Erastus A. Benson (February 10 1854–1932) was a

banker A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...

investor An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future Return on capital, return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some specie ...

and

land speculator In finance, speculation is the purchase of an asset (a commodity, goods, or real estate) with the hope that it will become more valuable shortly. (It can also refer to short sales in which the speculator hopes for a decline in value.) Many s ...

Omaha, Nebraska Omaha ( ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Nebraska and the county seat of Douglas County. Omaha is in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's 39th-largest cit ...

. Born and raised in Iowa, after graduating from the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is org ...

Benson speculated in land around Omaha. After investing in early business ventures in the phonograph and the

Kinetoscope The Kinetoscope is an precursors of film, early motion picture exhibition device, designed for films to be viewed by one person at a time through a peephole viewer window. The Kinetoscope was not a movie projector, but it introduced the basic ...

, Benson staged an unsuccessful bid to become the

Mayor of Omaha This is a list of mayors of Omaha, Nebraska, United States. List of mayors See also * Government of Omaha * History of Omaha References {{Omaha Omaha * Mayors In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municip ...

. In addition to being one of the inaugural members of the influential

National Phonograph Association National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, c ...

, the former town of

Benson, Nebraska Benson is a historic neighborhood in Omaha, Nebraska. Now a pocket within North Omaha, Benson Place was originally platted in 1887 and was annexed into the City of Omaha in 1917. Actor Nick Nolte lived in the Benson area before moving to the Wests ...

, was named after him.

Biography

Early life and education

Erastus Benson was born February 10, 1854, in Iowa. Benson completed his schooling in Iowa. He later attended both Wesleyan College and the

Land speculation

After moving to Omaha 1886, he acquired a number of properties in and around Omaha. Throughout his life, Benson was a respected member of the business community in Omaha, with memberships in the

Omaha Chamber of Commerce The Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce is the chamber of commerce in Omaha, Nebraska. When United States Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke spoke to the chamber in 2007, his comments were noted for his continued endorsement of globalization. ...

and the Real Estate Exchange. Through a company he owned called the Omaha Abstract and Trust Company, Benson accumulated a great deal of land around Omaha. In 1887 Erastus Benson purchased approximately of farm land approximately nine miles northwest of Omaha from John Creighton, an important businessman and philanthropist in the city. Benson Place, a suburb of Omaha, was platted on March 4, 1887. Benson's application to run a

streetcar A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport are ...

line connecting the suburb with Omaha was approved the same day. Benson attracted buyers by hiring Charles Jesse "Buffalo" Jones to graze herds of buffalo along Military Road.

Investments and politics

In the late 1890s, Benson was a central figure in the founding the first of the regional companies associated with the

North American Phonograph Company The North American Phonograph Company was an early attempt to commercialize the maturing technologies of sound recording in the late 1880s and early 1890s. Though the company was largely unsuccessful in its goals due to legal, technical and financ ...

called the Chicago Central Phonograph Company, along with Alfred O. Tate and

Thomas Lombard Thomas Lombard (born July 5, 1975 in Le Chesnay), is a French rugby union player. Thomas Lombard began playing Rugby Union with Racing but he moved to Stade Français with whom he won four top 14s. After a new title in 2004, he left Paris to play ...

. He later began the

Nebraska Phonograph Company Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...

, and was president of that company. As president of the company Benson had an exclusive deal with Edison, leading the company to dominate

phonograph A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...

sales throughout the

Midwest The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...

for several years. In that capacity he also discovered the young

Leon Douglass Leon Forrest Douglass (March 12, 1869 – September 7, 1940) was an American inventor and co-founder of the Victor Talking Machine Company who registered approximately fifty patents, mostly for film and sound recording techniques. Life and profes ...

, who was a self-educated boy telephone operator who at the age of 21 invented one of the first workable patents for a coin-operated phonograph. Douglas sold the patent to Benson. After

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventio ...

finished his

, he marketed the device and his films through the independently owned Kinetoscope Company. Erastus Benson, along with Alfred O. Tate, Thomas Lombard, Norman C. Raff, Frank R. Gammon, and Andrew Holland. In 1906 Benson ran on the Republican Party ticket to reform Omaha's reputation "open town" where anything goes. Criminal elements in the city, led by Tom Dennison, sought to defeat Benson. Their candidate, "Cowboy Jim" Dahlman, eventually won the election, and eight others thereafter. Benson never ran for public office in Omaha again.

Philanthropy and interests

While developing Benson Place, Erastus donated land in town for the construction of a schoolhouse, a town hall where church services and community events were held, and for an orphanage. After the outbreak of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

and increased hostilities by the Turkish against Armenians, Syrians and Greeks, Benson became instrumental in answering President

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

's call for assistance from Americans for the affected people. Benson became the vice-president of the Nebraska branch of the American Committee for Armenian-Syrian Relief, which was headquartered in Omaha. Benson also has a number of original recordings included in the Edison Sheet Music Collection of the Music Division of the

United States Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

. He has approximately twenty songs included that were recorded between 1866 and 1878. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/service/music/eadxmlmusic/eadpdfmusic/2002/mu002003.pdf Edison Sheet Music Collection.] Music Division, Library of Congress. Retrieved 8/10/07.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Benson, Erastus 1854 births 1932 deaths University of Iowa alumni American bankers American real estate businesspeople Businesspeople from Omaha, Nebraska Nebraska Republicans 19th-century American businesspeople 20th-century American businesspeople