Earl George Rodman, Sr. and William Douglas Noel
Odessa, Ector County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Earl George Rodman, Sr. (1896–1976) and William Douglas Noel (1914–1987) brought the petrochemical industry to Odessa. Rodman and Noel came together in 1946 to form the Odessa Natural Gasoline Company and enjoyed major success as their venture matured. While both men had previous experience in the petroleum industry, their backgrounds differed considerably. After serving in WWI, Rodman married Fay Louis Hummel and began working for Dunigan Tool and Supply Company in 1923. He and his family moved to McCamey in 1926 to establish a branch of Dunigan tools. Later, Rodman opened his first oil field in 1935, which led to additional work in development of oil reservoirs in Oklahoma. Meanwhile, Noel graduated from the University of Texas in 1935, and entered the world of petroleum as a roustabout. He moved to Wickett in 1936 as a chemist for Gulf Oil and married Ellen Witwer a year later. In 1940, he set out to form Trebol Oil Company with colleagues M.H. McWhirter and J.B. Tubb and found immediate success with drilling in west Texas. Upon meeting Rodman, Noel and he began a partnership in 1946 which caused Noel to move to Odessa in 1947. After the formation of Odessa Natural Gasoline Company, the two men expanded their venture in 1954 to explore ways to efficiently and profitably utilize wasted natural gas. Their plans influenced El Paso Products, Rexene, General Tire, and Shell Oil to open plants in Odessa, which fostered the economic prospects of the town. Rodman and Noel remained partners for 30 years, and their legacy remains a prominent part of recent west Texas history. (2015)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Earl Rodman and William Noel came from very different starts in the oil business—Rodman a WWI veteran turned oilfield developer, Noel a University of Texas chemist who began as a roustabout—before joining forces in Odessa in 1946. Their Odessa Natural Gasoline Company sought to profitably use the natural gas that refineries were wasting, and their vision drew El Paso Products, Rexene, General Tire, and Shell to open plants in the town. Over a thirty-year partnership the two men built the petrochemical industry that transformed West Texas.
Why it matters
Their partnership shows how individual enterprise turned an overlooked resource into a major industry, seeding the economic boom of postwar West Texas.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
The lives of Earl George Rodman, Sr. and William Douglas Noel span the arc that carried West Texas from the raw oil-boom years of the early twentieth century into the industrial prosperity that followed the Second World War. Rodman was born in 1896 and came of age around the First World War; Noel, born in 1914, belonged to the next generation. Between them they lived the whole modern history of the Permian Basin oil economy.
West Texas in these decades was a place where fortunes were made in the field. Towns like McCamey, Wickett, and Odessa rose and fell with drilling, and the petroleum business offered a ladder that a determined man could climb from the rig floor upward. It was rough, speculative, boom-and-bust country, and it rewarded both technical skill and nerve.
By the postwar era the frontier of opportunity was shifting—from simply finding and pumping oil toward the more sophisticated business of putting its byproducts to work. Rodman and Noel stand at exactly that hinge, two men whose partnership carried West Texas from wildcatting into the petrochemical age.
People & events
They came to the same place by very different roads. Rodman served in the First World War, married Fay Louise Hummel, and went to work for the Dunigan Tool and Supply Company in 1923. He moved his family to McCamey in 1926 to open a Dunigan branch, opened his first oil field in 1935, and went on to develop oil reservoirs as far afield as Oklahoma—an oilman who learned the business from the tools up.
Noel's path ran through the classroom. He graduated from the University of Texas in 1935 and entered the industry at the bottom, as a roustabout, before moving to Wickett in 1936 as a chemist for Gulf Oil. He married Ellen Witwer the next year, and in 1940 struck out on his own to form the Trebol Oil Company with colleagues M. H. McWhirter and J. B. Tubb, finding quick success drilling in West Texas.
When the two men met, they recognized something in each other. In 1946 they formed a partnership—Noel moved to Odessa in 1947—and together founded the Odessa Natural Gasoline Company. In 1954 they set out to find efficient, profitable ways to use the natural gas that was being wasted, and their plans drew El Paso Products, Rexene, General Tire, and Shell Oil to open plants in Odessa. Rodman and Noel remained partners for thirty years.
Its place in the American story
This marker tells a quintessentially American story: two individuals, from different backgrounds and different generations, whose enterprise reshaped a region. It is the classic pairing—the field-hardened developer and the university-trained chemist—each supplying what the other lacked, and together accomplishing what neither could have alone.
Their great insight belongs to a larger national turn. Across mid-century America, industry was learning to extract value from what had been discarded, and Rodman and Noel's decision to make something profitable from wasted natural gas is a textbook example. That single idea helped seed an entire petrochemical cluster and, with it, a wave of postwar economic growth.
There is also something here about the shape of American opportunity in the twentieth century. Noel began as a roustabout and Rodman as a tool-company employee; both ended as founders of a major industry. Their thirty-year partnership stands as a reminder of how personal enterprise, in the right time and place, could turn an overlooked resource into a lasting legacy—and turn a West Texas town into an industrial center.
If you visit
This marker sits in Odessa, in the heart of the country these two men transformed, and it's best appreciated alongside the story of the petrochemical complex their partnership set in motion. Reading them together turns an industrial history into a human one.
As you stand here, hold the two biographies side by side—the WWI veteran who came up through the oilfield tools, and the young chemistry graduate who started as a roustabout. Their differences are the point. It was the meeting of practical field experience and scientific training, in 1946, that made everything downstream possible.
For a traveler tracing the roots of the modern Permian Basin, this is a rewarding stop. Look out at the working industry on Odessa's horizon and remember that so much of it grew from a partnership between two men who simply refused to keep burning something valuable. Their thirty years together are written into the skyline you can still see today.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Earl George Rodman, Sr.
- · William Douglas Noel
- · M.H. McWhirter
- · J.B. Tubb
Themes & tags
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