A Digital Memoir
My Fortunate Career
From a carefree childhood in Bettystown to the oil fields of Libya, the deserts of Abu Dhabi, and the towers of Manhattan — one life, written down before the moving finger moves on.
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All Chapters
Introduction
Ch. Introduction·2026
Introduction
I was encouraged by family members to recall, and to write down, as much as I could of my childhood days and of my subsequent career. I started work on the story around 2018 or 2019, then COVID intervened. Then I got sidetracked into investigating, as best I could, the origin story of my paternal O’Connor ancestors,…
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Ch. I·c. 1945–1958
Carefree Childhood Years
Growing up was fairly idyllic (in retrospect?). From the age of about 4 until aged 14 or 15 we were in Bettystown by the sea, about 30 miles north of Dublin, for the month of August.…
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Ch. II·1958–1963
The High School Years
1958-'63 I was in high school from 1958 to 1963. The school was Coláiste Muire in Parnell Square in the north inner city of Dublin. Again it was an all-Irish school, meaning all teaching and conversation was in Irish.…
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Ch. III·—
What Was Your Dad Like?
What was my Dad like when I was a child, a question posed by StoryWorth? I suppose the overriding sense would be that he was a father figure, but not a father. I have no memory of him ever reaching out to me or touching me, or really even talking to me.…
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Ch. IV·—
What Was Your First Big Trip?
I ’m going to expand this topic, which was suggested by StoryWorth, to include a number of trips progressively!…
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Ch. V·1963–1967
College Time
1963-'67 I nterestingly, my childhood memories seem to be more recallable than my college years from 1963-1967! So I have no ability to do a chronology of the college years. I’ll try to do themes.…
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Ch. VI·1967
1967 — The Summer of Love
1967 -- The Summer of Love 967 was known as The Summer of Love. It was also just about the peak year for the Vietnam War, with in excess of 500,000 American troops in-country. The war dominated global headlines and created the student-led anti-war protests.…
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Ch. VII·1968
1968 — The Year of Dramatic Events
1968--The Year of Dramatic Events The multiplicity of earth-shaking events which impacted the US and indeed the wider world in 1968 was without precedent.…
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Ch. VIII·1968–1969
Libya
I flew to Tripoli, Libya in Autumn ’68, and never would a person go through a greater, more life-altering step-changing experience!…
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Ch. IX·1969
All Change
On the 1st of September, 1969, my work mates and I were leaving the airstrip in the middle of the desert on the Mobil DC-3. We were about 5 feet off the ground and slowly rising when a Jeep with mounted machine gun and Libyan troops came barreling down the runway towards us at speed. Fortunately we were able to clim…
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Ch. X·1970
Exciting Times
I t’s hard to overstate just how chaotic Tripoli was in September 1970. The Italian colonists were all being processed (kicked) out. The oil companies were being harassed and their production cut back.…
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Ch. XI·1971–1974
New Experiences
I don’t really know why, but when I flew to Abu Dhabi at the end of December 1970, I had to start on a solo, bachelor basis.…
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XII
Ch. XII·1974–1977
The Worm Turns
Why is 1974 picked out as a key date for me in this story? It was picked because it’s one of two years when events in the oil industry had a global impact. And of course, in addition to impacting worldwide economies, it greatly influenced the career path of people working in the industry.…
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XIII
Ch. XIII·1977–1980
Progress
Sometime in 1977, my career took another step forward when I was promoted to the role of Chief Petroleum Engineer. That probably happened more because so many experienced people had already been transferred out, than because I was a good candidate. Whatever the reason, being in the right place at the right time seem…
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Ch. XIV·1980–1983
Carousel
After the semi-sedate nature of work and life in Abu Dhabi, events now seemed, in retrospect, to move much more quickly. I arrived in Manhattan in Summer 1980 to work in Mobil’s head office on the fabled 42nd street. The first advice I got was to never go near Times Square because so many muggings were happening there.…
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XV
Ch. XV·—
The Monkstown Dublin House Experiment
