The oil market that sets today’s gas prices was invented in western Pennsylvania
A Penn State historian traces today's crude pricing system to 1859 Titusville, Pennsylvania, where Edwin Drake struck oil, and to the Oil City Oil Exchange, chartered in 1874 and opened in 1878. Trading moved from handshake deals to paper certificates representing oil in pipelines, with daily volumes reaching 10 to 14 million barrels, far exceeding actual production.
Standard Oil, run by John D. Rockefeller, effectively controlled crude pricing by 1895 until the Supreme Court broke up the trust in 1911. Today pricing runs through the New York Mercantile Exchange and Intercontinental Exchange, with futures contracts for delivery to Cushing, Oklahoma setting the U.S. benchmark.
The piece connects this history to a 2026 war that began February 28 when U.S. and Israeli airstrikes on Iran killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, prompting Iran to attack shipping and a Revolutionary Guard commander to declare the Strait of Hormuz closed. Gas prices rose 50% by May 2026 before work-arounds restored roughly half the strait's normal oil flow by late September, holding crude near $100 a barrel.
The full dispatch is available from the source below.