Cortlandt S. Dietler papers, 1951-2005

Successful oilman Cortlandt S. Dietler was born September 19, 1921, in Denver, Colorado, to Ralph O. (noted Denver oil consultant) and Christabel (Scoville) Dietler. As a young man, he attended Cascia Hall Prep School in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Culver Military Academy in Indiana, from which he graduated in 1940. He started college at Washington and Lee University in Virginia, but was called to serve in the Army Corps of Engineers during World War II in North Africa, Italy, France, and Germany. He returned to the University of Tulsa and graduated in 1946 with a bachelors degree in history and political science. In July 1946, he went to Beirut, Lebanon, to work for the Trans-Arabian Pipeline Company during construction of the Tapline. When work on that pipeline was shut down, Dietler returned to the United States in 1948, married, and moved to Casper, Wyoming. He left Casper in 1949 to return to Tulsa.

In 1950 Dietler moved back to Denver and took a position with Argo Oil as a division exploration manager. He formed the Platte Transport Corporation on the side, a company that hauled crude oil for producers. He left Argo to strike out on his own as an independent operator, and, in 1953, teamed up with partner Jack Oleson to form Western Crude Marketers, Inc., a crude oil buying and transporting company. Western Crude Marketers was started with only two trucks and less than $1,500. When it merged in 1961 with the Permian Corporation, it boasted assets of more than $9,000,000.

Dietler then founded Western Crude Oil, Inc. in 1967, which became a subsidiary of the Reserve Oil and Gas Company. He served as senior vice president of Reserve Oil in addition to president and chief executive officer of Western Crude. In 1975 he joined a consortium of small independent oil companies that founded the Northern Tier Pipeline Company and, in 1979, was named chairman of the company’s executive committee. He resigned as Western Crude Oil’s president and CEO in the fall of 1981 to pursue the Northern Tier Pipeline project full-time. Western Crude went on to become a subsidiary of Getty Oil Company. Northern Tier Pipeline Company abandoned its efforts to build the pipeline in late April 1983 after denial of permits in Washington State by Governor John Spellman. Even though it had successfully received all other federal and state permits and had invested over $60 million, prospects of ever being granted permits in the state of Washington were dim and did not warrant continued efforts.

In the early 1980s Dietler co-founded and was chairman and CEO of Associated Natural Gas Corporation, a natural gas gathering, processing, and marketing company, which he ran and later sold to Houston-based PanEnergy Corporation in 1994. He served on the board of PanEnergy as advisory director until 1997 when it merged with Duke Energy Corporation, now one of the largest energy companies in the country.

In 1981, Dietler co-founded successful TransMontaigne Oil Company in Denver, a company that operates pipelines, terminals, and storage facilities for refined petroleum products such as jet fuel, gasoline, diesel, and chemicals. He became chairman of the company in April 1995 and served as CEO from 1995 through 1999. In 1987, he became a partner in the privately held Caza Drilling Company of Denver. Dietler stepped down as CEO of TransMontaigne in 1999, but continued as chairman of the board.

By 1987, Cortlandt Dietler had formed at least 20 companies, bought 11, and was involved in three mergers. He had managed operations ranging from contract drilling and saltwater disposal to natural gas gathering, processing and marketing, crude oil marketing, and refining and wholesaling of products. His involvement in more than fifteen oil and gas companies over the course of his career earned him the moniker, “the man with the Midas touch.” The Colorado Petroleum Association named him “Pioneer Oil Man of the Year” in 1986, and he was inducted into the Colorado Business Hall of Fame in February 2001.

Dietler continued to serve as a director of the Carbon Energy Corporation as well as the Forest Oil Corporation, Hallador Petroleum Company and Key Production Company, Inc. He was a member of the National Petroleum Council and a director of the American Petroleum Institute. He was a past director of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, and a director, past president and life member of the Rocky Mountain Oil and Gas Association.