe so they ended their operations.

By this time Cities Gas Company a Columbus-based Ohio Oil Company had begun to make offers to buy out the company and made an offer of $24.50 a share to buy out the company. Cities Gas Company was building a refinery in Oklahoma, and Pure Oil had production capabilities that would benefit this company. So in 1917 the Pennsylvania company accepted the offer and made $22 million in profit on the sale.

In 1920, Ohio Cities Gas Company's would change its name to Pure Oil. In 1926, Pure Oil headquarters would move to Chicago. The Company now had refineries that were located in Ohio, West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Texas. One of the first Pure Oil Gas Station was built in 1933 and located in Saratoga Springs; New York and it was registered in 1978 with the National Register of Historic Places. Pure Oil ranked as one of the country's 100 largest industrial companies in the 1960s sales were over $700 million a year. The company employed over 1000 people just in the Chicago area. The company motto was "Be sure with Pure." that motto was used because it was said that some filling stations and oil companies were adding water and chemicals into their fuels and Pure wanted to assure their customer that they were getting the very best product.

Union Oil Company of California would make an offer and purchase Pure Oil in 1965. Shortly after the acquisition by Union Oil it would change the name of Pure Oil's Refining & Marketing operations to the Pure Oil Division of Union Oil Company of California with the Pure Oil name continuing in full force. When the 1970s came along the Pure Oil brand would be phased out and the remaining service stations, auto and truck stops would be rebranded as Union 76. The Pure Oil Division would fully merge with Union Oil's west coast Refining & Marketing division and become the Union 76 division. The Pure Oil name was still retained as a registered trademark and used the Firebird brand name primarily for motor oils and lubricants that were not extensively marketed toward consumers. In 1992, Unocal would announce their plans to end Southeast operations. The Pure Oil lives on as part of Unocal still today.


The Cities Service show below belonged to Ed Gesch Farm. Most of the town of Willmar, MN. is built on that farm. This pump is just one of the few items that were purchased from the farm.

Glass Fuel Cylinder with Ten Gallon Indicators

1920's Base and Body features hand pump to dispense gasoline

Wayne name plate

Certification plate features Model number 519 and Serial number 27802

Body and Pump Handle

Fill Pipe for either above ground or under ground storage tanks

nossel

The Wayne Pump Company
Fort Wayne Indiana
The Wayne pump company was founded in 1891 by employees of the S.F. Bowser of Fort Wayne, Indiana,. The company had a hard time deciding on an official name, sometimes advertising as the Wayne Oil Tank & Pump Company and the Wayne Tank & Pump Company. It wasn’t till 1928 the company began using the name Wayne Pump Company. Until then they used the name Wayne Oil Tank Company they began producing retail kerosene storage tank and pump combination for use in hardware and grocery stores to dispense kerosene. In 1907, they began production of gasoline pumps, and in 1918, they introduced what is considered to be the first true visible pump Model 276v. Wayne concentrated on production of visible gas pumps throughout the 1920. by 1928 the now newly named Wayne Pump Company had purchased Fry equipment and Boyle Dayton manufacturing and was ready to introduced the first clock face metering pump. Despite the many innovations, the Wayne Pump Company was near the point of bankruptcy and what saved the company was the invention of the computing mechanism that became industry standard for all gasoline dispensing equipment for the next 50 years. Wayne Pump Company licensed the computer to Veeder-Root manufacturing in 1934, the company was from Hartford, Connecticut, Veeder-Root manufactured gauges and metering devices and the Veeder-Root computer was made available to other pump manufacturers with-in a year or two. The Wayne Pump Company was never really given the credit that they deserved for their innovation. The timing was just right for the invention, that and a few new pump designs was what saved the company.
In 1951 Wayne Pump Company took a step forward and purchased an interest in the Martin & Schwartz pump operation. They were a division of Symington-Gould who were one of the industrial and railroad components manufacturer . The majority owners insisted the gas pump manufacturing operations would be consolidated in the Salisbury, Maryland.
The Wayne Pump Company merged in 1958 with the Symington-Gould to form Symington-Wayne. Some of the innovations that took place in this era included the development if the first twin pump using one single-width 500 series cabinet it was the first to have two complete pump systems combined. Sun Oil pioneered the first blending system, Wayne being the innovators that they were built the first custom blender model 511 in 1956 in conjunction with Sun Oil and introduced at few selected Sunoco stations in Buffalo New York, Indianapolis, and Norfolk, Virginia. Wayne developed a new cabinet design and a new model 511D and this new design was also use with the custom blenders at Sunoco stations throughout the east.
Dresser Industries the industrial giant absorbed the Symington-Wayne into it fold in 1968 and separated the service station equipment business from other their other manufacturing pursuits. Dresser Wayne would once introduced a new innovation with the first electronic gasoline dispensing equipment to their lineup of innovations in 1975. Dresser Wayne ceased operations in Salisbury, Maryland in 2001 and moved it’s operations to Austin, Texas where even today Dresser Wayne is still one of the leading innovator and one of the leading manufacturers of retail petroleum equipment. Dresser Wayne pumps can be found in many modern stations today.

