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Chapter 9

Sinclair Research, Tulsa, OK (1960-1961)

The Sinclair Oil Company was founded in 1916 by Harry F. Sinclair and grew to be the seventh largest oil company in the USA at one time. It was primarily an exploration company. Harry Sinclair was a colorful gent and spent time in jail for his involvement in the Teapot Dome Scandal. The company was extremely conservative and risk adverse. Their exploration paradigm was the “hind tit” approach, namely, let someone make the initial discovery and then lease offset acreage if available. The company was acquired by ARCO in 1969.

Sinclair Research was formed during the 1950’s and individuals from the operating company were transferred to staff it. Their only PhD on staff when I interviewed was Bernie Rolfe who hired me. In 1960, when Glenn Visher and I were hired, it was as much of an accident as to fill a need. The operating company, applying for a loan from a major New York bank, was asked, “What is Sinclair doing in the way of expanding its research to find more oil and gas?” Sinclair management responded that they just hired two PhD’s, one from Yale and one from Northwestern. The loan was approved.

After returning to the USA, I called Bernie Rolfe to make arrangements to start work. We mutually agreed I should rent a car and drive to Tulsa. I did so and drove west. I arrived around 1:00 PM on September 15, 1960, reporting to Bernie. After filling out forms to get on the payroll, health insurance, and few other formalities, I was asked to attend a staff meeting that afternoon at 2:00 PM.

Bernie then took me to another building and introduced me to my manager, Robbie Robinson. Robbie and I quickly established rapport particularly because he earned both his BS and MS at the University of Nebraska. We discussed the KU and Nebraska athletic rivalries. I also asked Robbie about his experience in the petroleum industry and he told me he had spent time on a Sinclair geophysical crew in Louisiana before the lab was established. He was transferred three years before I arrived and completed work on classifying and identifying visual porosity in carbonate rocks.

Robbie then took me to a large room which I was to use as an office and lab. I shared it with Glenn S. Visher (BS, MS Cincinnati, PhD Northwestern, stratigraphy; Shell Oil, Sinclair Research, Univ. of Tulsa, BNJ Exploration). Glenn worked for Shell Oil and left because they did not transfer him to their research lab, despite assurances they would do so.

I then attended the staff meeting and was introduced to everyone, including a computer systems person, a geochemist (Bill “Jake” Jacobsen), a water chemist (Nat Sage), three palynologists (Ned Potter, Bill Meyers, and a tech), a regional geologist (John Rogers), Jim Westphal (geophysicist) and a petroleum engineer. Also present was Jimmy Johnson, the Vice President of Exploration Research. Jimmy was a geophysicist. Bernie Rolfe reported to him as manager of geological research. The meeting was chaired by George Fanshaw, president of the lab, and included another Vice President who was an engineer.

Fanshaw opened the meeting to announce that the lab would handle all in-house training. We had a month to get ready for the first course. Assignments were given and because I had just arrived, Fanshaw asked if I could prepare a presentation. I offered to give a two-hour talk on the application of sedimentary structures to determining environments of deposition. Fanshaw commented that this would be new and encouraged me to put it together

Afterwards, Bernie and Robbie and I went to Bernie’s office. They assigned me to work on the reservoir sedimentology of the Minnelusa Formation (Permian) of eastern Wyoming and western North Dakota. At Sinclair Research, most project work was contract work for the operations division. The Casper, WY, office requested this project and funded it. I was the lead geologist and would coordinate with Chuck Tenney in Casper. During the previous summer, Chuck, Robbie, and John Rogers collected samples and thin sections were cut. I was first to complete a petrographic study, point counting all four hundred thin sections (all 400 samples were quartz arenites as per Bob Folk’s classification). Bernie and I were to fly to Casper in late October to meet Tenney and do reconnaissance field work, because I also was scheduled to give a paper at the GSA in Denver beforehand. I was to return next summer to continue detailed field work.

Bernie (BS CUNY; PhD Penn State; clay mineralogy; Cities Services Research, Sinclair Research, Consultant) then brought up something else. He explained Robbie did not have a PhD and asked if it would be a problem for me to have Robbie as my supervisor. I explained that Robbie had more experience in the oil industry than me. Robbie and I agreed he would train me about the oil business and I would be his resource person in areas where he wanted more expertise.

