1935-1941: Grandpa Arthur Turns Coal into Liquid Fuel

 After he immigrated to the US, Grandpa Arthur became an accomplished petroleum engineer. But before that, he had several different jobs:

• Engineer working on Coal Liquefaction Technology (CTL), a process where coal is converted to synthetic liquid fuels that can be used in motorcars.
• Foreman at a manufacturing plant that made defensive war materiel, galvanized tanks, and davits (specialized cranes that get lifeboats into the water when a ship is listing).
• Farmhand - after he and his family escaped to France during the war, he deliberately settled in an agricultural region close to food sources. He worked as a farmworker and accepted food as payment for his work.  
• Structural engineer working for the French government, helping to rebuild the war-torn country.

Click to enlarge.
Coal Liquefaction Technology
Source: http://www.biofuelsacademy.org/

    It makes sense that he worked on CTL. Europe is coal-rich and petroleum-poor, and fuel was essential to all nations, and Belgium was no exception. He probably began working on the technology when he graduated with his engineering degree in 1935.  Germany was also very interested in CTL and it was an important part of Germany's wartime planning and economy in the 1930s and 1940s, and it continued to be important to the Nazi regime after the occupation of Western Europe began.  In the fall of 1941 my grandparents and Aunt Lilly escaped from Belgium to Southern France (when he started working as farmhand), so he must have stopped working on CTL by that point.

   

    I don't know for sure, but I strongly suspect he stopped working to improve CTL technology before that, perhaps as early as the Nazi invasion of Belgium in the spring of 1940.  He wouldn't have wanted to help improve Hitler's access to fuel sources (Germany was producing 124K barrels of the stuff per day at the height of production, and it accounted for over 90% of fuel used by the Luftwaffe, and 50% of the automobile fuel in Germany).  Arguably, it was the Allied bombing of synthetic fuel plants that ended the war.  

    The fact that it was used primarily as aviation fuel by the Germans is another link to my grandfather - someone in his division at the factory where he was a foreman was sabotaging the galvanized aviation fuel tanks, by putting abrasive powders into the tanks after inspection, but before shipping, in the hopes that the abrasives could damage Luftwaffe engines.  Grandpa Arthur was certain the Gestapo suspected he was the culprit, or at least that he was involved. He wasn't, but he knew about it (I suppose turning a blind eye does indicate some level of involvement), and escaping when he did likely meant he was blamed in absentia, buying the real saboteurs some time.

    Funny story - General Patton, in his rush toward Germany toward the end of WW2, overextended his supply lines and ran out of fuel. Rather than wait until fuel was brought to him, he decided to siphon fuel from German cars and Panzer tanks and used that in his armored division, and it worked just fine.

    CTL isn't just a thing of the past - it is still being studied in the US, because we are rich in both oil and coal, and someday the oil may run out (the coal might as well, but that's another topic).

Links:

• The Early Days of Coal Research (in the US)
• CTL Wiki Page