Cities Service

 Oil entrepreneur Henry Latham Doherty started Cities Service in the early 1900s. Doherty would quickly become a leader in the manufacturing of gas and electric utilities. Doherty created his own organization, Cities Service Company in 1910, to supply gas and electricity to small public utilities. Doherty began by acquiring gas producing properties, then moved on to acquire distributing companies and tied them into a common source of supply. The company then developed a pipeline system, tapping dozens of gas pools. This was to make the gas available to its consumers. Cities service developed a plan to use slack demand periods to refill their depleted fields near their customer base. This way gas could be inexpensively withdrawn during peak demand. Cities service was the first company in the mid-continent to use this method.

Doherty being the business man that he was decided the next logical step was to develop a program to find and develop supplies of natural gas that would help his company move into the oil business. By doing this it would mark a major discovery in Augusta, Kansas in 1914 and later that year in El Dorado. Cities Service subsidiary, Empire Oil & Refining discovered the Oklahoma City field, one of the world's largest. They would also participate in the discovery of the East Texas field, which, in its time, was the most sensational on the globe. Cities Service would also go on to completed the nation's first long-distance high pressure natural gas transportation system in 1931. It was a 24-inch pipeline that would stretch some 1,000 miles from Amarillo, Texas, to Chicago, Illinois.

 At the height of Cities Service's growth, Congress would go on to pass the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935. This would force Cities Service to change itself of either being utility operations or get rid of its oil and gas holdings. The decision was difficult but Cities Service elected to remain in the petroleum business. The first step was to liquidate investments in its public utilities which took place in 1943. This would affect over 250 different utility corporations.

Around the same time the US government was almost at completion of a major refinery at Rose Bluff near Lake Charles, Louisiana. This refinery would eventually become the foundation of the company's manufacturing operation. The government would use designs that were developed by Cities Service and the Kellogg Co., the plant would be dedicated only 18 months after the first concrete was poured. The refinery would open a month before Allied troops would land in France; the refinery would turn out enough of the critically needed 100-octane aviation gasoline that the bombers would need to fuel the 1,000 daily bomber sorties that would take off from England to Germany. With enough Government funding through the Defense Plant Corporation (DPC) also prompted Cities Service to build plants to manufacture butadiene which is used to make synthetic rubber, and toluene, which is a fuel octane booster and solvent. In the years that follow Cities Service would see growth and become a fully diversified oil and gas company with operations around the world.

Cities Service Company first inaugurated use of the CITGO brand would happen in 1965 (officially styled "CITGO") was used for its refining, marketing and retail petroleum businesses which became known inside the company as the RMT Division, for Refining, Marketing and Transportation. CITGO would continued to be used only a trademark, and not the companies name until it was sold 1983 to what had been the RMT Division of Cities Service to Southland Corporation. Eventually Southland Corporation would sell 50 percent of CITGO holdings to Petróleos de Venezuela in 1986 and would acquire the remainder in 1990 which would result in the current ownership structure.

1917 Maxwell Roadster

1917 Maxwell Roadster

Side view of Maxwell Roadster

Advert for the Maxwell

The Maxwell was a brand of automobiles manufactured in the U.S. from about 1904 to 1925. The brand name of motor cars was started as the Maxwell-Briscoe Company of Tarrytown, New York. The company was named after founders Jonathan Dixon Maxwell, who earlier had worked for Oldsmobile, and the Briscoe Brothers Metalwork’s. Benjamin Briscoe, an automobile industry pioneer, was president of the company at its height in 1914. Many of the innovations such as using a shaft drive instead of the usual chain drive helped bring the Maxwell to the forefront of car manufacturing. 



