Photo Album Documenting the Havana Central Railroad Company Building Its Line from Havana to Guanajay in 1906
- Twenty-two photographs measuring 7 ¼ x 9 ½ inches, mounted on heavy cardstock measuring 10 x 12 inches. Photos numbered and da
- La Habana Province, Republic of Cuba , 1906
La Habana Province, Republic of Cuba, 1906. Twenty-two photographs measuring 7 ¼ x 9 ½ inches, mounted on heavy cardstock measuring 10 x 12 inches. Photos numbered and dated on negative. In album embossed with "Havana Central Railroad Co./ Progress Photographs/ GUANAJAY". Photos with fine contrast and some wear; mounts with minor damage, slightly warped, with some detached from binding. Overall excellent.. Havana Central Railroad Company was an American company formed in April 1905. It opened two electric tram lines—Havana to Guanajay in 1906 and Havana to Güines in 1907—before it was bought by the English company United Railways following the Panic of 1907. Offered here is a photo album showing the construction of the Guanajay line. The photographs show laborers, assisted by horse-drawn carts, digging culverts, laying tracks, and erecting bridges and buildings.
This project came on the heels of the successful efforts of the Cuba Company, another railroad company, to make the emerging Cuban Republic amenable to American business.They did so first by using 'revocable permits', which could ostensibly be revoked by the new government when it was formed, to circumvent the Foraker Amendment prohibiting concessions to American companies by the US's military government; and second by using their close relationships to several members of the Cuban Constitutional Convention to include a law allowing irrevocable permits.[1] These, along with the Platt Amendment and Governor Leonard Wood's General Railway Law, led to what would amount to domination by US interests in Cuba, particularly but not exclusively in the railroad industry.[2]
Of interest to scholars of the early Republic of Cuba, especially the history of US businesses in the country.
[1] Juan C. Santamarina, "The Cuba Company and the Expansion of American Business in Cuba, 1898–1915," The Business History Review 74, no. 1 (Spring 2000): 41–83.
[2] Louis A. Pérez, Jr., "Insurrection, Intervention, and the Transformation of Land Tenure Systems in Cuba, 1895–1902," Hispanic American Historical Review 65, no. 2 (1985): 229–254.
This project came on the heels of the successful efforts of the Cuba Company, another railroad company, to make the emerging Cuban Republic amenable to American business.They did so first by using 'revocable permits', which could ostensibly be revoked by the new government when it was formed, to circumvent the Foraker Amendment prohibiting concessions to American companies by the US's military government; and second by using their close relationships to several members of the Cuban Constitutional Convention to include a law allowing irrevocable permits.[1] These, along with the Platt Amendment and Governor Leonard Wood's General Railway Law, led to what would amount to domination by US interests in Cuba, particularly but not exclusively in the railroad industry.[2]
Of interest to scholars of the early Republic of Cuba, especially the history of US businesses in the country.
[1] Juan C. Santamarina, "The Cuba Company and the Expansion of American Business in Cuba, 1898–1915," The Business History Review 74, no. 1 (Spring 2000): 41–83.
[2] Louis A. Pérez, Jr., "Insurrection, Intervention, and the Transformation of Land Tenure Systems in Cuba, 1895–1902," Hispanic American Historical Review 65, no. 2 (1985): 229–254.