When John D. Rockefeller expanded his Standard Oil company, he changed the image of big business, became the country’s richest man and set the foundation for the city of Baton Rouge.The exhibit “A Century of Standard Oil in Baton Rouge” on display at Hill Memorial Library lets visitors explore life in Baton Rouge before, during and after the establishment of the Standard Oil company, which is now ExxonMobil.”[The exhibit] gives people a real window on what it was like here 100 years ago,” said Elaine Smyth, head of Special Collections at Hill Memorial Library. “You can see how people lived. The pictures are interesting … They show a glimpse of the history of Standard Oil and how it changed Baton Rouge as well.”The exhibit features reproductions of photographs taken in 1909 by Standard Oil of Louisiana accountant John Adam Bechtold. These photos were donated to the exhibit by Bechtold’s granddaughter Marna Shortess of Baton Rouge. “[The exhibit] gives [viewers] a sense of the history of how much Standard Oil meant to Baton Rouge and how much it’s helped Baton Rouge evolve,” said Shortess. “Way back then, everyone had a connection with Standard Oil.”Bechtold photographed his fellow employees, the Standard Oil headquarters, the railroads, the commotion on payday and the construction of the company in Baton Rouge. “We thought it was appropriate to mark the 100th anniversary of the company in Baton Rouge,” Smyth said. The exhibit also features items from the University’s Special Collections, such as old newspaper clippings about Standard Oil and two maps of Baton Rouge that show the progression of the city and growth of subdivisions around the refinery. Smyth said these subdivisions housed Standard Oil employees and made it an easier commute for the workers. “Baton Rouge, around 1900, was a relatively small place. It was a river port,” said Paul Paskoff, history professor. “When Standard Oil came in 1909 … it transformed Baton Rouge almost overnight into a high-tech center. It’s been essential to the economic development of the state.”Paskoff said companies like Standard Oil changed how Americans identified themselves in society. He said people began to define themselves by what they did and for whom they worked in the early 1900s.The photographs depict this sociocultural change of big business in America in the early 20th century. Some of the pictures show the refinery employees doing calisthenics in the field in their white button-down shirts, ties and pants. The Standard Oil company of Louisiana also had its own baseball team and marching band, which played at the dedication of the University’s current campus in 1926. “For people going to school here, especially for LSU students from Louisiana, this is the corporation that transformed this state and certainly Baton Rouge and Southern Louisiana from being a predominately agricultural region into a vital and the crucial source of petroleum products, refining and shipping of petroleum in the U.S.,” said Paskoff.The exhibit will be on display at Hill until August 15, 2009.—-Contact Mary Walker Baus at [email protected]