By the early 1900s, tsarist Russia was producing more than half the global oil output, much of it in Baku, and as the oil bubbled up, and the surrounding sea burned, staggering fortunes were made. East of Baku’s railway station lay the refineries built by the Swedish Nobel brothers, and farther east lay the Rothschilds’ petroleum and trading company. Workers toiled twelve-hour shifts, suffering deadly chemical exposure, rabbit-hutch living quarters, and miserly wages of 10 to 14 rubles per month, before the “deductions” for factory-supplied meals.
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