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PEI Flourishes after Half a Century

On the 50th anniversary of the Petroleum Equipment Institute, PE&T looks back at PEI’s founding members and their successors over the ensuing 16 years. Jaime Kammerzell presents a pictorial tribute to the founders and leaders of NAOEJ and the current PEI leaders.



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Author: Kammerzell Jaime
Pictorial tribute to the
Jobber panel at 3rd annual meeting, Columbus, OH 1953
Warren Cruzen, right, talking with Bertram C. Green at 3rd annual convention, 1953

In America, whenever we look back through the years at how an important organization got started and endured “the lean years,” one thing always seems to ring true: the founders and early leaders were visionaries who just happened to be on the scene at a time when their unique wisdom and leadership were critically needed. It seems that these individuals were just made to fill whatever roles were crucial during their tenures. Just look at the history of the United States and its founding fathers and early leaders and someone always rises to the occasion.

On this, the 50th Anniversary of the Petroleum Equipment Institute, a look at its birth, its childhood and its early teens will bear out this tenet. PEI’s founding fathers were actually “founding jobbers,” a couple of petroleum equipment jobbers who saw the need for forming an organization to help deal with the complex problems of equipment distributors. They and their successors over the ensuing 16 years provided the vision and leadership that form the foundation for today’s flourishing organization known as PEI. But it was not always called PEI.

As the story goes, Jimmy Newberry of the Newberry Equipment Company in Memphis, TN and Fred Coffield, Jr. of the Coffield Supply Company in South Bend, IN were World War II veterans who had returned to their family-owned petroleum marketing equipment companies. When management problems occurred, they felt isolated because they had no distributor network for discussing their problems. So they contacted other equipment distributors and proposed the formation of a national association.

As a result of their efforts, the National Association of Oil Equipment Jobbers (NAOEJ) held its first annual convention in 1950 in St. Louis, MO. One hundred and ten delegates attended the three-day event. There were no exhibits that first year. However, one year later, at the Neil House in Columbus, OH, 15 exhibitors attended. By way of comparison, attendance at the 50th PEI convention (Convex 2000) in San Diego on October 2-4 is expected top 5,000, with 619 trade-show booths. The following is a pictorial tribute to the founders and leaders of NAOEJ, after which photographs of the current PEI leaders are presented. The photographs and captions were provided by Howard Upton and Robert Renkes.

At a banquet on October 3, 1952,
J. M. Newberry, founder and first president receives a plaque from
E. de Penaloza
 
October 24, 1955 at 5th annual meeting in Indianapolis (left to right): Fred Coffield, Jr., Coffield Supply Co., South Bend, IN; Joe Davis, Indiana Oil Equipment Company, Indianapolis; Howard Upton, NAOEJ executive secretary; and Ralph M. Hoffhein, Indiana Oil Equipment Company
 
At the 1956 convention in Kansas City: W. E. Marshall, Jr., president-elect from Equipment Sales Company in Atlanta, takes gavel from Melvin Schlesinger, out-going president from the Tri-State Equipment Company in Kansas City
 
3rd annual meeting in Columbus, Ohio, 1953. (Left to right) August Schramm, vice president-elect, W. E. Crowder, president-elect, and John Quilter, out-going president
 
 
3rd annual meeting in Columbus,
OH
In 1957, Fred Coffield, Jr., Coffield Supply Company, South Bend, IN is the vice president-elect and H. E. Anderson, Northwest Service Station Equipment Company, Minneapolis, is the president-elect
 
8th annual meeting in Dallas in October 1958. Bob Scoville, SECO-Scoville Equipment, Sioux City; Howard Upton, executive secretary, Tulsa; Fred Coffield, president-elect; Eugene de Penaloza, vice president-elect
 
O. Habhegger, Miss Washington, George Hubbard at a ribbon cutting ceremony that opened the 11th annual trade show in Washington, DC
 
 
Trade-show scene at the 10th annual meeting in St. Louis, October 16-18, 1960 at the Hotel Sheraton-JeffersonIn 1957, out-going president W. E. Marshall, Jr. hands gavel to president-elect, H. E. Anderson
T. C. Sutton and R. S. Murray, Jr. prior to ribbon cutting ceremony in Atlanta at the 13th annual convention
 
Senator John Tower talks with NAOEJ officers prior to his address at the 13th annual convention. Left to right are T. O. Bratten, Houston, vice president elect; Senator Tower, E. M. Beaver, Charlotte, vice president; John Quilter, Richmond, president-elect; and R. S. Murray, Jr., El Paso, president
 
 
15th convention. John R. Queen (left) is joined by Mrs. Queen as
his election as president of PEI is announced
H. E. Andersen, out-going president, handing gavel to Fred Coffield, president-elect, at the 8th annual meeting in 1958
 
NAOEJ officers and directors. c. 1964
 
Today’s PEI The PEI name and the organization to which it refers has endured into the year 2000. Its total membership today is 1612 companies that are engaged in the manufacture, distribution, installation or servicing of petroleum distribution equipment. PEI carries with it the same mission as when it was started, to be a leading authority and source of information for the petroleum handling equipment industry
Philip Cruzen
Let the next 50 years begin Bob Renkes, Philip Cruzen, Lawrence Hafer and Kendall Johnson are just a few of today’s PEI leaders who will bring PEI into the next 50 years
Bob Renkes
Managing Editor of PE&T

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