Fore!
One of those recent sunny spring afternoons, five Home Office girls — neophyte golfers all — took advantage of the expert advice of General Records' Bob Herrmann to perfect their swings. Bob, an old hand at the game, soon refreshed the girls' memories on the fine points of stance and swing.
His pupils, left to right, were: Pearl Bodle, Bulk Station Checking; Dolores Geiss, Sales; Dolores Repasky, Service Station Credit Ticket; Marge Angelo, Canton Accounting; and Caroline Polk, General Engineering.
Vote May 19 in
EMBA Election
The Sohio News
Vote May 19 in
EMBA Election
Vol. 9 MAY 1955 No. 5
Let's All Work Smarter for SEIP
For the fourth consecutive quarter, members of the Sohio Employees' Investment Plan received last month an addition to their accounts equal to one-third of the amount they allotted to the plan from their own pay checks during the preceding fiscal quarter.
Announcement of this 11th company contribution since the plan's inception in mid-1952 accompanied President Clyde T. Foster's disclosure that the rate of return on the company's borrowed and invested capital for the 12 months ending March 31 had shown a definite upturn. This improvement followed three successive declines.
The return on borrowed and invested capital for the latest 12-month period amounted to 8.41 per cent. Had it reached 9 per cent, the amount of the company contribution would have been raised to 50 per cent of the sums allotted to the plan by members in the first three months of this year.
As previously reported, for the 12 months ending Dec. 31, the company's return on borrowed and invested capital amounted to 7.81 per cent. For the 12 months ending last Sept. 30 it was 8.22 per cent, and for the 12 months ending June 30, 1954, it was 8.85 per cent.
As of March 31, the Investment Plan trustee held 87,641 U. S. Government bonds in the name of plan members, as well as 63,781 shares of Sohio common stock and 13,894 shares of Sohio preferred. The common stock represented slightly more than 1-1/2 per cent of all common shares outstanding. The plan remained the largest holder of Sohio preferred, with nearly 4 per cent of the outstanding shares.
At the end of March, the plan had 7,294 members, representing 86 per cent of all Sohioans eligible to participate.
Widely publicized as a "giant brain," the IBM-705, latest in electronic data processing machines, has been ordered by Sohio and will be delivered early next year. It will be 10 to 50 times as fast as the IBM-650 obtained only last month.
This was announced by Sohio Controller Ralph A. Martin, who stated that Sohio is getting one of the first of the new units to be produced by International Business Machines Corp.
The 705 actually consists of a number of machines. Key machine is the central processing unit. It will add, subtract, multiply, divide, select items from a list, compare information, point out errors, make decisions—all at terrific speed.
This central unit receives information on punched cards or magnetized tape and stores it in "memory cells." It produces information on connected machines which automatically punch cards, magnetize tape, or print records.
An operator sitting at its control console follows progress of the work on a board of flashing lights. From time to time an attached typewriter clatters off messages — pointing out errors, telling the operator when to change reels, etc.
Despite such spectacular "giant brain" aspects, the 705 fundamentally operates from the punched card system now used. However, it will require yearlong planning of accounting procedures and training of personnel to prepare for its use.
Controller Martin, commenting on possible effects on personnel, told more than 700 Home Office Accounting Department Sohioans getting a preview of the new machine: "President Foster has authorized me to state definitely that no one will lose his job as a result of acquiring electronic equipment.
"The 705 system should make higher grade jobs — jobs which pay more money and are more interesting," Martin said.
As an indication of this change, 20 Sohioans already have taken four-week training courses at the IBM school in Cleveland. Other groups are scheduled for courses during the coming year.
Although basic data comes from punched cards, the 705 can quickly convert them to magnetized tape. This not only will cut costs, but will make previously inaccessible records available for study.
