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Standard Oil’s market position, 1901 to 1923: accounts

Accounts of Standard Oil’s share before the 1911 breakup and of its standing after it, from an economist’s blog post, a Yale history, Time in 1923 and the ABA Journal.

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Dates
1901–1923

These are accounts, not measurements. We found no study of whether the pieces competed with one another in the first decades after 1911.

Connections 4

involved

  • Standard Oil its refining share was falling before 1911, by this economist’s account (a blog post that gives no figure for the fall) Scholarship & press 1
  • Texaco its predecessor emerged as a competitor after 1901, by Yale’s account Scholarship & press 2
  • Standard Oil Time called it in 1923 a practical monopoly, twelve years after the breakup (that magazine’s word, in that year) Scholarship & press 3
  • Standard Oil the ABA Journal says the breakup did little to foster competition within the industry Scholarship & press 4
Timeline 1 date
  1. 1901–1923 Standard Oil’s market position, 1901 to 1923: accounts
Proof 4 sources
  1. Who’s Afraid of Standard Oil?, Life on the Margin, Bowdoin College, 31 Jul 2021. Scholarship & press
    Standard’s share of refining had been falling for over a decade.
  2. Antitrust and Monopoly, Yale Program on Energy History, Yale University, 2021. Scholarship & press
    Significant new competitors, including the predecessors to Texaco, Gulf Oil, and Sun Oil, emerged following a major discovery at the Spindletop field in southeast Texas in 1901.
  3. Business: The Standard Oil, Time, 11 Jun 1923. Scholarship & press
    The origin of the Standard Oil monopoly, for practical monopoly it still is, was the foundation of a refinery in Cleveland by an Englishman named Samuel Andrews in 1862.
  4. May 15, 1911: High Court Dissolves Standard Oil, ABA Journal, 2011. Scholarship & press
    The divestiture did little to foster competition within the industry
Page history 2 changes
  1. Second revision of Too Big to Fail: the FTC's 1917 finding, the 1952 report's seven firms, the 1984 hearing record, and corrected cards for Spirit, beef, tickets, Google and the final verdictAlibek05663c47
  2. Revise Too Big to Fail after the skeptic's review: read to 2 November 2026, a verdict card that separates findings from shares, the 1929 fight with its scandal and the board's stand, and sources for every cardAlibekc819f2cb

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