And when the Standard cut, it cut to kill; the only purpose was to drive the competitor from the field, and, when this had been accomplished, the price of oil would promptly go up again.

The organization of "bogus companies," started purely for the purpose of eliminating competitors, seems to have been a not infrequent practice.
This latter method emphasizes another quality that accompanied the Standard's operations and so largely explains its unpopularity--the secrecy with which it so commonly worked.

Though the independent oil refiners were combating the most powerful financial power of the time, they were frequently fighting in the dark, never knowing where to deliver their blows.
This same characteristic was manifested in the form of corporate existence which the Standard adopted.

The first great "trust" was a trust not only in name but in fact.

The Standard introduced not only a new economic development into our national organization; it introduced a new word into our language and an issue into American politics that provided sustenance for the presidential campaigns of twenty-five years.
From the beginning the Standard Oil had always been a close corporation.
Originally it had had only ten stockholders, and this number had gradually grown until, in 1881, there were forty-one.