Bernie was a tough individual. He grew up in the streets of New York City and was drafted into the US Army. He saw action in the Battle of Bulge and survived without injury. The GI Bill provided him with the opportunity to receive a university education and achieve a better life. However, the hard street side occasionally flared and one had to be careful with him. He also liked calling me “kid” because I was the youngest of the professional research staff.

Sinclair Research’s facilities were located on the northwest side of Tulsa in the old Pan Am Research Lab across the street from the Carter Oil Research Lab. When Pan Am built a new lab in South Tulsa, they tried to sell the old lab but no buyer was forthcoming. Pan Am finally donated it to the University of Tulsa who rented the space to Sinclair. We were located in four buildings, an administrative building with a small library, a core storage building, a maintenance building for trucks and equipment, and a lab building. My office was in the lab building.

My office served another function. It was where the only coffee pot in the lab building was located. There was no refrigerator. Only black coffee was available. When tasting my first cup, I discovered its unique taste. It was Luzianne Chicory coffee. When Jake, Robbie, Jimmy Johnson, and John Rogers were working in Louisiana on geophysical crews they acquired a taste for it. They assured me that I would too.

I spent two nights at a nearby motel and searched for a furnished apartment. After finding one and moving in, I returned the car to the rental agency and had no car. Jacobsen lived nearby and picked me up every morning and took me home at night. Grocery stores were in walking distance so I could manage until I bought a car.

After receiving my first paycheck and opening a local bank account, I bought a 1954 Ford station wagon. My bank provided a loan. I planned to camp out on weekends if I wanted to see something different and used it to do some extracurricular field work in the Ouachita Mountains of Arkansas and Oklahoma that fall.

Slowly, I began work on the Minnelusa and prepared my two-hour lecture for their October short course. We also offered the course in November and December. The October course was for regional managers and Sinclair housed them at a motel with its own private club and a conference room. In Oklahoma, the only way to buy liquor was from a state store and drink at home or be a member of a private club. The motel provided club membership for its guests and during the training sessions, for Sinclair instructors.

Bernie suggested I stay each evening and become better acquainted with the regional managers, even joining them for dinner. That enlarged my network into the company. I also obtained a close-up view of what happened to career geologists at Sinclair, how it influenced their lives, their attitudes, their politics, and their morale. It was a mixed picture.

I presented my lecture the first afternoon of the course. During the middle of it, an older gentleman appeared at the door and Bernie went outside the room to talk with him. I continued and they returned. During the discussion period, that visitor asked me questions, most of which I answered without difficulty. When discussion was over, Bernie came to the podium and said,

“Thank you George. By now you know we have a surprise visitor, Fred Busch, Sinclair’s Chief Geologist. Fred, would you care to say a few words?”

The older gentleman who arrived in the middle of my lecture was Fred Busch. He made the usual remarks about the importance of the new training programs at Sinclair and even said that “. . given what I heard so far from George Klein, this program is off to a strong start.”

Busch stayed the rest of the afternoon and invited me for a drink so we could get better acquainted along with some of the other participants. Bernie took me aside and told me that normally, he would have interrupted so Busch could give a pep talk but Busch insisted on hearing what I had to say first. In the corporate world, breaks like this seldom come in a lifetime, let alone during the first month on the job.

However, I observed a sobering side-show. While having a drink with Busch, Rolfe and some of the others, I noticed three attractively dressed women in their late twenties at the bar. They were having drinks with different patrons and now and then, snuck off to the patron’s motel room. One didn’t have to think hard about what was going on. Underneath America’s bible-belt family town, there was, indeed, a dark side.

I also joined the Tulsa Geological Society and attended most dinner and luncheon meetings. Consequently, I met a lot of well-known geologists in Tulsa and reconnected with Gerry Friedman (BSc Imperial College, University of London, PhD, Columbia; sedimentary petrology; Univ. of Cincinnati, Uranium Consultant, Pan Am Research, RPI, CUNY, Northeast Science Foundation) and Harry Werner (PhD, Syracuse, petroleum geology; Pan Am Research, University of Pittsburgh) at Pan Am Research. They apologized for not arranging a plant trip and explained that when A. F. Frederickson was fired, all hiring stopped. Frederickson found a new job as head of the department of geology at the University of Pittsburgh. I developed a lifelong friendship with Gerry Friedman and his family.

