We don’t normally think of Philadelphia as being an oil town, but the Point Breeze refinery in South Philadelphia, easily visible from the Pratt Bridge on your ride to the airport, dominated the skyline for many decades with its storage tanks and distilling towers.
- Born in the middle of Pennsylvania’s Titusville oil boom in the northwest corner of the state, J. Newton Pew established Sun Oil in 1890.
- After its move to Philadelphia, Newton’s sons Howard and Joe Jr. ran the company for decades and established a refinery at Marcus Hook and the Sun Shipbuilding Company in Chester. The Pews are known today for their charitable contributions throughout the city. The Pew Mausoleum at Laurel Hill West holds several generations of this prosperous philanthropic family.
Learn about oil, crude and refined, shipbuilding, philanthropy, and even some political intrigue in this month’s episode of “All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories – Philadelphia and Oil” from wherever you listen to podcasts.
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