Conoco ( ), formerly known as Continental Oil, is an American petroleum brand that is operating under the current ownership of the

Phillips 66 Company The Phillips 66 Company is an American multinational energy company headquartered in Westchase, Houston, Texas. Its name, dating back to 1927 as a trademark of the Phillips Petroleum Company, assisted in establishing the newly reconfigured Ph ...

since 2012 and is headquartered in the Westchase neighborhood of

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

, ( Harris County),

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

. The brand is one of the several successors of the original

Standard Oil Company Standard Oil Company was a corporate trust in the petroleum industry that existed from 1882 to 1911. The origins of the trust lay in the operations of the Standard Oil Company (Ohio), which had been founded in 1870 by John D. Rockefeller. The ...

(" oil trust" founded 1870 by industrial titan

John D. Rockefeller John Davison Rockefeller Sr. (July 8, 1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American businessman and philanthropist. He was one of the List of richest Americans in history, wealthiest Americans of all time and one of the richest people in modern hist ...

(1839–1937). Conoco was a subsidiary of Standard Oil from 1884 until 1911 when the

Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all Federal tribunals in the United States, U.S. federal court cases, and over Stat ...

, in an anti-trust legal case, ruled to decouple and break up the monopolized entity of Standard Oil. Alongside Phillips 66 and 76, it operates as one of the major fuel brands of the Phillips 66 Company. Of those two brands, Conoco has a more dominant presence of gas refueling stations in the markets of the

states State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

, Texas,

Montana Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...

, Missouri, and

Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...

in the

Midwestern United States The Midwestern United States (also referred to as the Midwest, the Heartland or the American Midwest) is one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. It occupies the northern central part of the United States. It ...

, as well as a growing presence in Eastern Pennsylvania following taking over the retail contracts of several

Gulf Oil Gulf Oil was a major global oil company in operation from 1901 to 1985. The eighth-largest American manufacturing company in 1941 and the ninth largest in 1979, Gulf Oil was one of the Seven Sisters (oil companies), Seven Sisters oil companies. ...

locations there, while having a complete absence in states such as

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

to the west and

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

to the far southeast. Continental Oil, originally based in Ogden, Utah was founded by Isaac Elder Blake in November 1875 as the Continental Oil and Transportation Company and was acquired nine years later in 1884 by the increasingly dominant

(nicknamed the " oil trust", established 14 years earlier in 1870, by John D. Rockefeller Sr. 1839–1937). Eighteen years after Standard Oil's federal court-ordered dissolution of 1911,

Marland Oil Company Marland Oil Company was an American integrated petroleum company that existed from 1921 to 1929. The company was founded by E. W. Marland, Ernest Whitworth Marland (1874–1941) and was based in Ponca City, Oklahoma. Originally operating in Oklah ...

(founded in 1921 by E. W. (Ernest Whitworth) Marland (1874–1941), oilman, businessman and later politician of

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

and later

), would then acquire Continental Oil, moving its headquarters to Marland's home town of Ponca City, ( Kay County),

, in 1929. As the Continental-Marland acquisition took effect, Marland Oil favorably phased out its own personal name and rebranded itself into the more nationally known titles of Continental and Conoco nameplates. As it eventually became one of the largest oil companies in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

, Conoco further expanded its operations globally during the decade of the

1970s File:1970s decade montage.jpg, Clockwise from top left: U.S. President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office following the Watergate scandal in 1974; The United States was still involved in the Vietnam War ...

. Similar to other oil companies during the

1970s energy crisis The 1970s energy crisis occurred when the Western world, particularly the United States, Canada, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, faced substantial petroleum shortages as well as elevated prices. The two worst crises of this period wer ...

, initially caused by the 1973-1974

Arab oil embargo In October 1973, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) announced that it was implementing a total oil embargo against countries that had supported Israel at any point during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, which began after E ...

, Conoco's operations were negatively impacted and so in 1981, Conoco then the ninth-largest American oil company at the time, was embroiled in one of the most expensive corporate takeovers in U.S. history when the Mobil Corporation and

Seagram The Seagram Company Ltd. (which trade name, traded as Seagram's) was a Canadian multinational beverage and during the last few years of its existence, entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate formerly headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. ...

attempted to acquire the company. The

DuPont Dupont, DuPont, Du Pont, duPont, or du Pont may refer to: People * Dupont (surname) Dupont, also spelled as DuPont, duPont, Du Pont, or du Pont is a French surname meaning "of the bridge", historically indicating that the holder of the surname re ...

company, of

Wilmington, Delaware Wilmington is the List of municipalities in Delaware, most populous city in the U.S. state of Delaware. The city was built on the site of Fort Christina, the first Swedish colonization of the Americas, Swedish settlement in North America. It lie ...

who was conjured up by Ralph Bailey (the C.E.O. of Conoco at the time) was brought in and hired as a so-called "white knight" and would eventually emerge triumphant defending Conoco from the two vendors (corporate predators). DuPont's acquisition of Conoco at US$1.5 billion, made it the largest merger in U.S. history upon to that time, surpassing that of the earlier

Shell Oil 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 Y ...