I attended GSA in late October and presented a paper on Triassic sandstone petrology challenging the paradigms of tectonic associations and sandstone petrography. The paper was scheduled in a general session and I was the second speaker. The speaker before me was Larry Sloss who presented a paper on “Cratonic Sequences.” The room was packed. When I reached the podium to make my presentation, the room was half full. Instantaneously, I resolved to give the best talk I was capable of presenting and make sure I never spoke to a half-full room again. Later, I met Sloss in the halls who apologized for leaving and said he heard I gave a great paper.

Bernie and I met at the Denver Airport and flew to Casper, WY via Cheyenne, WY, the first stop and then Laramie, WY. We flew over the “gangplank” as the ground rose to meet us. We arrived in Casper and were met by Chuck Tenney. It was cold, snow was falling and we went to the Sinclair office where Bernie met everyone and introduced me.

After meeting in Chuck’s office reviewing maps, cross-sections and Chuck’s perspectives of the project goals, we drove to Beulah, WY to stay at “Ranch A” a dude ranch. We arrived on October 31 for dinner. The place had many hunters from Minnesota, Nevada, and elsewhere. Some hunters also brought along their girlfriends or mistresses (not sure which). Bernie commented over drinks that “they’ll shoot poorly with their rifles during the day, and if they don’t drink too much, they might do better with their pop guns in bed.” Hunting season started next morning.

After breakfast, we drove into a box canyon as the sun rose. It snowed overnight and it was beautiful. I suggested we stop and examine an outcrop on the canyon wall. On opening our car doors, shot guns fired away and the noise echoed around the box canyon. Bernie said, “Sorry George, let’s get out of here. This is worse than the Battle of the Bulge.”

We spent two days in the field examining outcrops. We heard gunfire all day. At night, the hunters were getting tanked up at Ranch A but none bagged a deer.

On Sunday, we drove back to Casper. During the entire trip, Bernie and Chuck talked about other company people, their strengths, their foibles, their weaknesses, their intelligence, their ethics, and so on. I listened. Finally, Bernie said to me, “George, you must think we do nothing but gossip about everyone in the company.” After a non-committal response, Bernie said, “Look kid, you’re still wet behind the ears and new on the job. It’s a cold cruel world out there. And another thing, don’t believe this crap about company loyalty. They can fire you at will, and if you’re lucky, it might be with two week’s notice.”

I flew back to Denver, rented a car and drove to Boulder. I needed to read some theses at the University of Colorado that were relevant to my project. I also had dinner with Don Eicher and his wife. He had been at Colorado for two years teaching paleontology.

I flew back to Tulsa and returned to work.

By this time, I became better acquainted with Glenn Visher. Glenn was articulate and loved putting people down and arguing with them. I noticed that others in the lab were not that appreciative of his style. I didn’t mind the arguments, but did mind some of his acerbic comments. While at Shell, he completed their training program and was trying to build research on one aspect, namely the vertical sequence concept of changes in grain size, sedimentary structures, well log shape and trend to characterize depositional environments. I reviewed his work and felt he was on to something, but it was a hard sell to the company. Moreover, there was concern that he used Shell proprietary data and this could lead to difficulties.

As I went over Glenn’s work, I realized I needed to review the literature of the present day Gulf Coastal Plain of the Gulf of Mexico. It was the incubator of predictive models of sedimentology of the 1960’s.

Around Thanksgiving, I reassessed my situation. I missed the academic environment and the freedom to pursue research of one’s own choice. I found Tulsa a disappointing place to live particularly because I was single and dating opportunities were few. Most of my age group or younger were married with families. All eligible women I met were divorced with at least two young children requiring a major adjustment. Tulsa was a great place to live if one had a wife and three or more children. It was also heavily church oriented, and although I joined the local Unitarian church with a young charismatic minister, single ladies were few. There weren’t many other attractions.

