Charles E. Spahr

Charles E. "Charlie" Spahr (born October 8, 1913, Kansas City, Kansas died April 7, 2009, Shaker Heights, Ohio) is the youngest person to be appointed President in Sohio (Standard Oil of Ohio) history. He was then appointed as CEO of Sohio from 1959 to 1977, and was instrumental in the building of the Alaskan Pipeline.

Spahr's grandfather, Moses Spahr, was a Methodist minister, sent to minister in the Coffeyville, Kansas area, located on the southern Kansas border, prior to Oklahoma becoming a state. Growing up on a small family farm in Independence, Missouri, Spahr’s father worked at the nearby Sugar Creek refinery location of the Standard Oil Company of Indiana.

Graduating from the University of Kansas, with his bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering in 1934, he was a member of the Theta Tau Professional Engineering Fraternity and of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society.

Spahr worked his way through college during the Great Depression by binding books for the engineering program, and working as chauffeur for Chancellor Ernest Lindley. He would later give money to the University of Kansas, which helped fund the construction of a large classroom in the new School of Engineering building and Spahr Engineering Library for the University. Following his graduation from the University of Kansas, he worked as a boiler operator at the Sugar Creek Refinery in Sugar Creek, Missouri.

He then went to work for Phillips Petroleum Company in Bartlesville, Oklahoma as Assistant to the vice-president of Engineering. After three years, he did graduate studies in industrial management at Harvard Business School.

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