In 1850, the lamp fuel of choice was made from turpentine (distilled from wood), alcohol (distilled from grain) and camphor oil. It was called burning fluid and "camphene." It sold for 50 cents a gallon and it provided a bright light.

VINTAGE HUMOR:

"Revenge: Do you know sir, what Ill do, if this Government persists in carrying out this tax on liquors and cigars. Ill not drink another glass of liquor or smoke another cigar. No sir. Not one." -- Harpers, 1862

Well over 90 million gallons of alcohol, or about 180 million gallons of camphene, were sold nationwide, making it by far the largest selling lamp fuel.

It cost about 50 cents a gallon.

A $2 per gallon tax was imposed on alcohol to help pay for the Civil War.

Meanwhile, a new kind of fuel, refined from "rock oil" pumped out of the ground in Pennsylvania, was coming into the market. Kerosene was taxed at 10 cents a gallon.

At the dawn of the automotive era, gasoline was was cheaper and more abundant, but ethanol was widely used as a racing fuel.

William K. Vanderbilt's racers often used ethanol.

Ethanol was considered the farmers fuel, and the tax on beverage alcohol was lifted for industrial and fuel alcohol in 1906.

The tax adjustment was opposed by the oil industry and regulations were put into place that effectively shut down the farm alcohol production idea.

Meanwhile in Europe, alcohol was fueling not only cars but all kinds of household appliances.

In the years before electricity was widely available, common appliances included alcohol irons, coffee roasters, hot water heaters and stoves -- along with alcohol fueled cars.

Some engines were developed in the early 20th century that had tremendous fuel flexibility but, with low compression, efficiency suffered.

Most people thought alcohol was the fuel of the future, as this Scientific American article from 1920 said.

"With regard to coal and oil, the world’s annual consumption has become so enormous that we are now actually within measurable distance of the end of the supply. What shall we do when we have no more coal or oil? Apart from water power ... and the employment of the sun’s rays directly as a source of power, we have little left, excepting wood...

"There is, however, one other source of fuel supply which may perhaps solve this problem of the future.

"Alcohol makes a beautiful, clean and efficient fuel, and, where not intended for consumption by human beings, can be manufactured very cheaply.

"Alcohol can be manufactured from corn stalks, and in fact from almost any vegetable matter capable of fermentation. Our growing crops and even weeds can be used. The waste products of our farms are available for this purpose and even the garbage of our cities. We need never fear the exhaustion of our present fuel supplies so long as we can produce an annual crop of alcohol to any extent desired.

-- Alexander Graham Bell, National Geographic, February, 1917

Just as ethanol / gasoline blends were beginning to find a market in the 1920s, another additive appeared. Leaded gasoline, called "ethyl" and made by GM and Standard Oil, was a notorious occupational hazard called "loony gas" by refinery workers.

“Our continued development of motor fuels is essential in our civilization... Now, after 10 years research ... we have this apparent gift of God which enables us to [conserve oil] ... We cannot justify ourselves in our consciences if we abandon the thing."

-- Frank Howard, Standard Oil, to the US Public Health Service, May 20, 1925.

In 1924, seventeen refinery workers were killed, and a public health advocates denounced the GM and Standard Oil Co. as reckless with public health. Yet the oil industry claimed that it had no alternatives.

Even though civilization had many octane boosting fuels, including ethanol, the oil industry was given a free hand to market the poison by the US government in 1926.

Anonymous oil tycoon callously sells leaded gasoline without waiting for an investigation. (New York World, 1925).

In fact, the original GM motive behind leaded gasoline was to improve fuel to the point where engine compression ratios could be raised.

Higher compression engines could more easily be swtiched to alcohol fuel when oil ran out, as was then expected within a few decades.

But as they entered the partnership with Standard Oil in 1923, GM researchers were surprised to learn that there was not going to be any oil shortage. Oil reserves had been understated, even to the point where USGS believed the shortage was imminent. So Ethyl leaded gasoline, a profitable entrprise, became the main method for raising engine compression until 1986.

James Alcohol Gas station, Kansas, circa 1936.

Widespread attempts to market alcohol gasoline blends in competition with leaded gasoline failed as Ethyl Corp. ruthlessly controlled the fuel market.

Owners of this gas station were among those whose complaints about fuel price fixing by oil and leaded gasoline companies (Standard and Ethyl Corp.) helped trigger a Justice Dept. anti-trust investigation. Ethyl Corp. was convicted in 1940.

In 1938, the first government financed ethanol plant was established at Atchison, Kansas. The plant was not a commercial success.

Experience gained at the plant, however, was extremely helpful in World War II.

Meanwhile, alcohol blends were marketed in over 40 nations in the inter-war period.

Some forced the oil industries to buy domestic alcohol from farm surplus.

Others gave preferential tax treatment to alcohol blends.

World War II saw shortages of oil fuel for all kinds of uses.

All of the major powers used a variety of fuels and were accutely aware of the strategic value of fuel supply.

This Mitsubishi A6M2 (Zero) used ethanol as a secondary fuel. (National Renewable Energy Labs)

When WWII broke out, rubber was in critically short supply in the US.

Sen. Harry Truman's committee discovered in 1942 that the US oil industry had been blocking development of rubber because of patent agreements with German chemical companies. It was shockingly close to treason.

British intelligence, meanwhile, had made sure that alternative non-oil routes to synthetic rubber were known in the US.

Alcohol plants like this one in Omaha, Nebraska were put to work making synthetic rubber.

The lesson:

1. Never trust the oil industry with national security.

2. Renewable systems are flexible and easily scalable.

3. Renewable systems are more expensive and, if security is an issue, must be protected with tax incentives.

After the war, American farm advocates wished they could follow the European and Latin American example with alcohol fuel.

But in the big cities, farm ethanol was treated as a crackpot idea.

After all, gasoline was cheap and there would always be lots of it.

Right?