In 1907, a fire destroyed the Tarrytown, NY factory; Maxwell-Briscoe constructed what was then the largest automobile factory in the world in New Castle, Indiana. The factory continued operations until 2004 as a Chrysler plant until its demolition.

 Maxwell along with Stoddard-Dayton, Courier Car Co, Columbia Automobile Company, Brush Motor Car Company, formed the United States Motor Company formed in 1910. But due to a conflict between two of its backers, the United States Motor Company failed in 1913 after the failure of its last supporting car manufacturer; the Brush Motor Company. Maxwell became the only surviving member of the combine.

In 1913, Maxwell was purchased by Walter Flanders, who reorganized the company under the name, Maxwell Motor Company, Inc. He moved the company to Detroit, Michigan. Some of the Maxwell’s were still manufactured at the two plants in Dayton, Ohio. For a time, Maxwell was considered one of the three top automobile firms in America along with Buick and Ford. By 1914, Maxwell had sold 60,000 cars.



In a short period of time, however, Maxwell over-extended and wound up deeply in debt with over half of their production unsold in the post World War I recession in 1920. The following year, Walter P. Chrysler arranged to take a controlling interest in Maxwell. Maxwell Motors was re-incorporated in West Virginia with Walter Chrysler under control as the chairman. Around the same time that all of this was happening, Maxwell was also in the process of merging with the ailing Chalmers Automobile Company who were have financial problem of their own. Chalmers ceased production in late 1923.

In 1925, Chrysler would form his own company, the Chrysler Corporation. That same year, the Maxwell line would be phased out and the Maxwell Company would be absorbed by Chrysler Corporation. The Maxwell would continue on in another form however, because the new line of 4-cylinder Chrysler's which were introduced for the 1926 model year were created largely by using the design of earlier Maxwell’s. And these former Maxwell’s would undergo yet another transformation in 1928, when a second reworking and renaming would bring about the creation of the first Plymouth.

About 750 Maxwell’s are known to exist today. The Maxwell has become one of the most iconic cars as it was feature on the Jack Benny radio and television show thorough out his career.

Footnote: One day I had the pleasure of hearing Mr. Schwanke tell one of our guests a story. He told the gentle man that he had been stop by a fellow who had stop in and took a tour of the museum and was told by the manager at the time (not me) that Mr. Schwanke had purchase the 1917 Maxwell from Jack Benny. Which is not true but here is what the fellow was told.

Jack Benny was going through Willmar and got a flat tire and was so mad that there was not any filling station open to fix his tire. Mr. Benny got upset and wanted to sell the car. So when Mr. Schwanke heard about this he offers to buy the car from Mr. Benny. Mr. Benny took the offer and went out and bought another car then went on his way. The story sounds so good the fellow believe it. Of course Virgil told him it was not true. But he still tells the story of what the manager at that time told people.

Maxwell badge

1923 Anderson Touring Car

1923 Anderson Touring Car

Manufactured in Rock Hill, South Carolina,

When I asked Mr. Schwanke how he acquired the Anderson he told me that he had bought it from a gentleman who owned a body shop by New London, Minnesota. Mr. Schwanke learned that this body shop had the vehicle and approached the owner to see if he wanted to sell the car. At first the gentleman wanted too much for the car. But when the gentle man found out that Mr. Schwanke had a model T body he was interested in restoring they came up with a trade. When asked how the gentleman had purchase the vehicle himself he told this story.

He had been traveling in the Chicago area and he learned another gentleman had this junk car in his storage shed and wanted to get rid of it. The New London man went with the gentleman to his home and was shown the car. When he saw the car he realized he needed to buy this car. He asked the man how much he wanted for the car, the other man quoted a price at which they settled upon. The man from New London then brought the Anderson to Minnesota. The car looks pretty much like how it was found, with only a few minor repairs done to a rear fender.

After the museum acquired the Anderson, the Great Grand daughters of the manufacturer found out that the museum had the 1923 Anderson Touring car and came for a visit. After seeing the car, they informed Mr. Schwanke that they had never seen a 1923 and thought this might be one of a few in existence.  After an exhausting search no other 1923 Touring car have been found to this day. Ten other Anderson cars are known to exist in public and private collections. Most of them are not in the condition like the one found here at the Schwanke museum.

