In the early 20th century, Milton S. Hershey faced a vulnerability common to industrial titans: a reliance on volatile global supply chains. As World War I triggered a sugar shortage and the domestic "Sugar Trust" tightened its monopoly on processing, Hershey turned his gaze toward Cuba. His objective was not merely to buy land, but to construct a totalizing system of vertical integration that would insulate his chocolate empire from market shocks.
Beginning in 1916, Hershey’s Cuban venture transformed a swath of the island into a mirrored version of his Pennsylvania company town. Under the protection of the Platt Amendment, which effectively rendered Cuba a satellite state of the U.S., Hershey established five sugar plantations, five modern mills, and a refinery. To power this massive operation, he built an oil-fired power plant and a sophisticated electric railway system, marking a departure from the steam-powered standards of the era.
The Hershey Electric Railway was more than a logistical tool for hauling cane; it was the backbone of a private industrial ecosystem. The network connected his company towns and substations, providing a level of infrastructure that bypassed the island’s existing, often unreliable, transit. For Hershey, the railway represented the ultimate expression of industrial autonomy—a self-sustaining loop of energy, transport, and production that ensured the American consumer’s milk chocolate bar remained an affordable, mass-market staple.
With reporting from [IEEE Spectrum].
Source · IEEE Spectrum
