Standard Oil was John D. Rockefeller's petroleum monopoly during the Gilded Age. The trust dominated the petroleum business through ruthless and underhand tactics, including colluding with railroads, which carried Standard's oil at big discounts and paid Mr Rockefeller a fee for every barrel of competitors' oil they transported.
In 1902 the journalist Ida Tarbell, whose father was an independent oil producer ruined by Standard's practices, began publishing a 19-part exposé of Mr Rockefeller's perfidies. Her findings were also compiled into a book. In 1911 the Supreme Court ordered the trust to be broken up.
There are people so addicted to exaggeration that they can't tell the truth without lying.