Ellis Wyatt
Ellis Wyatt, in Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged, was an entrepreneur specializing in obtaining petroleum from shale. He worked in the mountains of Colorado, part of the Rocky Mountains chain. He figured prominently in the building of the "John Galt Line" of the Taggart Transcontinental Railroad. When the United States government promulgated a series of directives that effectively killed the economy of Colorado, Wyatt joined John Galt's strike of the men of the mind and set fire to his oil fields, a fire that continued to burn until the strike was "settled."
Contents
Background
The novel says little about Ellis Wyatt's background, other than a description of his experience in oil exploration and a hint about his process for oil-shale extraction.
Rise to prominence
Beginnings
Ellis Wyatt began his rise in the early years of John Galt's strike, probably after 1917. He had developed a means by which to extract oil from shale, and to do it inexpensively. Accordingly, he bought vast tracts of land in the Colorado mountains (near Winston, Colorado, the eastern portal of the Taggart Tunnel) and set to work to produce oil from that land.
Eventually he encountered a problem that was slightly beyond his ability to control. The Taggart Transcontinental Railroad's Rio Norte Line began to fall into disrepair. Wrecks were frequent, and Wyatt rapidly concluded that the line was unreliable. So when Dan Conway started his Phoenix-Durango Railroad in the region, Wyatt started to ship his oil by that line.
The Anti-dog-eat-dog Rule
Then came an announcement that made Wyatt angry clear through: the Phoenix-Durango Railroad would have to cease operations within nine months. James Taggart, President of the TTRR, had lobbied the National Alliance of Railroads to promulgate a new "Anti-dog-eat-dog Rule," by which no railroad was allowed to offer what would be regarded as "cutthroat competition" in any territory where another railroad had been operating for a long-enough period of time. This rule was billed as an effort to prevent a recurrence of the rate wars that were a regular feature of [railroad]]ing in the United States in the nineteenth century. Ellis Wyatt saw it for what it really was: a "snide stunt" by which the TTRR would "save [them]selves the necessity of effort."
Ellis Wyatt then traveled personally to New York City and demanded to see Dagny Taggart, the Vice-President in Charge of Operations. As he told her directly,
| “ | I came to see you because you are the only one left who has any brains in this rotten outfit. | ” |
He then proceeded to give her an ultimatum: if Taggart Transcontinental, nine months from that time, did not "run trains in Colorado as [Wyatt's] business require[d] them to be run," then Wyatt would make sure that the TTRR would collapse as they appeared to be sentencing him to collapse.
To his shock and surprise, Dagny Taggart did not take any exception to his remarks. Instead, she said, "You will get the transportation you need." Not have anything more to argue about, he bid her good day and returned to Colorado.
The John Galt Line
In the next months Dagny Taggart surprised him even more, by making good on her promise. She was a frequent visitor to Colorado, often taking personal charge of the project to rebuild the Rio Norte Line from one end of it to the other. Her plans called for laying rail made from Rearden Metal, not ordinary steel. Her most audacious decision was to build an entire bridge of Rearden Metal, after Henry Rearden evidently assured her that he could design one that would be less expensive than shoring up the present bridge with Rearden Metal members.
Wyatt actually thanked Dagny for "the best slap in the face that I ever got and deserved."
When the Rearden Metal Controversy broke out, Wyatt held his breath. Then came another surprise: Dagny Taggart organized her own company, "John Galt, Incorporated," to build the line and take the heat off the TTRR. Wyatt very enthusiastically bought some shares in that company.
When the line opened, Wyatt invited Dagny Taggart and Henry Rearden to stay at his house. He did not learn directly, but he probably guessed, that his two guests began an affair while under his roof. Whether he ever inquired fully into the particulars, the novel never says.
Wyatt's Torch
Then the government changed the rules, seemingly overnight. Wyatt had laid plans for expansion of his facilities, using Rearden Metal to accomplish this, and for a direct branch line. But thanks to a series of directives affecting Rearden Steel, he saw that that would never happen, because his "fair share" would never be sufficient. Furthermore, Washington issued at least two directives that made rail shipment ridiculously inefficient, mainly by imposing an unnecessary speed limit and requiring trains to be seriously over-crewed.
At this point, the namesake of the John Galt line came to see him. Ellis Wyatt received a young man who obviously had a mission. John Galt told him that he had a right to exist, and that he ought to decide now whether to put up with such interferences any longer.
Ellis Wyatt decided that he would not. As it happened, neither would any of many other businessmen who had relocated to Colorado after the John Galt Line had opened, and who now saw Colorado's favorable business conditions utterly destroyed.
Wyatt rigged his oil fields with high explosives and set them off all at once. The resulting fire, thereafter known as "Wyatt's Torch," would prove impossible to extinguish. Shortly before he walked away from his property for the last time, he erected a sign near its front gate:
| “ | I am leaving it as I found it. Take over. It's yours. | ” |
Wyatt then boarded an aircraft, with John Galt as his pilot, and flew to Galt's Gulch, which would now become his home. The novel does not specifically say whether John Galt took any other passengers that day, but he probably did. Later Wyatt was surprised to see that the fire at his oil fields was visible even from the secluded valley to which he and so many other leading businessmen had now retreated.
Development of Galt's Gulch
When Ellis Wyatt landed in Galt's Gulch, he found a valley consisting mostly of farmland and a handful of small cottages. One of them was John Galt's own house. Wyatt spent his first night in the Gulch as a guest of Mr. Galt, in a room that he quickly realized that many other men had occupied before him. All had left their signatures, each with a brief message, on one of the walls of the room. Wyatt left his own signature the next morning, with a message that the perspective would always be improved after a good night's rest.
Then Ellis Wyatt took stock of his new home. The Gulch was not well developed, but it was resource-rich. Specifically, it had a mountain slope with abundant shale, from which Wyatt could extract oil, just as he had done on the outside. Somehow, he knew that if he could assure the valley of an abundant supply of motor fuel, he would solve a problem that would allow other men, including the automaker Lawrence Hammond, to duplicate their own businesses and turn this mnountain hideaway into a thriving community.
His experiments succeeded, and men like Lawrence Hammond and Dwight Sanders, a builder of monoplanes, restarted their own businesses, though only inside the Gulch. Soon many participants in John Galt's movement relocated permanently to the Gulch when Wyatt, Hammond, Sanders, and the others could offer them permanent employment.
Ellis Wyatt would see Dagny Taggart briefly, in June of the last year of the strike, when she made an unannounced visit to the valley (and almost got herself killed). He would see her again during the rescue of John Galt from the State Science Institute's "Project F."
Aftermath
The novel does not mention what Ellis Wyatt did after the strike was settled. The best assumption is that he returned to his old oil fields, put out the fires, and rebuilt his operation.
Spoilers end here.
Typology
Ellis Wyatt is a type of any businessman who wants to make things work, but has little patience for anyone who, though not targeting him directly, interferes with his business indirectly though his effects on those with whom he does business. He will continue to have a minimum amount of patience, so long as he senses that he is dealing with someone who can still think. But when even that option is closed to him, he not only withdraws from the world, but also ensures that the world will not even benefit from the efforts he has made before his break with it. Hence Wyatt's Torch and his sign reminding everyone that he is leaving things as he found them.
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