The Monkstown, Dublin House Experience I n Abu Dhabi, the annual vacation time was 4 weeks. I understand that this derived from the earlier colonial times when Brits traveling to India went by steamer (POSH…Port Out, Starboard Home to stay out of the sun!). The passage took so long that the vacation time had to take…
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XVI
Ch. XVI·—
People & Places
Somewhere along the way StoryWorth proposed a title like this as the theme for a story. For a while I thought there wasn’t enough to be bothered with. Then one day I decided to list the people I met who would have been somewhat publicly known.…
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Ch. XVII·1983–1985
New Orleans
So now, after the hiatus in 2020–2021 to do the research on the Limerick O’Connor genealogy, I feel like I need to get back to picking up the threads of my career journey. And so off we go to I don’t quite remember the travel from Indonesia to New Orleans in September 1983, but I was certainly looking forward to my …
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Ch. XVIII·1986–1987
The Hague
I ’m resuming this saga in November 2024 after a long layoff.…
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Ch. XIX·—
The Oil Business
To gain a better understanding of the next trajectory of my career I think it would be helpful to have an overview of how the oil business is structured.…
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XX
Ch. XX·1988
New York 1988
My new appointment in the New York head office was called GM, International Negotiations and Acquisitions. Much to my surprise, the job was in the Exploration Division. As I noted above, this was one of two arms of the whole E&P (Exploration & Production) business.…
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Ch. XXI·1989–1990
Calgary 1989
My first memory connected to the Calgary move was when we were on the plane headed there and six-year-old Gavin asked plaintively whether Santa Claus would be able to find us in a new country!…
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Ch. XXII·1990–1991
Fairfax, VA
My job in Calgary was really the last time I held a conventional line management job in Mobil, i.e. chief executive of a large, integrated profitable production company. Mocan, was one of ten companies in the E&P Division.…
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Ch. XXIII·1991–1993
Special Ventures
The world looked on in some amazement in 1991 as the former monolith, the Soviet Union, began to come apart. The process had started when Gorbachev, the Premier of the USSR, had tried to liberalize the economy. Lithuania promptly declared itself independent in 1990.…
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Ch. XXIV·1993–1994
EVP, E&P
My scouting trips in 1992 had clarified a number of things about oil opportunities in the FSU, the Former Soviet Union.…
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Ch. XXV·1994–1997
BHP
Australia is a distant landmass at the bottom of the world in the western Pacific. The next land mass to the south is Antarctica.…
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Ch. XXVI·1997
Strange Approach
I n October 1997, refreshed after my sailing in Maine with Robin West and living in the McLean house, I received a call from someone I didn’t know and whose name I don’t remember. He wanted to discuss a job opportunity with me, which, given that I was unemployed, intrigued me. He didn’t share any details but said he…
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Ch. XXVII·1998–2001
Texaco
I was still looking for a job after the Russia opportunity had passed when I was contacted by Graham Hearne, the chairman of Enterprise Oil, a London-based company. We met in Houston and he told me he was looking for a new CEO.…
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Ch. XXVIII·2001–2009
Hess
I joined Hess (or Amerada Hess as the company was called) in Midtown Manhattan in October 2001 as head of Global E&P. How good it was to change employers without having to move house.…
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Ch. XXIX·2020–2021
Hiatus
I t’s now February 2022, two years since the onset of the pandemic, COVID-19. In late February 2020, I was passing through Dublin on the way back from checking on Sapphire in Falmouth Shipyard. During a cruise in the Baltic in 2019 we had been dismasted for no apparent reason, but that’s a story for another day.…
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Ch. XXX·2008–2025
We Are Sailing
There was precious little to do in Abu Dhabi in the 1970s (there were precious few people there), but they did have a small sailing club, which had a modest fleet of 420 dinghies.…
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XXXI
Ch. XXXI·—
Reflections
I t’s been so long since I started writing this story that it’s actually hard to remember when I started, though it must be seven or so years ago. You might be wondering why I even started this task. The impetus was a combination of Aisling asking about my early years in Ireland and Dermot seeking to understand what…
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