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The big reason was that Amerada pioneered and perfected the scientific geophysical methods now in general use for finding oil. It has since kept a bit ahead of most oil companies in their use. Says Jacobsen: "I guess we manage to squeeze a little bit more information out of our maps." On the other hand, he adds, "we found oil in the Williston Basin with the same men and the same methods with which we missed it in other places that looked just as good. In the end, to find oil, you still have to drill a well."
If the Iverson well had missed, Jacobsen would have tried two or three more wells in different places and, if these were dry, would have written off the $2,000,000 or so loss without a quiver. The thing to remember, he says, is that "you have to be right more often, dollarwise, than you're wrong. It's not just a case of drilling more oil wells than dry holes. You can make a series of mistakes which may cost you a total of $5,000,000, but you can offset them by being right the one time when $9,000,000 is involved."
The Player. One reason Jacobsen is right more often than wrong is that his work is his consuming interest. He usually spends Saturday and Sunday in his Manhattan office because "I can get more work done when I'm alone." He has no social life, shuns the theater, movies, TV, but is a wide reader. A wealthy man (his Amerada stock alone is worth $8,000,000), he makes no show of it, wears a somber uniform of dark clothes, has no car, shuttles to his Manhattan office by subway from the staid old Plaza Hotel, where he has lived for 25 years. "I'm not gregarious," he says. "I don't have many friends and no particular friends. I have business associates, but no personal friends. I don't go in for that sort of thing."
He plays no golf or other sports; in fact, he does not need to. He gets his exercise in his office, where he can't sit still. "It gives me hydrophobia," he says. While dictating, talking, or just thinking, Jacobsen paces swiftly back & forth for hours on end, moving so fast that visitors have to swivel their heads to keep him in view —like watching the ball in a tennis match. When Jacobsen gets really interested in conversation, he paces in a big, swooping circle, walking right around visitors. They usually stop trying to swivel around with him, just sit still and catch him each time he passes in front. "I don't know how many carpets I've worn out," he grins.
He doesn't waste words, often merely barks out the monosyllables "Right!" "Shoot!" "No!". But if necessary he can talk for hours—with great clarity. He speaks five languages (Danish, English, Spanish, German, French), but deprecates this facility, saying: "Languages have always come easy for me. It has nothing to do with intelligence. It's just a gift in that direction."