Benjamin Franklin Dillingham (September 4, 1844 – April 7, 1918) was a businessman and industrialist during the late

Kingdom of Hawaii The Hawaiian Kingdom, or Kingdom of Hawaiʻi ( Hawaiian: ''Ko Hawaiʻi Pae ʻĀina''), was a sovereign state located in the Hawaiian Islands. The country was formed in 1795, when the warrior chief Kamehameha the Great, of the independent island ...

era, throughout the period of the

Republic of Hawaii The Republic of Hawaii ( Hawaiian: ''Lepupalika o Hawaii'') was a short-lived one-party state in Hawaii between July 4, 1894, when the Provisional Government of Hawaii had ended, and August 12, 1898, when it became annexed by the United State ...

, and during the first two decades of the

Territory of Hawaii The Territory of Hawaii or Hawaii Territory ( Hawaiian: ''Panalāʻau o Hawaiʻi'') was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from April 30, 1900, until August 21, 1959, when most of its territory, excluding ...

Early life

Benjamin Franklin Dillingham (1844–1918)

Dillingham was born on September 4, 1844 into an old

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

family in Brewster, on

Cape Cod Cape Cod is a peninsula extending into the Atlantic Ocean from the southeastern corner of mainland Massachusetts, in the northeastern United States. Its historic, maritime character and ample beaches attract heavy tourism during the summer mont ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

. His father was Benjamin C. Dillingham and mother was Lydia Sears Howes. At the age of fourteen he became a sailor on the Yankee

clipper A clipper was a type of mid-19th-century merchant sailing vessel, designed for speed. Clippers were generally narrow for their length, small by later 19th century standards, could carry limited bulk freight, and had a large total sail area. "C ...

''Southern Cross'' which was captured and destroyed by the Confederate steamer ''Florida'' in 1863 during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

. In 1865 he became first mate of a barque named ''Whistler'' that did a regular run between

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

and

Honolulu Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island ...

. On his third trip to the island kingdom, Dillingham broke his leg after falling from a horse and was forced to convalesce in Hawaii.

Later life

He decided to stay in Honolulu and by the end of 1865 was a clerk at Diamond Hardware, which he bought out for $28,000 in 1869. On April 26, 1869, he married Emma Louise Smith (1844–1920), of a prominent missionary family. She was the daughter of Reverend Lowell Smith and Abigail Willis Tenney. Dillingham turned out to be an astute businessman, and more importantly, was always willing to take risks. In 1879 he started a dairy farm in upper Honolulu, and during the 1880s became increasingly successful. He founded the Oahu Railway and Land Company (OR&L) that began service in November 1889. Dillingham was well-liked among Honolulu's various communities, and he included King Kalākaua and

Queen Liliuokalani Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...

as his friends. Although he disapproved of the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1893, he looked favorably on the American annexation in 1898, which he believed would bring long-term stability to the islands. Dillingham spent the rest of his life in Hawaii. Apart from the OR&L, Dillingham was especially active in sugarcane plantations, including the Olaa Sugar Company on the Big Island, and the Ewa and Kahuku sugarcane plantations on Oahu. While the OR&L and these sugar companies were profitable, Dillingham's Big Island railroad, the Hawaii Consolidated Railway (Hilo Railroad) was a financial drain until its destruction by a tsunami in 1946. His Hawaiian Fiber Company, which operated a sisal plantation on the Ewa coral plain in southwestern Oahu, was ultimately also a failure. Nevertheless, Dillingham was one of the major business people in the early years of Hawaii's economic and industrial development. He died on April 7, 1918 and was buried in Oahu Cemetery. Two days before, James Bicknell Castle, a distant cousin of his wife and a partner in sugarcane plantation ventures, died. His son

Walter F. Dillingham Walter Francis Dillingham (April 5, 1875 – October 22, 1963) called the Baron of Hawaii Industry, was an industrialist and businessman from Honolulu, Hawaii. He gained favors from Hawaii politicians to develop urban Honolulu. Biography Dillin ...

(1875–1963) would also become a businessman in Oahu. His wife Emma Louise Smith Dillingham wrote a book of poetry on Diamond Head. His daughter Mary Emma (known as May) Dillingham married Walter Francis Frear (1863–1948) who became Governor of the

1907–1913. The next governor from 1913 to 1918, Lucius Pinkham, was a Democrat, although he had worked for Dillingham at OR&L 1892–1894 and as manager of his hardware company 1898–1903. Two sons died young, Charles Augustus Dillingham (1872–1874) and Alfred Hubbard Dillingham (1880–1880). Youngest son Harold Garfield Dillingham (October 9, 1881 – December 19, 1971) married Margaret Bayard Hyde-Smith in 1908 and had 5 children. Youngest daughter Marion Eleanor Dillingham (September 23, 1883 – January 19, 1972) married John Pinney Erdman in 1904 and had five children. Benjamin Dillingham played an important role in the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, he created a railroad system that helped transport sugar and pineapples, which made the sugar industry more efficient.

Early life

Later life

References

Further reading