’s acquisition of the Belridge Oil Company at USD$3.5 billion dollars in 1979. Almost two decades later, in 1998, DuPont and Conoco announced their intentions to split which was commenced when DuPont sold 30% of its interest that year and the remaining 70% the following year in July 1999, officiating their corporate separation. For many years, the company would operate its own

oil refineries An oil refinery or petroleum refinery is an industrial process plant where petroleum (crude oil) is transformed and refined into products such as gasoline (petrol), diesel fuel, asphalt base, fuel oils, heating oil, kerosene, liquefied pet ...

until 2002 when it was merged with the

Phillips Petroleum Company Phillips Petroleum Company was an American oil company incorporated in 1917 that expanded into petroleum refining, marketing and transportation, natural gas gathering and the chemicals sectors. It was Phillips Petroleum that first found oil in th ...

to form

ConocoPhillips ConocoPhillips Company is an American multinational corporation engaged in hydrocarbon exploration and production. It is based in the Energy Corridor district of Houston, Texas. The company has operations in 15 countries and has production in t ...

. A decade later, ConocoPhillips would then divest its downstream operations that consisted of its gas stations refueling operations under the brands of Conoco,

Phillips 66 The Phillips 66 Company is an American Multinational corporation, multinational energy company headquartered in Westchase, Houston, Texas. Its name, dating back to 1927 as a trademark of the Phillips Petroleum Company, assisted in establishing ...

, and 76. The divestiture would eventually commence and the spin-off that contained the downstream operations of ConocoPhillips went under a separate company known as the Phillips 66 Company.

History

The "Continental Oil and Transportation Company" was founded by Isaac Elder Blake in November 1875. Based in

Ogden, Utah Ogden ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Weber County, Utah, Weber County, Utah, United States, approximately east of the Great Salt Lake and north of Salt Lake City. The population was 87,321 in 2020, according to the United States Census ...

, the company distributed the recently discovered mineral resources of

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil or simply oil, is a naturally occurring, yellowish-black liquid chemical mixture found in geological formations, consisting mainly of hydrocarbons. The term ''petroleum'' refers both to naturally occurring un ...

/ oil (first found in August 1859 by Edwin Drake (1819–1880), in a well drilled at Oil Creek, near Titusville, ( Crawford County), in the far northwestern corner of

) and its refined by-products of

kerosene Kerosene, or paraffin, is a combustibility, combustible hydrocarbon liquid which is derived from petroleum. It is widely used as a fuel in Aviation fuel, aviation as well as households. Its name derives from the Greek (''kērós'') meaning " ...

benzene Benzene is an Organic compound, organic chemical compound with the Chemical formula#Molecular formula, molecular formula C6H6. The benzene molecule is composed of six carbon atoms joined in a planar hexagonal Ring (chemistry), ring with one hyd ...

, and other products in the

Western United States The Western United States (also called the American West, the Western States, the Far West, the Western territories, and the West) is List of regions of the United States, census regions United States Census Bureau. As American settlement i ...

. Continental Oil Company was acquired by

in 1884, and was subsequently spun off during the Standard Oil divestiture in 1911. Conoco logo1930

The main office was later moved to Ponca City, Oklahoma, when in 1929,

(founded by exploration pioneer E. W. Marland) acquired the Continental Oil Company. Marland Oil acquired the assets (subject to liabilities) of Continental Oil Company for a consideration of 2,317,266 shares of stock. The merged company took the more recognizable Continental name along with the Conoco brand. However, it adopted Marland's red triangle logo, which it retained until 1970, when the now-familiar capsule logo was adopted. Dan Moran (1888–1948, led company 1928–1947), who succeeded Marland Oil Company founder E. W. Marland as president of Marland Oil in 1928, and subsequently became the first president of the merged Conoco. Moran then ran Conoco for twenty years, seeing the company through economic hardships and challenges of the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

of the

1930s File:1930s decade montage.png, From left, clockwise: Dorothea Lange's photo of the homeless Florence Owens Thompson, Florence Thompson shows the effects of the Great Depression; due to extreme drought conditions, farms across the south-central Uni ...

, and retiring in 1947, the year before he died. The company ran into early trouble when, shortly after acquisition, it was hit by the Great New York Stock Market Crash of October 1929. Conoco became a key supplier to the

federal government and its world-wide deployment of the

United States Armed Forces The United States Armed Forces are the Military, military forces of the United States. U.S. United States Code, federal law names six armed forces: the United States Army, Army, United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps, United States Navy, Na ...

