D'Arcy, William Knox
William Knox D'Arcy was an English businessman who was the principal founder of the Iranian oil industry. Between 1882 and 1889 D'Arcy made a fortune in the Mount Morgan (Australia) gold industry. In 1900, D'Arcy was again approached to finance a mineral exploration venture, this time for oil in Persia. After a considerable number of expensive dry holes, oil was struck at Masjid-I-Sulaiman in 1908. In April 1909, the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (APOC) was founded and D'Arcy became the director. The company would later become British Petroleum, one of the world’s largest integrated oil corporations.
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