Which wealthy owner of Standard Oil built trusts and used ruthless tactics to eliminate competitors?

• A. Andrew Carnegie
• B. John D. Rockefeller
• C. Terence Powderly
• D. Henry Ford

Answer: (B)

Monopolies and how trusts operated during the Gilded Age. John D. Rockefeller built Standard Oil into a nationwide monopoly by creating a trust that brought many oil companies under one management. This structure let him coordinate production, set controls over prices, and push rivals out of business. He used tactics that were widely seen as ruthless: cutting prices to undercut competitors, securing secret railroad rebates to ship oil cheaper, and buying up competing refineries to consolidate power. Through these moves, Rockefeller amassed extraordinary influence over the oil industry.

Andrew Carnegie is known for dominating the steel industry through vertical integration and efficiency, not for running a major oil trust. Terence Powderly was a labor leader, not an industrialist. Henry Ford revolutionized mass production with the moving assembly line, but he did not build the kind of oil-trust empire Rockefeller did.