, along with several other Allied powers and their militaries during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

(1939/1941-1945). Under the leadership of successor Leonard F. McCollum, Conoco grew from a regional petroleum company to a global corporation in the post-war years after World War II of the late

1940s File:1940s decade montage.png, Above title bar: events during World War II (1939–1945): From left to right: Troops in an LCVP landing craft approaching Omaha Beach on Normandy landings, D-Day; Adolf Hitler visits Paris, soon after the Battle of ...

and into the

1950s File:1950s decade montage.png, 370x370px, Top, L-R: U.S. Marines engaged in street fighting during the Korean War, late September 1950; The first polio vaccine is developed by Jonas Salk.Centre, L-R: US tests its first thermonuclear bomb with co ...

. Another rough patch for the company came two decades later during the

, beginning with the 1973-1974

(resulting from the fourth Arab-Israeli conflict of the

Yom Kippur War The Yom Kippur War, also known as the Ramadan War, the October War, the 1973 Arab–Israeli War, or the Fourth Arab–Israeli War, was fought from 6 to 25 October 1973 between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states led by Egypt and S ...

of October 1973), from which it did not fully recover until 1981, when Conoco became a subsidiary of former corporate rival

company of

In 1981, Dome Petroleum made a

tender offer In corporate finance, a tender offer is a type of public takeover bid. The tender offer is a public, open offer or invitation (usually announced in a newspaper advertisement) by a prospective acquirer to all stockholders of a publicly traded corp ...

for 20% of Conoco. More than 50% of Conoco shares were tendered, evidence that shareholders were unhappy, and several companies made their own tender offers to take over Conoco. Cash rich and wanting to diversify,

Company Ltd. engineered a takeover of Conoco. Although Seagram acquired a 32.2% stake in Conoco, DuPont was brought in as a "

white knight A white knight is a mythological figure and literary stock character. They are portrayed alongside a black knight as diametric opposites. A white knight usually represents a heroic warrior fighting against evil, with the role in medieval literatu ...

" by the oil company and entered the bidding war. Mobil Corporation, the nation's second-largest oil company at the time, also joined the bid, and borrowed $5 billion to bid for Cocono. In the end, Seagram and Mobil lost out in the Conoco bidding war. In exchange for its stake in Conoco Inc, Seagram became a 24.3% owner (almost one-quarter of stock / interest) of the DuPont company. By 1995, Seagram was DuPont's largest single shareholder with four seats on the board of directors. In 1998, DuPont sold 30% of Conoco,DuPont, Conoco Splitting
" '' Ponca City News''. Monday May 11, 1998. Retrieved on February 3, 2010. and in 1999, DuPont sold the remaining 70% stake it holds in Conoco Inc. When the independent Conoco went public in October 1998, under a retooled name, Continental Oil Company, it resulted in the largest IPO in history. In 2001, Conoco announced it has agreed to buy

Gulf Canada Gulf Canada was a Canadian integrated petroleum company that existed between 1944 and 2001. Gulf Oil, Gulf Oil Corporation began operating in Canada in 1942, and two years later formed a Canadian subsidiary called the Canadian Gulf Oil Company. In ...

for C$6.7 billion dollars (

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

), (equal to $4.3 billion, in the United States currency). Conoco merged with

Phillips Petroleum Phillips Petroleum Company was an American oil company incorporated in 1917 that expanded into petroleum refining, marketing and transportation, natural gas gathering and the chemicals sectors. It was Phillips Petroleum that first found oil in th ...

in 2002 to form

Corporate headquarters

Before the merger, Conoco had its headquarters in what is now the current ConocoPhillips headquarters in the

Energy Corridor The Energy Corridor is a business district in Houston, Texas, located on the west side of the metropolitan area between Texas State Highway Beltway 8, Beltway 8 and the Texas State Highway 99, Grand Parkway. The district straddles a stretch of ...

; the complex was formerly known as the Conoco Center. The headquarters of Conoco moved to Houston, in 1949. In 1965, the headquarters moved back East to

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

, in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. Seven years later in 1972, the headquarters moved northeast outside New York City to adjacent suburban

Stamford, Connecticut Stamford () is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, outside of New York City. It is the sixth-most populous city in New England. Stamford is also the largest city in the Western Connecticut Planning Region, Connecticut, Weste ...

; there in Stamford, Conoco occupied space in the three-story High Ridge Park commercial complex, remaining for a decade.Conoco Offices to Close
" ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' at ''

The Spokesman-Review ''The Spokesman-Review'' is a daily broadsheet newspaper based in Spokane, Washington, the city's sole remaining daily publication. It has the third-highest readership among daily newspapers in the state, with most of its readership base in ...

''. Sunday November 7, 1982. C10.

