It's hard to imagine that
there was a time when Americans didn't know what to do with oil -- or that it was just 150 years ago. But when oil was discovered in Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1859, one oil-based product was "advertised as a cure for coughs, colds, and rheumatism." A
Pittsburgh entrepreneur sold Rock-Oil, 'grease
that could be burned to provide light." Refining technologies
advanced quickly, though, and the rest his history. As writer Steve Weinberg tells it: When the Civil War e