I met two great couples at the Unitarian church, Ken and Marge Ackley and Hugh and Grace Hay-Roe. Ken was regional exploration manager for Humble and grew up in west Texas, graduating from the University of Texas. Early in his career, Ken was assigned to the district office in Mattoon, IL. He met Marge there at church. She was teaching school in Mattoon after graduating from the University of Illinois. His knick-name for me was ‘Rocknocker.’ Ken explained that we were fellow rocknockers pounding on rocks to find oil and natural gas. Meeting the Ackley’s was one of the bright spots during my entire stay in Tulsa.

Hugh Hay-Roe (BSc, Univ. of Alberta; MS, PhD, Univ. of Texas @ Austin; Jersey Production Research, International Petroleum – Peru; Belco; private consultant; BPZ Energy) became a life-long friend. A Canadian, we developed a good friendship. After I left Tulsa, we saw less of each other but reconnected when I moved to Houston and I completed some spec work for BPZ Energy, and later when BPZ Energy asked me to help them with a book on Peruvian basins. Hugh is best known for writing columns and a book on proper geological writing.

Sinclair Research, in many respects, was a great training ground, but I kept looking for teaching positions. I applied for a two-year temporary position at the University of Wisconsin and had a memorable breakfast interview at the Denver GSA meeting with three people, including Louis M. Cline who was now chairman. They hired someone even younger and in their view, cheaper. They were unconvinced I’d take a 30% pay cut if the job was offered.

At Christmas, I arranged to take time off and make up the time working Saturdays for six weeks. During that vacation, I interviewed for a faculty appointment at Villanova University but knew it was a poor match. A year later, Ed Belt, who was Catholic, accepted a job there. I also drove to New Haven and met with John Sanders to assess the situation and my options.

During January, there were changes on the job. I was expected to put out “fire-drill” requests from the operating company and did so. The first involved a granite wash problem in the Permian basin. Bernie and I worked together and completed our report which was well received.

Robbie then told me that management wanted Glenn and I go in the field with Allen P. Bennison, Sinclair’s regional geologist, to get exposed to some of his ideas and places he had worked in southern Oklahoma and Arkansas. Bennison published a definitive paper on the Potato Hills of Southern Oklahoma and correctly recognized it as a window within an overthrust belt. I already spent some weekends in that area looking at the Stanley-Jackfork (Mississippian) and Atoka (Pennsylvania) turbidites which Lewis Cline described at the 1959 Pittsburgh GSA meeting. It was an opportunity to obtain background information and also thought it advisable that I work with the person who Sinclair’s management considered their regional tectonic guru.

Glenn was incensed. He said because he worked with great professors at Northwestern (Krumbein, Sloss, and Dapples) and because I completed coursework with John Rodgers at Yale, we did not need to be taught anything by Bennison. I told him I didn’t know enough about Bennison and welcomed a chance to go in the field.

I went on the trip. I did not agree completely with Bennison’s approach, but learned new geology and at least saw it through his eyes. Geology is a science based on experience and observation. This trip with Bennison was an opportunity to gain needed additional experience.

Moreover, I also used the trip as an opportunity to propose a project to Sinclair management and it was approved. It dealt with a regional sandstone petrographic study of the Stanley-Jackfork boundary, utilizing field samples and well samples. That gave me reasons to go into the field more often at company expense.

In February, Gerry Friedman told me he accepted a position at the University of Pittsburgh as an Associate Professor. Frederickson offered him a job. I congratulated him.

Also that month, I received an invitation from the Yale Alumni Association to attend a function at a local country club. I went more out of curiosity. I met a young couple, Don and Ruth Nelson. He graduated from Yale and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. She graduated from Bryn Mawr and met Don while there.

Ruth’s father, a German immigrant, owned the Kaiser Oil company. It sold drill pipe and got into oil exploration using a unique approach. He noticed where his clients drilled from pipe deliveries. He determined from total pipe length how deep they drilled, which wells were successful, and which failed. He reasoned that companies spent a lot of money putting a prospect together so they knew oil might be recovered. He drilled offset wells from dry holes, discovered oil, and made millions doing so. I spent many a weekend with the Nelsons and their children.

