Exxon: Transforming Energy, 1973–2005

Four giant volumes (plus a companion one on Humble Oil) appeared between 1955 and 1988 on the history of Standard Oil Company (New Jersey) and its successor (as of 1972) Exxon Corporation. These well-documented volumes took the story to 1975. As related by the publisher and author of this book, about four years after the 1999 megamerger of Exxon and Mobil and the formation of ExxonMobil, the merged unit gave a collection of its historical files—containing some four million documents—to the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History (DBC) at the University of Texas at Austin. When the document transfer was made, in 2003, William Hale, a thirty-year Exxon/ExxonMobil manager (most recently in the public relations department) suggested that it was time for a fifth volume of Exxon history. ExxonMobil's top management approved, and in 2005 the DBC asked Joseph Pratt to write it. He agreed, and the book under review, which covers the period 1973 through the merger to 2005, was written by Pratt “with the assistance of William Hale†and published by DBC.