This Week in Petroleum History: May 26 – June 1

by | May 26, 2025 | This Week in Petroleum History

May 26, 1891 – Carbon Black Patent leads to Crayola –

Edwin Binney and C. Harold Smith received a patent for an “Apparatus for the Manufacture of Carbon Black.” The Binney & Smith process created a fine, intensely black soot-like substance — a pigment blacker than any other. Its success would lead to another petroleum product, Crayola crayons.

Patent drawing of May 26, 1891, of E. Binney carbon black-making apparatus.

Edwin Binney in 1891 patented a petroleum-burning “Apparatus for the Manufacture of Carbon Black.” Twelve years later, Binney & Smith produced another oilfield product, Crayola, named by his wife Alice.

After introducing a popular black crayon called Staonal (stay-on-all) the Pennsylvania company began manufacturing Crayola crayons in 1903 using paraffin hand-mixed pigments. Each box contained eight colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown and black.

Learn more in Carbon Black and Oilfield Crayons. (more…)

Dinosaur Fever – Sinclair’s Icon

by | May 21, 2025 | Petroleum History Almanac

Marketing icon “Dino” and friends introduced children to wonders of the Mesozoic era courtesy of Sinclair Oil.

 

Harry Ford Sinclair established his petroleum company in 1916, making it one of the oldest continuous names in the U.S. energy industry. Appearing among other Sinclair Oil Company dinosaurs during the 1933-1934 World’s Fair in Chicago, “Dino” became a marketing icon whose popularity with children remains today. (more…)

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