For instance, Sohio's sales records for one month require 300,000 punched cards filling 80 file drawers. Such bulky records are piled to the roof in Sohio's Stationery and Storage Warehouse. Five 11-inch diameter reels of tape will hold the same information as 300,000 cards. And the tape can be fed into the 705 in 30 minutes, while it would take 40 to 50 hours with cards and present equipment.
Preliminary studies indicate that such "paper work" savings will more than pay the rental of the machine. But the real significance of the "brain" lies in its opening new possibilities in engineering, research, and operations control, says Norman Pat-ton, head of the Electronics Data Processing Special Applications Group of Methods and Procedures Staff.
"Sohio engineers and planners will be able to solve problems in minutes which now require hours," Patton says. Sales research, production scheduling, quantity and quality control, cost studies, inventory control-practically any sort of statistical picture of company operations should be possible on the new machine.
oklahoma city—Sohio's Production Headquarters here should have its own modern, air-conditioned office building at this time next year! Plans for construction of the 235 by 100-foot two-story building were announced by Board Chairman A. A. Stambaugh, following authorization of the nearly $900,000 project" by Sohio's board of directors.
New Sohio Production Headquarters will be located adjacent to a large, new shopping center at 50th and May streets in the northwestern section of Oklahoma City. Sohioans will have their own parking lot away from downtown traffic, congestion and will have excellent transportation connections. Surveys of where Sohioans live helped establish a location centrally convenient to their homes.
Combined in the new building will be offices now located in Skirvin Tower, First National Bank Building, and Liberty National Bank Building. Growth of Sohio's Production Headquarters has made it impossible to find available office space in any single building.
Mid-Continent Division Office, the Production Research Laboratory, and District Land and Geological Office will continue to have separate facilities.
First floor of the new building will have 23,000 square feet of space. Accounting, auditing, purchasing, and tax offices will be located here. On the 21,000-square-foot second floor will be general administration, land and exploration, industrial relations, engineering, chief clerk, and gas-gasoline offices.
The basement will provide an additional 20,000 square feet of space. Storage now maintained at three locations in the city will take 15,000 square feet of this.
Sorey, Hill, and Sorey are architects for the building. Construction should begin late this summer and be completed about May 1, 1956.
Grease Institute Elects Ferguson
DETROIT - At a meeting of the National Lubricating Grease Institute here, Howard P. Ferguson was elected to the board of directors. Mr. Ferguson, manager of Sohio's Lubricating Oil Sales, was also elected to the lubrication committee in the American Petroleum Institute's division of marketing.
Sohio's board of directors, at its meeting following the annual shareholders' meeting, named Thomas R. Cadwell assistant secretary of the company and Bert W. Nichols assistant treasurer, in addition to his post as assistant secretary.
Both new officers are veterans of more than 20 years with the company.
T. R. cadwell
New assistant secretary.
B.
W. NlCHOLS
New assistant treasurer and assistant secretary.
Mr. Cadwell, a 53-year-old native of Cleveland, studied civil engineering at Case Institute of Technology and economics at Northwestern School of Commerce before joining Sohio as a service station salesman in the Cleveland Division on Aug. 3, 1933.
Subsequently he served as a vacation relief truck driver and maintenance clerk before becoming chief clerk in the Cleveland Division Office in 1938. He was named manager of the Cleveland Division Maintenance Department in February 1941.
In October that year he was transferred to the Accounting Department at the Home Office as a special clerk. He moved to the Budget Unit in 1943 and to Consolidating and Research in 1946. Since July 1953 he has been serving as staff assistant in the Secretary's Office, Finance Department.
Tom enjoys music, photography, and working in the yard. He and his wife Elsie have one son Thomas and a daughter, Mrs. Mary Ellen Wobbecke, whose husband Kenneth is a research analyst in Home Office Sales Research. They also have four grandchildren.
Bert W. Nichols
Bert Nichols was born April 10, 1907, in Cleveland. He studied business administration at Colgate University and Cleveland College of Western Reserve University.
