Rubbing Out the Rubber Rubbish (Classified internal report)

Near Fine in plain wraps, punched and held in variable thickness metal clasp binding – some age yellowing a couple of pencil marks in text. This is a 180 page, single sided, CONFIDENTIAL/CLASSIFIED report that was apparently only distributed internally to 20 persons in Phillips and its author, who had developed the Phillips Research Lab after WWI (first in the country for an oil company). However, there were probably 50 copies produced, since this was number 50 and went to the author. The report is fairly technical and cites numerous references, and presents a number of charts, tables and graphs. By the time of this report, Oberfell was Phillips Vice President for Research. The report concerns the transition to synthetic rubber after WWII. During the war the U.S. government constructed (at a cost of almost a billion 1942 dollars), and funded the operation of, 51 synthetic rubber plants across the country. These plants are shown on a fold-out map. The plants were eventually turned over to private oil/rubber companies, and the report recommends strategies for this transition and how a Standard Oil monopoly should be avoided. Further the report addresses issues related to natural rubber and producers thereof (mostly European Companies controlling the rubber plantations of Southeast Asia), and misleading information being distributed by the both natural and synthetic rubber interests. A very rare internal report, distributed only within Phillips because of the controversial issues discussed. Section titles for Chapter IV give a feel for these issues: Natural Rubber Growers Attempt To Throttle Competition; Standard Oil Company Attempts To Dominate Synthetic Rubber; General Tire & Rubber Company Attempts To Sell A Pig In A Poke; Rubber Industry Attempts To Make Government The Scapegoat. This copy is housed in a mailing package addressed to the author. It is from the estate of Betty Rapp Tarr (one of the first female chemical engineers in the U.S.) who worked in the Phillips Research Lab at the time of this report. She is acknowledged by Oberfell for compiling and preparing much of the document and also for editing it. A rare document that has some historical value relative to both recovery efforts after WWII and also to the Petroleum industry.