Google News Google News is a news aggregator service developed by Google. It presents a continuous flow of links to articles organized from thousands of publishers and magazines. Google News is available as an app on Android, iOS, and the Web. Google ...

48 of 67. Retrieved on February 3, 2010. In 1982, the DuPont company announced that Conoco's headquarters would move again from Stamford, Connecticut further south down the East Coast to

, where DuPont's headquarters were located since its founding almost 222 years earlier in 1802. The move occurred in 1982. Edward G. Jefferson, the chairperson then of DuPont, said that the headquarters relocation was to bring the head workforces of DuPont and Conoco together. DuPont also announced that it was closing the Conoco offices in Stamford; the lease in the Stamford commercial offices complex was originally scheduled to expire in 1992.

Conoco–Iran deal

In 1995, Conoco Inc. was awarded a contract by the

Islamic Republic of Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

to develop a huge offshore oilfield in the adjacent

Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.Un ...

to the south. It was the first energy agreement involving Iran and the

since Washington severed diplomatic relations 15 years before with

Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...

in 1979–1980, during the American Embassy invasion, seizure and occupation there by mobs of student activists and taking U.S. diplomats hostage for a year in the

Iran hostage crisis The Iran hostage crisis () began on November 4, 1979, when 66 Americans, including diplomats and other civilian personnel, were taken hostage at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, with 52 of them being held until January 20, 1981. Th ...

. The contract was signed after three years of protracted negotiations. However, the company dropped the plan after the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...

announced that after further consideration and consultation, that 42nd

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television *'' Præsident ...

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...

(born 1946, served 1993–2001), would issue a directive blocking all such transactions on grounds of

national security National security, or national defence (national defense in American English), is the security and Defence (military), defence of a sovereign state, including its Citizenship, citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of ...

Museum

The official Conoco historical

museum A museum is an institution dedicated to displaying or Preservation (library and archive), preserving culturally or scientifically significant objects. Many museums have exhibitions of these objects on public display, and some have private colle ...

was completed in 2007 and is located in Ponca City, Oklahoma, along with the preserved 1914 mansion Marland Grand Home on Grand Avenue, residence of co-founder E. W. (Ernest Whitworth) Marland (1874–1941) and his two wives and adopted children.

Conoco brand

Along with sister brands, Phillips 66, and 76, "Conoco" (), is a major American brand of oil and gas station that has been owned by

since 2012 and was originally the brand used by its originator, Conoco Inc., from 1875 to its merger with Phillips Petroleum in 2002. Although the Conoco brand can be used in any state in which the Phillips 66 Company operates, it is very rare to see the Conoco brand in California and Oregon where the 76 brand predominates.Scrape hero. "76 gas station locations in the USA" retrieved May 31, 2021.
/ref>

Leadership

President

# Isaac E. Blake, 1877–1893 # Henry M. Tilford, 1893–1907 # Edward T. Wilson, 1907–1924 # C. E. Strong, 1924–1927 # Sidney H. Keoughan, 1927–1929 # Daniel J. Moran, 1929–1947 # Leonard F. McCollum, 1947–1964 # Andrew W. Tarkington, 1964–1969 # John G. McLean, 1969–1972 # Howard W. Blauvelt, 1974 # Dr John E. Kircher, 1974–1977 # Ralph E. Bailey, 1977–1987 # Constantine S. Nicandros, 1987–1995 # Archie W. Dunham, 1996–2002

Chairman of the Board

# Edward T. Wilson, 1929–19?? # Charles A. Perlitz Jr, 1963–1964 # Leonard F. McCollum, 1964–1972 # John G. McLean, 1972–1974 # Howard W. Blauvelt, 1974–1979 # Ralph E. Bailey, 1979–1987 # Constantine S. Nicandros, 1995–1996 # Edgar S. Woolard Jr., 1998–1999 # Archie W. Dunham, 1999–2002

Bibliography

* * '' Conoco: The First One Hundred Years''.

Dell Publishing Dell Publishing Company, Inc. is an American publisher of books, magazines and comic books, that was founded in 1921 by George T. Delacorte Jr. with $10,000 (approx. $145,000 in 2021), two employees and one magazine title, ''I Confess'', and ...

, 1975.

References

External links

*
The Conoco-Somalia Declassification Project at College of DuPage
{{Portal bar, Texas, Oklahoma, Utah, Companies, Energy Defunct oil companies of the United States Standard Oil ConocoPhillips Automotive fuel retailers Gas stations in the United States Chemical companies of the United States Non-renewable resource companies established in 1875 Non-renewable resource companies disestablished in 2002 American companies disestablished in 2002 Companies disestablished in 2002 1875 establishments in Utah Territory 2002 disestablishments in Texas Companies based in Ogden, Utah Companies based in Houston Defunct companies based in Oklahoma Defunct companies based in Texas Defunct companies based in Utah Kay County, Oklahoma Phillips 66 Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange