Walter Clark Teagle

Walter Clark Teagle (May 1, 1878 – January 9, 1962) was president of Standard Oil Company of New Jersey from 1917 to 1937 and was chairman of the board from 1937 to 1942. He was responsible for leading Standard Oil to the forefront of the oil industry and significantly expanding the company's presence in the petrochemical field. In 1923, Cornell University announced that Teagle was their highest salaried graduate. He served as vice president of the Cornell Club of New York and on a variety of committees.

Biography He was born in Cleveland, Ohio on May 1, 1878 into a wealthy oil family. He helped pioneer worker representation on refinery councils and the eight-hour workday. From ca. April 1915 till December 1917 he was president of the International Petroleum Company (Canada), then newly formed as the consolidation of 4 large Peruvian oil production and marketing companies serving the entire west coast of South America. International Petroleum was controlled by Imperial Oil Co. of Canada, a subsidiary of the Standard of New Jersey. Peru was not an important factor in the world oil market at the time.

Teagle married twice, to Edith Murray on October 3, 1903, and after her death, to Rowena Lee in 1910. Following Standard Oil house counsel Virgil Kline, who had earlier won cases against Standard for his father's firm, Teagle built a summer house in Blue Hill, Maine.

He served as a trustee for Cornell University from 1924 to 1954 and donating funds for the Teagle Hall athletic building. Teagle has been accused of contributing to Nazi Germany during World War II through his involvement with German chemical company IG Farben. As a director of IG Farben's American subsidiary, he allied Standard Oil with the German company and conducted research jointly. Standard Oil supplied information to IG Farben on how to manufacture tetraethyl lead and synthetic rubber, both critical resources to the war effort. In 1938, under Teagle's leadership, Standard Oil and its British subsidiaries supplied five hundred tons of tetraethyl lead to Germany's Luftwaffe. Germany had very few industrial resources of its own, and without this octane booster for its aviation gas, the Luftwaffe would have been practically grounded. At the time tetraethyl lead was a rare and highly controlled commodity and it is unlikely Germany would have been able to find another source for it. Had Teagle not arranged such a massive transfer of the substance to the Luftwaffe, it is likely that the second World War would have been postponed for several years. By 1934, Standard Oil, under Teagle, also supplied Japan with large quantities of this critical aviation gas component, including to Japanese forces in Japan-occupied Manchuria. In a memorandum dated October 24, 1934, Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs Stanley K. Hornbeck discussed his meeting with Teagle to U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and how Teagle was also uncooperative with U.S. recommendations and was given special treatment by the Japanese government, which made him and his company less subjected to Japan's national businesses regulations than they did other companies. He was replaced by Ralph W. Gallagher.

Despite the settlement, for the duration of the Second World War, Standard Oil, under deals Teagle had overseen, continued to supply Nazi Germany with oil. The shipments went through Spain, Vichy France's colonies in the West Indies, and Switzerland. Standard's oil shipments from the United States to Spain were briefly halted in January 1944 due to American public pressure, then began again in May 1944. Spain, meanwhile, was shipping 48,000 tons a month of American oil to Germany. Shortly after the war in Germany ended in May 1945, Teagle underwent patent suit trial, which resulted in him testifying about his business dealings with Nazi Germany.

In 1962, Teagle died at the age of 83 in Byram, Connecticut after a long illness, He was entombed in the Teagle Mausoleum at Putnam Cemetery, Greenwich Connecticut.

Honors Teagle was selected as one of 20th Century Great American Business Leaders by Harvard Business School and was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in 1974 for his work at Standard Oil in expanding research and development of petroleum-based products, leading to fuel refinements and diverse petrochemical uses such as in cosmetics and food preservatives. He appears on the cover of the December 9, 1929 issue of Time Magazine. He was also selected as one of the 100 Most Notable Cornellians and inducted into the Cornell University Athletic Hall of Fame.

Other positions Teagle was very active in labor, business, and trade organizations and councils. Though supportive of the Republican Party, Teagle was also more supportive of labor rights, in contrast to many other businessmen of his day.

During the 1956 U.S. Presidential election, Teagle donated $6,200 to the Republican Party.