He worked for two years in the sales engineering department of W. S. Tyler Co., Cleveland, before joining Sohio as a service station salesman on March 31, 1931. He was promoted to service station supervisor in October 1933, and to assistant manager of the Cleveland Division service station department in 1941. He became chief clerk in the Cleveland Division in 1943.
Bert was transferred to the Finance Department at the Home Office as a staff assistant in the Secretary's Office in February 1944. He has been assistant secretary since May 1945, and manager of Insurance and Claims since September 1949.
Bert is a director of the Chagrin Valley Rotary Club and a member of the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, Council on World Affairs, Cleveland Association of Claims Men, Cleveland Insurance Buyers Association, the Oil Insurance Administrators Group, and the planning council of the American Management Association.
Bert arid his wife have two daughters, Laura and Mrs. Marilyn Mowery, and two grandchildren. Their residence is on Mill Hollow Dr., Chagrin Falls.
Announces Sales Increase
Sohioans' sales efforts — particularly in boosting Boron Supreme gasoline—raised the company's sales and operating revenue in the first quarter this year to a new peak of $81,161,000, President Clyde T. Foster reported at the annual meeting of shareholders April 25.
This represents an increase of about 8 per cent over sales and operating revenue of $75,228,000 reported for the first quarter of 1954.
Aided by a special non-recurring profit resulting from liquidation of Ajax Pipe Line Corp., net income for the quarter rose to $6,080,000, up 36 per cent over the $4,460,935 earned in the corresponding 1954 period.
Earnings are equal to $1.46 per share of common stock, after providing for dividends on preferred stock, compared with $1.06 per share last year.
Part of this year's earnings— 22 cents per share — represents the non-recurring profit from the Ajax liquidation.
Excluding this special profit, totaling $879,000, Sohio's net income for the first quarter this year is about 17 per cent ahead of last year, President Foster noted.
"The number of gallons of Sohio branded petroleum products sold during the first quarter was up 6 per cent, which includes a gain of 5 per cent in our sales volume of Sohio branded gasoline," he reported.
"Not only were our gasoline sales well ahead of last year, but the portion of them represented by premium _grade gasoline was up substantially," President Foster continued. "Our new Boron Supreme gasoline was the big factor in this gain."
Total volume of all petroleum products sold, both branded and unbranded, was 8 per cent higher than in the first quarter of 1954.
Crude oil processed at Sohio refineries during the first quarter averaged 132,300 barrels per day, an increase of about 8 per cent over the 122,800 barrels per day average in the 1954 period.
First Quarter Sales Rise to Record High
Elliott B. McConnell, vice president in charge of Manufacturing, told the shareholders' meeting that Sohio refineries in the first quarter this year operated at 97 per cent of capacity, compared with an average of 90 per cent for the petroleum industry east of the Rocky Mountains.
"Net production of crude oil and other liquid hydrocarbons averaged 31,023 barrels a day this year," President Foster reported, "compared with 34,557 barrels a day during the first three months last year, when we had a substantial increase in production from the resumption of full operations in the Spraberry Area and the new wells which had been drilled there during the latter part of 1953."
"Our production in the Spraberry Area averaged 3,812 barrels a day this year, compared with 7,382 barrels a day last year," he added. "This decline was anticipated due to the unusual conditions existing in the underground formation from which the production originates. Production in other areas was just about the same as last year as new wells offset the effects of lower allowables and declining production rates at older wells."
Foster Praises Employee Record
Safety consciousness of Sohio workers, always a source of pride to the company, won bouquets in 1954 by qualifying for three of the National Safety Council's highest awards, President Clyde T. Foster informed shareholders at the annual meeting.
The council presented Sohio with one award of honor for the safety performance of the entire company, another for the Manufacturing Department, and an award of merit for the Production Department's Producing Division.
Each award recognized Sohio's substantial reduction last year in the frequency rate of occupational injuries to employees, compared with the average rate for the corresponding petroleum industry classification in the previous three-year period. For the company as a whole, the rate was 50 per cent lower.
