On 4 July 1988 the Petroleum Geological Circle opened a monument to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the discovery of oil in the Netherlands and the 10th anniversary of the society. The monument is not officially a monument but a 'street-object'. It was found that the legal procedure to raise a monument could take up to a decade; the alternative only required a signature of the city council.

In 1938, just before the war, an exhibition was held on The Netherlands Indees. At the exhibition the 'Bataafse Oliemaatschappij', now part of Royal Dutch Shell was carrying out a drilling demonstration with a rig that would be shipped to The Netherlands Indees later. In those days geologists believed the Tertiary to be very thick, but Cretaceous rocks with traces of oil were penetrated at a depth of 500m. This caused a hazardous situation; the drilling was stopped because a blow-out preventer had not been installed. Also, a concession permit had not been requested. Because of World War II, commercial follow-up drilling had to wait.

In 1988, when PGK had taken the initiative to raise a monument, they needed approval of alderman Duin Lunel. Being a left-wing representative within the City Council of The Hague, Duin Lunel had little affinity with Shell. It was within Shell that the PGK was founded and meetings in the early years were held at the Shell Research Laboratory in Rijswijk. Not to upset the the alderman, it was decided that the inscription on the monument would refer to the Bataafse Oliemaatschappij only. Duin Lunel signed the permit and on 4 July the monument was opened in the presence of many Shell representatives.

Despite the absence of the Shell name on the monument, activists stained the monument with paint a few days later. A day later the local paper headlined that "..anti-shell activist had stained the Shell monument...", a message that of course did not fail to reach wethouder Duin Lunel...