Preface
Benjamin Franklin Dillingham fell off a rented horse, and the history of modern Hawai'i was changed forever. Dillingham was a New Englander, born on Cape Cod in 1844, and he went to sea at the age of 14. After a series of adventures, and rapid advancement, he landed in Honolulu as first mate aboard the bark Whistler in 1864. He was 20. After breaking his leg in the topple from the horse, he was carried to the American Marine Hospital in Nu'uanu to heal. The Whistler sailed without him, and Dillingham was an ex-seafaring man, ashore for good.
After recuperating, he found work at a local hardware store. An entrepreneurial spirit bubbled within, and in a few years he had borrowed some money and was its owner. He also married a missionary daughter and started a family. Frank Dillingham's business—the hardware operation and later a large dairy—struggled with heavy obligations for decades, and he was constantly searching for a 'big score' that would eradicate his debts and provide for his family.
That score was Oahu Railway & Land Company, a narrow-gauge operation that established sugar as a phenomenally profitable crop on O'ahu. The primary line headed west from the main station in downtown Honolulu, eventually stitching together sugar plantations in 'Aiea, Waipahu, 'Ewa, Wai'anae, Waialua, and Kahuku.A later branch winding its way to the centre of the Island served the pineapple growers around Wahiawa. For almost 60 years—from 1889 to 1947—OR&L trundled both freight and passengers around the island creating great fortunes not only for the Dillinghams, but for many others as well.
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