More than 700 stockholders attended the annual meeting—the company's 85th—at Hotel Cleveland on April 25. They elected three new directors and re-elected seven, raising membership of the company's board to ten.
Newly elected directors are Lawrence A. Appley of New York City, president of the American Management Association; Thomas F. Patton, assistant president and first vice president of Republic Steel Corp., Cleveland; and Charles E. Spahr, Sohio's executive vice president. All three were nominated for the board posts earlier this year.
Re-Elect Directors
Directors re-elected are Samuel H. Elliott, Clyde T. Foster, William A. McAfee, Elliott B. Mc-Connell, James J. Nance, A. A. Stambaugh, and A. E. Wolf.
Board Chairman Stambaugh, presiding at the meeting, announced that Sohio now has approximately 35,000 stockholders, an increase of more than 50 per cent over the 22,500 shareholders at the end of 1950.
A feature of the morning session was introduction by Mr. Elliott, vice president in charge of Sales, of representative members of his organization, while exhibiting color slides showing their operational headquarters.
Represent Sales Personnel
Representing Sohio's salary service station personnel was Robert Angus, manager at Cleveland Division's East 223rd and .Lake Shore Blvd. Servicenter, Kenneth A. Widder, distributor at the Carrollton (Ohio) Bulk Station, represented Sohio distributors. Bill Plesec, who operates a dealer station at 16901 Waterloo Rd., Cleveland, represented the dealers, and Stewart MacKeigan, proprietor of a dealer-rented outlet at Warren and Madison, Cleveland, represented the DR's.
An innovation at the afternoon session was presentation to the group by Chairman Stambaugh of two of Sohio's youngest shareholders, Arline and Marline Early, twin 3 Vg-month-old daughters of the James Earlys of Cleveland. The twins were two of the Ohio babies born Jan. 10— Sohio's 85th anniversary—each of whom received a share of stock from the company.
Construct Gathering Lines
Joseph D. Harnett, manager of the Transportation Department, reported his organization is now laying 31 miles of gathering lines in the Illinois Basin which, with required pumping equipment, will cost approximately $275,000.
Richard W. French, vice president in charge of Production, stated that a substantial portion of Sohio's exploratory expenditures this year will again be in the Tidelands area of the Gulf of Mexico.
Edward F. Morrill, manager of the Petrochemical Department, estimated that 75 per cent of the petrochemical plant's output will be used in agriculture. He forecast that the new $17,000,000 plant at Lima will be in operation, and marketing of products will start, early in 1956.
oklahoma city— Timbalier Bay State Well No. 1, first wildcat of the offshore group in which Sohio holds a quarter interest, hit possible oil or gas sands in penetrating to 12,000 feet before being halted recently by a stuck drill pipe.
This was announced by Richard W. French, vice president in charge of Production, in a progress report on Sohio's offshore interests.
"We have had some indications of gas or oil in State Well No. 1," Mr. French reports, "and we'll continue testing."
Drilling crews, blocked by stuck drill pipe at 10,900 feet which wouldn't yield to a fishing job, have whipstocked out the side of the hole and will continue drilling to the 14,000-foot target.
Farther offshore, at the group's "Big Jumbo" federal lease, another oil firm hit a salt dome at 8,900 feet without finding oil.
Under a cooperative drilling arrangement in which the well was drilled offsetting the Sohio group's lease, Sohio will contribute $50,000 "dry hole" money. Such an arrangement, a common practice in the industry, makes it possible for companies to share the fabulous costs of searching for oil. Sohio would not be required to pay any money if the well were a producer.
Drillers at "Big Jumbo" are now whipstocking out of this hole and will drill farther down the slope of the dome to test objective sands to perhaps 12,000 feet.
"Our leases are on the slope and look good for the deeper sands — our original target," French reports.
Plans for further testing of our other offshore blocks were discussed in a meeting of the group May 2 in New Orleans.