“Be as a tower
firmly set; shakes not its top for any blast the blows.” Dante Alighieri
1955 Standard Oil Refinery Explosion
Recent explosions in the Chinese port city of Tianjin and on a U.S.
base in Sagamihara, Japan, conjure up memories of the Standard Oil refinery explosion
that occurred in Whiting 60 years ago in the early morning of August 27,
1955. One resident described it as “the end of the world.” Some thought a nuclear bomb had caused the
blast. A black mushroom cloud 8,000 feet
in the air obscured the sun and was visible for 30 miles. A 252-foot hydroformer blew up, resulting in
a fiery inferno that, according to the Chicago
Tribune, caused steel oil storage tanks to melt “like ice cream cones as flames licked at their rivets and plates.”
Some 67 storage tanks were destroyed,
train tracks curled like limp spaghetti noodles, and fires raged for more than
a week. Pieces of flying steel and concrete leveled nearby structures and forced
residents to evacuate the area. A chunk
of steel weighing 180 tons flattened a house and grocery two blocks away. Amazingly, only two people died, a refinery
foreman heart attack victim and a three year-old hit by a 10-footsteel pipe
that came through the roof where he lived. The boy’s older brother had a leg severed and
his father suffered serious injury.
Archives volunteer John Hmurovic (below) has produced a 30-minute film about the
traumatic event entitled, “One Minute After Sunrise.”
NWI Times photo by John J. Watkins
Though Standard Oil’s use of the name Amoco began in the mid-1920s, it
was not until after the 1955 explosion that the Whiting facility became known
as the Amoco refinery. In 1998 Amoco
merged with British Petroleum, and within three years all service stations used
the name BP.
William Buckley referenced the Amoco refinery in “Lake Michigan”:
I
keep running to this lake,
to
walk the long shore,
to
listen to ships,
and
I can’t help thinking of beams,
riveted
with words,
verbs
for a frame
of
certitude.
Chicago
sways in steel
the
way the brain rocks in dreams,
and
in all those Gothic rooms
where
prayers are said,
the
dark bells still announce
the
deliveries, the payments,
the
profits.
I work in this lake-light,
riveting
words
before
they are spoken.
Today,
I
look out over the cobalt blue waters
and
write
under
the lights of the Amoco refinery,
and
I ask if I am entitled to love
in
these winds, that shake steel.
Lake Michigan, a profound force of nature, has made a major
impact on the people of Northwest Indiana. It was an essential ingredient
in the coming of heavy industry to the Calumet Region. How different the lakefront might look had
not these industrial giants located on its southern shores. Still, if the mills shut down, due more to
foreign dumping that excessive labor costs, the economic impact would be
enormous.
Until restarted on August 24, BP’s crude distillation unit had been
off-line for weeks, triggering a steep hike in gas prices at the pumps despite
the overall drop in oil prices. Illinois
and Michigan public officials have called for an investigation into whether BP
was involved in a price-gouging scheme.
No word yet from pro-business Republican officials in Indiana – and none
expected.
Attending a rally near Gary City Hall, Chesterton Tribune ace correspondent Kevin Nevers interviewed Rob
Popplewell. For each steelworker job lost, the Local 1066 Grievance Committee
Chairman stated, a half dozen others will be imperiled, not to mention area
merchants whose customers include steelworkers.
Signs reading, “Treat Us Fair,
Mario,” referenced U.S. Steel CEO Mario Longhi, who had his yearly
compensation doubled to over 13 million dollars while the corporation was
demanding work force concessions. Nevers
contrasted the dire present situation with 1959 when after a 116-day strike steelworkers
received cost-of-living increases plus improved health and pension benefits. Nevers included an excerpt from Dave Alvin
song “Gary, Indiana 1959.” Here is the
full version:
I'm old, weak and grey and I'm running out of time
Yeah, but you should have seen me, brother,
when I was young and in my prime
Back in Gary, Indiana in 1959
I was a steel working man with 2 kids and loving wife
And the Union was strong, smokestacks burning day and
night
Back in Gary, Indiana in 1959
But then the accountants and lawyers and bosses at U.S.
Steel
Sent down the word that we had to take their rotten deal
But from Birmingham to Pueblo, Oakland to Allentown
The workers got together and we shut the Big Boys down,
The President and Supreme Court tried to force us off the
line
Back in Gary, Indiana in 1959
Now the years have disappeared in the blink of an eye
And I feel like a stranger in a world that isn't mine
My dear wife died, my kids all moved away
'Cause there's nothing round here to make them want to
stay
'Cause the factories are in ruins, decent jobs are hard to
find
And you can't get ahead no matter how hard you try
'Cause the Big Boys make the rules, tough luck for
everyone else
And out on the streets, brother, it's every man for
himself
But I still remember when we marched side by side
Back in Gary, Indiana in 1959
Don't bury my body, brother, when it's my time to die
Just throw me in that smelter and let my ashes fly
Back home to Gary, Indiana in 1959
Jeopardy contestants were
asked to name the first asteroid belt dwarf planet observed by spacecraft. One guy wrongly said Pluto, and an opponent exclaimed,
“I was going to say that.” The correct answer: Ceres.
In the mid-1950s the word “blast” was similar to today’s ubiquitous “awesome”
and reflected an awareness of nuclear blasts producing noxious mushroom clouds
similar to what Whiting residents gaped experienced at dawn on August 27,
1955. Timeless musical blasts from the
mid-50s past include Maybelline”
(Chuck Berry), “Ain’t That a Shame” (Fats Domino), “Tutti-Fruttie” (Little
Richard), and most tellingly, “Sh-Boom” by the Chords. In an essay on Cold War pop music, Russell
Reising explained:
Most lines in “Sh-Boom” conclude with the singing of the explosion sound
of “sh-boom,” suggesting that this love song gets sung in the midst of a hard
nuclear rain falling on humanity. Given this scenario and in “Sh-Boom’s”
hopeful “hopin' we'll meet again”
line, the song actually, and very strangely, anticipates the horrifyingly
ironic conclusion to Dr. Strangelove. In that film's final orgy of
destruction, we witness scores of hydrogen bombs exploding, signaling the
complete destruction of the world to the soundtrack tune of “We'll Meet Again
Some Sunny Day.” These utopian impulses, of course, get vaporized with every
man, woman, child, tree, animal, and building in the world.
Aetna Powder Co. boarding house, circa 1890s
For 4 decades beginning in 1881 Aetna Powder Company experienced
periodic explosions that endangered employees and neighboring communities. One blast involving 3,000 pounds of
nitroglycerin could be heard 120 miles away in Fort Wayne. Another in 1912 killed eight, and a 1914
blast shattered windows in downtown Gary.
With the Steel City’s population rapidly growing, the plant was deemed a
menace and demand for its product decreased.
Shortly after he end of World War I, owners gave way to suburban
developers.
Nicole Anslover talked about President Harry Truman being relatively
unknown at the time of FDR’s death even though in 1943 when Senator he had made
the cover of Time. I noted that Missouri Senator Claire
McCaskill, ranking Democrat on the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations,
recently declared to Bill Maher that her predecessor saved the country billions
of dollars preventing waste and war profiteering by the military-industrial
complex during World War II. That’s why “Investigator Truman” was on Time’s cover, Nicole responded.
At Cressmoor Lanes I cleaned out my locker and turned in the key. Owner Jim Fowble asked if I wanted to substitute
Wednesday evenings, and I suggested former Engineers teammate Melvin Nelson,
who didn’t want to switch to an afternoon league.
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