We acknowledge the gift of Ida Tarbell ....

As we enter this New Year of 2021, we acknowledge a new source for our own inspiration in this continuing work, by the pioneering investigative journalism created by Ida Tarbell.

It was Ida Tarbell whose influence caused us to move the scope of this work back in time beyond its original limited boundary. We were influenced by Ida's own words that she wrote and published back in the so-called 'Gilded Age'.

We had already discovered the influence of Herman Brown and his brother, and they have had a major impact on our research into reasons for the arrival of offshore broadcasting in the  North Sea. But it was Ida's "muckraking", as President Teddy Roosevelt called the 'boodling' revelations of her colleagues, and Ida's own investigative examination of the Trust created by John D. Rockefeller, that turned our own attention to the key subject of oil.

It is oil from on land and under the sea which has created our modern world of gadgetry and transportation, and without oil our Modern Age could not have developed in the way it has. But oil is more than the lubricant that make 'things' work, it is also the means by which huge wealth has been privately assembled to buy influence that controls our political world.

Thank you Ida Tarbell for not only revealing this basic truth to us, because in so doing you have helped us to assemble a gigantic jigsaw puzzle and see the really big picture.

Ida, you also provided additional proof and inspiration - especially for women - to show that anyone can succeed, even when Society tries to block your path.

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