Editing United Fruit Company (section)

==Origins and Growth==
(1870–1899)
Founding: United Fruit Company (UFCO) traces its roots to the 1870s, when Lorenzo Dow Baker, a Cape Cod sailor, began importing bananas from Jamaica to Boston, founding the Boston Fruit Company in 1885. Concurrently, Minor Cooper Keith, an American entrepreneur, developed banana plantations and railroads in Costa Rica, establishing the Tropical Trading and Transport Company in the 1880s.

Merger and Incorporation: In 1899, Keith merged his operations with Boston Fruit to form the United Fruit Company, incorporated in New Jersey with $20 million in capital (equivalent to $700 million in 2025). The merger consolidated control over banana production, shipping, and distribution, creating a vertically integrated monopoly. By 1900, UFCO controlled 75% of the U.S. banana market, leveraging refrigerated steamships (the “Great White Fleet”) to transport perishable fruit.

Early Expansion: UFCO expanded rapidly, acquiring land concessions in Central America and the Caribbean. By 1910, it owned or leased over 1 million acres across Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama, Colombia, and Cuba, operating 112,000 acres of plantations and employing tens of thousands. Its infrastructure included railroads, ports, and telegraph lines, making it a dominant economic force. Allegations of how the acquisition of the land occurred involved bribery, corruption and intimidation. UFCO was known to pay off corrupt government officials to gain favorable legal reforms making it possible for foreigners to own the land.