Graham Farish - 373-656 - Tank Wagon, 14T - Shell Oil - 3950

Road Name History: Shell Oil Company is the United States-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, a multinational "oil major" of Anglo-Dutch origins, which is amongst the largest oil companies in the world. Approximately 22,000 Shell employees are based in the U.S. The U.S. head office is in Houston, Texas. Shell Oil Company, including its consolidated companies and its share in equity companies, is one of America's largest oil and natural gas producers, natural gas marketers, gasoline marketers and petrochemical manufacturers.

Shell is the market leader through approximately 25,000 Shell-branded gas stations in the U.S. which also serve as Shell's most visible public presence. Shell Oil Company is a 50/50 partner with the Saudi Arabian government-owned oil company Saudi Aramco in Motiva Enterprises, a refining and marketing joint venture which owns and operates three oil refineries on the Gulf Coast of the United States. The Shell Oil Company Warehouse, built in 1925 and located at 425 S. N. 16th Ave. Phoenix, Arizona. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Shell products include oils, fuels, and card services as well as exploration, production, and refining of petroleum products. The Shell Oil Refinery in Martinez, California, the first Shell refinery in the United States, supplies Shell and Texaco stations in the West and Midwest.

In 1997, Shell and Texaco entered into two refining/marketing joint ventures. One combined their Midwestern and Western operations and was known as Equilon. The other, known as Motiva, combined the Eastern and Gulf Coast operations of Shell Oil and Star Enterprise, itself a joint venture between Saudi Aramco and Texaco.[6] After Texaco merged with Chevron in 2001, Shell purchased Texaco's shares in the joint ventures. In 2002, Shell began converting these Texaco stations to the Shell brand, a process that was to be completed by June 2004 and was called "the largest retail re-branding initiative in American business history."

Brand/Importer Information: Graham Farish is a British brand of N gauge model trains, that belongs to Bachmann Europe.
The company entered the model train business in the early 1950s, focusing on British OO gauge rolling stock, track and accessories.
In the 1970s, it started to produce N gauge models under the GRAFAR label. After the withdrawal of Lima and Minitrix from the UK market in the late 1980s, Graham Farish was the only major supplier of British outline models in N gauge, soon withdrawing from the OO scale market.
In 2001, Graham Farish was purchased by Kader Industries of Hong Kong, and absorbed by its subsidiary Bachmann Industries. Bachmann immediately closed the British manufacturing facility and moved production to China.
Bachmann have since increased the size of the Farish range, by duplicating models introduced to the Bachmann OO range; often, an OO scale Bachmann Branchline model is followed between 6 months to a year later by an N gauge Graham Farish model.

Manufacturer Information: Bachmann, a US company founded in 1835, was purchased by Kader Industries in 1987. Kader formed Bachmann Industries Europe in 1989 with their main UK headquarters in Moat Way, Barwell, Leicestershire, UK (former Palitoy location) and the following year launched the Bachmann Branchline range for the British market with the moulds that had previously been used for the Palitoy Mainline and Replica Railways model railway products. From this starting point Bachmann has developed the range further and now produce a large range of models.
In 2001 Bachmann Branchline bought Graham Farish, an N gauge manufacturer, and since then many of their models have been made available in both gauges.
Bachmann Europe portfolio also comprises other model trains brands such as Liliput.