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Adriaan Stoop (18 October 1856 – 7 September 1935) was a Dutch oil prospector and mining engineer.
Life and career
Stoop was born in
Dordrecht
Dordrecht (), historically known in English as Dordt (still colloquially used in Dutch, ) or Dort, is a city and municipality in the Western Netherlands, located in the province of South Holland. It is the province's fifth-largest city after R ...
. He graduated from
Delft University
Delft University of Technology ( nl, Technische Universiteit Delft), also known as TU Delft, is the oldest and largest Dutch public technical university, located in Delft, Netherlands. As of 2022 it is ranked by QS World University Rankings among ...
with a mining degree in 1878, was posted to the Department of Mines and arrived in the
Dutch East Indies
The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which ...
. Realizing he knew little about oil prospecting, Stoop requested paid leave for a study trip to the United States. Although the
American oil industry
Petroleum has been a major industry in the United States since shortly after the oil discovery in the Oil Creek area of Titusville, Pennsylvania in 1859. The industry includes exploration, production, processing (refining), transportati ...
, afraid of new competition in Asia, refused to see him, Stoop was still able to collect essential new information on the latest American drilling techniques. His report became the "bible" for oil drilling technology in the Dutch East Indies. Stoop proposed that the Dutch colonial government should start a state petroleum enterprise, but the idea was rejected. Stoop then requested three years leave of absence so he could initiate oil exploration at his own risk. Stoop "was a man above average, a forceful personality in a delicate frame; able, matter-of-fact and self-disciplined; a silent man, his mind only revealed itself in sparks of keen humor."
Stoop acquired one of the first oil concessions in Indonesia in 1886 and with money from friends and family in 1887—as Gerretson puts it, 50,000
Dutch guilders
The guilder ( nl, gulden, ) or florin was the currency of the Netherlands from the 15th century until 2002, when it was replaced by the euro.
The Dutch name ''gulden'' was a Middle Dutch adjective meaning "golden", and reflects the fact that, wh ...
"from head-shaking relatives"—he founded the Dordtsche Petroleum Maatschappij. Within a year, he had a "spouter." Production increased steadily and he had a ready home market on the island of Java. He introduced gasoline street lighting to several large cities on Java in the 1890s. "If the Royal Dutch relied upon distribution for its strength, the Dordtsche excelled in manufacture." In 1896, Stoop returned to the Netherlands and sold shares in the company to the public, becoming very wealthy. He had held all 350 shares in the company, and converted each into 14,900 guilders in cash and 20,000 guilders in ordinary shares. Thus he yielded more than 5 million guilders in cash and 7 million guilders in shares from the initial investment just ten years earlier.
However, in order to stay competitive the company would have needed to expand its sales territory beyond Java and this would have required an enormous investment in ships and unloading supplies. By 1910, the Dordtsche was the last independent producer on Java and rumors spread that
Royal Dutch Shell
Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, England. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New Yo ...
's main rival,
Standard Oil
Standard Oil Company, Inc., was an American oil production, transportation, refining, and marketing company that operated from 1870 to 1911. At its height, Standard Oil was the largest petroleum company in the world, and its success made its co-f ...
, would buy it. But in the end Stoop merged his enterprise with the Royal Dutch Shell through an exchange of stock in 1911. Dordtsche Petroleum Maatschappij board minutes later revealed company officials feared a "public outcry" if they did not sell to another Dutch company. The board expected “a storm against us, if the competition struggle would end in the favor of the foreigner
tandard Oil” the minutes said.
While prospecting for oil in Bavaria, Germany in the early 1900s, Stoop discovered instead thermal water containing high levels of sulfur and iodine.
History of Bad Wiessee
/ref> German specialists thought this water would have health promoting properties and this led to creation of a spa at Bad Wiessee
Bad Wiessee (Central Bavarian: ''Bad Wiessä'') is a municipality in the district of Miesbach in Upper Bavaria in Germany. Since 1922, it has been a spa town and located on the western shore of the Tegernsee Lake. It had a population of around ...
that exists to this day. Stoop also built his vacation home Jungbrunnen there.
References
Footnotes
Bibliography
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Stoop, Adriaan
20th-century Dutch explorers
1856 births
1935 deaths
Explorers of Asia
People from Dordrecht
Delft University of Technology alumni