During the middle of March, Jimmy Johnson called unexpectedly to let me know I passed my six month’s probationary period, had done well, and all colleagues were pleased with my work and interactions with them. My salary was raised from $9,000 (approximately $57,000 in 2009 dollars) per year to $9,500 (Approximately $60,500 in 2009 dollars) per year. He said he looked forward to a continued long-term working relationship with me at the lab.

As the spring continued, more “fire drill” requests were made. I wondered if I could ever finish any projects. Bernie called a meeting which Glenn, Robbie, John Rodgers, Bill Jacobsen, Nat Sage and I attended. Nat completed an eighth grade education but was a drinking buddy of Harry Sinclair, the company founder. When Sinclair passed away, Nat was assigned to the lab as an oil field water chemist.

Bernie showed a map of an area in west Texas. It displayed the organic content of soil samples and presumably the high organic content was correlated to possible oil seeps. When Nat looked at the map, he smiled and said, “Oh, I remember that ranch. All the highs are around the water troughs for cattle. Their anomalies correlate with bull shit.” We recommended the proposal be declined.

In April, Apache, a small independent in 1961, made a major gas discovery in the Arkoma basin. Other companies leased offset acreage. Sinclair requested me to assess their opportunities with a report due in two weeks. I completed some field work, scoured all reports I could find, made an assessment, and wrote a report. Basically, Apache’s discovery was a stratigraphic play exploiting a strandplain/barrier island system. I mapped the extent of this play and made my presentation. When Sinclair’s exploration management looked at my maps, the landman at the meeting reported that all the good acreage in the play was leased by competitors.

The chief geologist asked me, “George, while you were assessing data, did you see any new opportunities that hadn’t been leased or discovered?”

I explained that on the north side of the Arkoma basin, I observed Atoka outcrops which looked identical to the Oriskanie Sandstone (Devonian) of the Appalachians, a well-known gas reservoir. I interpreted them as fluvial channel sands.

He looked at me and said “Don’t people at the research lab know that oil and gas only occur in marine rocks?” The meeting ended.

Eight months later, Apache found natural gas exactly where I told Sinclair to look for it. By then, I had left the company.

Gerry Freidman decided to stay at Pan Am’s research lab and declined Pitt’s offer. I wrote Frederickson applying for the job. He called two weeks later and invited me for an interview. He wanted a reference from Bernie so I called and explained the situation. Bernie gave a good reference. The interview went well, although I only met with Frederickson. Two weeks later, I accepted an offer to start teaching at Pitt that fall.

I gave Bernie my resignation letter and the first thing he said was “George, we invested a lot in you. Where’s your company loyalty?” I replied, “Bernie, remember when you, Chuck Tenney, and I rode in the car going from Beulah, WY, to Casper back in November and you said that company loyalty was a bunch of crap?” He looked at me and said, “You’re right. Good luck with it. But I hate to see you go to work for Frederickson”

A week later, Jimmy Johnson called me into his office. Bernie Rolfe was there as was the Vice President of the lab. They asked why I would leave. I explained I wanted freedom to pick my own research, that the inability to complete research with all the fire drills slowed me down, and there was a particular project in the UK on the Jurassic Great Oolite Series I wanted to undertake. They made a counter offer. They offered three months off during the summer during the next two summers to do field work in the UK, and they would pay me to do the lab work at Sinclair. I turned it down knowing they could reverse their offer any time.

I completed my reports, turned them in and said my good-byes at the end of July, 1961. I spent two extra days in Tulsa to visit the Carter Oil Research Lab and the Pan American Research lab representing the University of Pittsburgh which meant they could show me more of their work. I then packed everything I owned into my car and headed east.

LESSONS LEARNED:

1. When working as an employee of an oil company, one is an “at will” employee, meaning that the company can fire you any time. Therefore, it is best to build up and keep a cash reserve.

2. Risk adverse companies ultimately will fail or are merged into a more aggressive company. Sinclair Oil was merged with ARCO for their assets in Alaska.

3. When employed in a less-than-desirable location, use weekends to go out of town for R&R. While in Tulsa, I should have travelled on weekends to Dallas to counter the negatives of the Tulsa region. I learned later to do so when living in east-central Illinois.