Here is a brief history of the 1923 Touring Car:   

Anderson Aluminum Six Touring Car, priced at $1195. It had a Aluminum Body, 6-Cylinder Red Seal Continental Motor, Westinghouse Starting/Lighting/Ignition, Borg and Beck Clutch, Motometer, Snubbers, and much more. The car boasted an average of 19 MPG.

 John Gary Anderson was a former carriage maker who wanted to make Rock Hill, South Carolina the automobile capital of the country. In 1923 nearly 2,000 Anderson automobiles were made. They were sold in southern states and throughout the country.

These cars were hand crafted and made from 1916 to 1926. The Anderson business started out as a cart and buggy manufacturer where they would line produce a new buggy every 17 minutes and 10 second. In 1915 Anderson decided to build and test six cars. These cars featured wheels made from the best South Carolina hickory; they built a six cylinder engine capable of 38 horse power @ 200 RPM.

Anderson bought and used the best materials available at the time to use in their new vehicle. Fine metals, leather upholstery, plate glass windshields, and components bearing names respected even today. The Rock Hill plant made the main part of the body and the rest of the parts were shipped in to complete the car.

6300 cars were built in the 10 year production run. The cars were priced at $1195.00 after production but the Anderson could not compete with the less expensive Ford car which built for $298.00 and was soon force to stop their production.

Of the 6300 Anderson's built, only 11 are still in existence.   

Here are some Sales Flyer's Featuring Anderson's

 I borrowed these flyer's from this website http://www.american-automobiles.com/Anderson-2.html if you are interested this site features histories of other American made Automobiles.

A.O.Smith

1963 A.O. Smith fuel dispenser





dial face of the A.O. Smith pump

Side view of pump which features 6' hose and banana nozzle with auto shutoff system.

Front view of pump featuring RED CROWN GASOLINE and dial face.



Dial face of  an A.O.Smith fuel dispenser.

Smith Meter Systems (1937 - 1976)

R.Stanley Smith founded the Smith Meter Systems. His company manufactured petroleum meters, Valves, and related oilfields equipment as well as gasoline dispensing pumps. The original Smith Meter Company was founded in Los Angeles, Calif., in 1937. Smith meter acquired Neptune Meter in (1948). Neptune meter was a manufacture of service station pumps. In (1955) Smith acquired Erie Meter Systems Inc. (1958) Consolidated operations into the meter and service station divisions. Later changing the name to A.O. Smith - Erie Division.

Erie Meter (1922 - 1958)

Erie start selling gasoline pumps under the name of "Erie Service Station Equipment Company." Erie meter produced their first pump in 1922. In 1927 Erie shorten their name to "Erie Meter Systems Inc." Their early pumps were encased in masonry housings, then in cabinets that looked like masonry housings. Erie produced a great number of clock meter pumps, in 1930 Erie manufactured only one visible gasoline pump design. 100 were made and are very collectible today. Erie also made Art Deco pumps in the mid - 30's and they too have become very collectible today. Erie also manufactured oil dispenser, air compressors, air towers, and greasing equipment. In 1958 Erie merged with A.O. Smith Company.

A.O. Smith Company (early 1900's)

Smith started business in the early 1900's as a supplier of petroleum Equipment, like oil drilling equipment, transportation platforms and pumps. A.O. Smith bought out his nephew R. Stanley Smith, then added Neptune Pumps, (1948), then Erie Pumps, (1955). Today A.O. Smith is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. A.O. Smith Corporation still manufactures water pumps, Aqua pumps, and Commercial Water Heaters.

In 1976 A.O. Smith sold their Meter and Service Station Equipment Division to GeoSources Inc. of Houston, Texas.

The pump shown above features RED CROWN GASOLINE a product of STANDARD OIL COMPANY.

"Like most companies, Standard Oil started small. Unlike most companies, however, it had the backing of a big name in American industry, John D. Rockefeller.

Standard Oil of Indiana, as the company was officially known for many years, took shape in 1899. Initially it consisted of a single facility outside Whiting, Indiana, which refined oil intro products that people and business needed: axle grease for industrial machinery, paraffin wax for candles, kerosene for home lighting.

