Earl George Rodman, Sr. and William Douglas Noel

To anchor the complex, Noel brought El Paso Natural Gas into a joint venture on a butadiene plant that opened in 1957; the Handbook of Texas calls the result the world's largest inland petrochemical complex, six plants south of Odessa. In 1963 El Paso Products bought the plant and Odessa Natural Gasoline, and Noel ran the company until 1980; in 1984 he led the employee buyout that saved the basin's petrochemical industry. The partners also founded West Texas Gathering Company in 1957 and Odessa's American Bank of Commerce in 1956, later holding banks in five more cities.

What the plaque says

Earl George Rodman, Sr. and William Douglas Noel 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)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• White-Pool House — 0.7 mi
  Odessa's oldest standing building, an 1887 brick house of a family the Texas and Pacific drew west, later cut into apartments for the oil boom and now a free house museum.
• Odessa Meteor Crater — 9.1 mi
  A shallow bowl in the ranchland southwest of Odessa where a shower of iron meteorites struck in the late Ice Age, with a trail down into it and a small museum on the rim.
• Midland Army Air Field Museum — 11 mi
  A hangar museum at Midland's airport, run by Commemorative Air Force volunteers, telling how a 1927 grass field became the bombardier college that graduated 6,627 officers in World War II.
• Permian Basin Petroleum Museum — 19 mi
  Midland's museum of the oil basin it sits on, from a restored diorama of the Permian reef to a 40-acre yard of drilling rigs and Jim Hall's Chaparral race cars.

More markers nearby

• Odessa Petrochemical Complex — steps away
• First National Bank of Odessa — steps away
• The Jackrabbit — 0.2 mi
• Odessa — 0.2 mi