Mount Pleasant's refinery was one of its earliest industries and for many years provided well-paying employment for over 150 residents.
The refinery began life in 1937 as the Talco Oil & Refining Company. In 1949 the refinery was sold to American Liberty Oil Company, which later became American Petrofina and finally Fina. Fina sold the refinery to Dorchester Refining Company. Damson Oil Company acquired Dorchester Refining Company in a hostile stock takeover of the Dorchester Company in 1984.
The Mt. Pleasant refinery did not fit Damson's main business of oil and mineral production, and just six months after acquiring the local refinery, they closed it down in October, 1984. The refinery sat idle for many years, then Total Corporation acquired the it in 2007 and began dismantling it in accordance with guidelines established by the federal and state environmental protection agencies.
In a relatively short time, there will be no trace left of this business that was so important to Mt. Pleasant for almost 50 years.
The story of Mt. Pleasant's refinery is a long one, so we have made a chapter of several pages out of it. Unfortunately, like many other stories on the website, we were not able to complete the story of the refinery in time for the April, 2008 update due to the poor condition of the newspaper microfilm.
We will complete the story as soon as possible as we continue searching and typing the microfilm.
Please Note!
We are currently still researching the Mt. Pleasant refinery. Please contact us if you have information, photos, or artifacts that pertain to the refinery's operation from the time of its founding until its closure in 1984. We would like to review your information, scan your photos, or photograph your artifacts to include in our history of the refinery so we can share them with our website visitors.
We also need information, photos, and artifacts from the Talco refineries in order to write histories of those plants.
To read the story of Mt. Pleasant's refinery, click a link below or on the menu above.
Page 5 - Mt. Pleasant refinery - Part III
Page 6 - Mt. Pleasant refinery - Part IV
Page 7 - Mt. Pleasant refinery - Part V