The company grew. By the early 1900s it was the leading provider of kerosene and gasoline in the Midwest. Kerosene sales would eventually falter. But with car ownership booming across the United States, demand for gasoline would only go up and up." <<< taken from the bp website that features the history of the standard oil company along with the Amoco history. I am also posting the web address here. >>>> www.bp.com/ 

The Interview

Yesturday we had the pleasure of meeting Lorn Manthey, he is a Correspondent for Oakridge Marketing Group. He made an appointment last week to come to the museum. Lorn, interviewed Virgil Schwanke, Mike Schwanke, and Blair Hoiland <<<<< (thats me) for an article about the museum which will be published in  Farm Show Magazine. I will get to see the draft before he submitts it to the publisher and once the artical is published. I will post a link to the site or put it here on the blog. I am excited because this is the second organization that has been in the museum in the last few weeks.

Lorn took a picture of me so I thought it would only be fair if I took one of him.

Lorn Manthey

Thanks Lorn I have never enjoyed a interview as well as your interview was.
If you are interested in all things farm related here is Lorn's publications address.
http://www.farmshow.com/ and thank you once again Lorn Manthey.


We also had the pleasure of having Kee W. Groshong of Columbia, MO. Kee stopped in to look at our Sawyer Massey 11-22 we have on display. The Sawyer Massey that we have in the museum is said to be one of Eleven left in exsistance. Kee called me last week to find out what year our Sawyer Massey and I informed him that is was built in 1918.

Kee W.Groshong of Columbia, MO.

I will write more about the Sawyer Massey later in my blog. I just wanted to thank Kee for the information that he supplied us with.

1926 Model T Coupe

1926 Model T Coupe

1926 Model T Coupe



1926 Model T Coupe

Virgil Schwanke began his collection of vehicles when he was a young man of 15 years old with the purchase of this Ford Model T Coupe. He had used the money he had earned from shelling corn from a farmer from northern Minnesota.

The Ford Model T Coupe is just one of the Ford vehicles in the museum. Henry Ford the automobile manufacture born July 30, 1863. On the family farm near Dearborn, Michigan. As a young man Henry loved to tinker with machines as he worked on the farm. Henry's got him self a Parttime job as an employee of The Westinghouse Engine Company this afforded him the finances to build his first horseless carriage in 1896, which in turn he sold to finance his work to make an improved model.

Henry Ford struck out on his own and formed the Ford Motor Company in 1903, proclaiming, "I will build a car for the Great Multitudes." In October 1908, the Ford Motor Company offered the Model T for $980.00. The Model T was in production for 19 years and it price went as low as $280.00. Nearly 15,500,000 were sold in the United State alone. The Model T endure with little change in its design and was built from 1908 to 1927. Only one other car style has had a longer build run and that is the Volkswagen Beetle.

The Ford Motor Company revolutionized car manufacturing with the invention of the assembly line. The innovative production techniques that Ford had design made it so that they could produce a complete chaise every 93 minutes, this was a improvement over the production time of 728 minutes. Using a constantly moving assembly line and the subdivision of labor, with careful coordination of operations, Ford realized huge gains in productivity. With increased production Ford rewarded his employees by doubling what other manufactures were offering for pay. At $5.00 a day and a work day of eight hours production increased and with new mass production techniques, Ford company could produce a Model T every 24 seconds.

Eventually this would alter American Society, More Americans were able to afford a car, which lead to a national highway system. Ford witnessed many changes during his lifetime, which came to an end with his death on April 7, 1947.  



Welcome

Welcome Friends,

I would like to thank you for visiting our Blog here at Schwanke Museum. I would like to start by giving you a quick history of the Schwanke Museum. We first opened out doors in 1998 to the public and we featured Cars Tractors and Trucks in the museum. Among one of the many vehicles that was featured was Virgil Schwanke's 1926 Ford Model T coupe that he purchase at the ripe old age of 15.

My intent is to feature one new Car, Tractor or Truck that is in the museum. We also would like you to stop in the museum and witness the vehicles for yourself. I would like to apologize in advance I do not have a camera so I have been using the one I have on my cell phone.

Inside the museum we have over 200 tractors, over 100 cars and trucks and small and large gas and diesel engines.

If you have any questions please feel free to ask.

Thank you
Blair