rs. A
fierce freight war was thus precipitated, in which the Erie and New York
Central supported the Standard Company. The Pennsylvania road was soon
forced to surrender and sign an ignominious treaty.

The Baltimore and Ohio, which had again commenced to carry the product
of those Pittsburgh refineries which received their crude oil through
the Columbia Conduit Company, was in a similar manner forced to reject
their freights. The pipe line, whose value was thus almost entirely
destroyed, was soon after sold to the Standard Oil Company. This company
had now an almost complete monopoly of the oil business of the United
States, and still it was not satisfied. It appears that some of the
producers of crude oil had been in the habit of shipping a part of their
product in spite of the advantages which the Standard had through its
rebates. To prevent even these shipments, or rather to exact another
tribute from railroad stockholders, the American Transfer Company, one
of the auxiliaries of the Standard Oil Trust, in 1878, demanded and
received from the Pennsylvania road a "commission" of 20 cents a barrel
on all shipments of petroleum _made by any_ shipper. It had been shown
to the satisfaction of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company that similar
commissions, ranging from 20 to 35 cents a barrel, were being paid by
the New York Central and Erie roads.

When, in 1879, an effort was made to establish a pipe line from the oil
regions to the seaboard, nothing was left undone by the trunk lines to
thwart the enterprise. The new company finally succeeded in making
connection with a railway which had no part in the pool, and there was
some hope that under this arrangement competition might at least be
maintained at some points. The Standard Company again appealed to the
trunk lines to protect it against injury by competition and obtained
from them a special rate of 20 cents per barrel, which rate was even
reduced to 15 cents per barrel two months later. Against such a rate it
was impossible to compete, and after a short struggle the new line found
itself compelled to sell its works to the Standard.

To crown its monopoly, the Standard Oil Company finally bought of the
New York Central and Erie roads their terminal facilities for the
transportation of oil, and thereby made it virtually impossible for them
to transport oil for any of its few remaining competitors. Mr. Josiah
Lombard, part owner of the New York refinery, stated in 1879