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United Fruit Company

Page history last edited by Elie Lamazerolles 14 years, 9 months ago

The United Fruit Company was a major corporation from the United States that traded fruits and vegetables, formed by Minor C. Keith. Considered the representative of US imperialism in Central America, it had many privileges in the region. However, in Cuba, 1959, when Fidel Castro came to power, the company’s holdings in Cuba were expropriated by the hands of the revolutionary government led by Castro. This was because Castro was accusing the United Fruit Company of aiding supporters of the previous Cuban leader, Fulgencio Batista, and claiming that they were planning an overseas invasion from the United States to Cuba.  

Source: <http://www.business.uiuc.edu/working_papers/papers/06-0115.pdf

            <http://www.unitedfruit.org/chron.htm>

 

 

Picture source <http://www.caballerosandantes.net/public_images/Colombia/Siglo%20XX/1920%20UnitedFruitCompany.jpg>

 

 

The Banana Massacre

 

One of the most famous strikes that had been planned by the 30,000 workers of the United Fruit Company was ‘The Banana Massacre.’ It took place on the 12th of November 1928 on the Caribbean coast of Columbia. An attack was set up and Colombian Army troops under the command of General Cortés Vargas marched to the town of Ciénaga. They fired on a crowd of strikers claiming that the strike was rebellious and the people who had arranged it were Communist Revolutionaries. Congressman Jorge Eliécer Gaitán said that they had acted attributable to the United Fruit Company, who had demanded they put a stop to the strike. This scandal resulted in the Conservative party of President Miguel Abadía Méndez being elected out of the office in 1930.

 

The United Fruit Company logo for its bananas.

 

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_fruit_company#Reputation

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/03/02/books/kurtz-phelan-600.jpg


Conclusion

The business of the United Fruit Company was a major corporation of the US but was a lot criticized by artists, writers, journalists, politicians in the United States. There was a lot of incidents with the workers like for example; the Banana Massacre. After the revolution, Castro took over the company because of his suspicion of helping the last president “Batista” and also planning an attack from overseas to invade Cuba. There were frequently accused of bribing officials for favors and were also involved in “institutionalized racism”. The Company brought a lot of benefit in countries but also a lot of problems at the same time. The United Fruit Company later changed their name to United Brands but had financial problems in the 1970’s and got bought from Del Monte Corporation.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Fruit_Company

http://www.mayaparadise.com/ufc1e.htm

http://www.unitedfruit.org/

image: http://www.sinaltrainal.org/anterior/Imagenes/chiquita.jpg

 

 

 

Comments (1)

Yuki Mizutani said

at 1:53 pm on Jun 9, 2009

Wiki Evaluation
Your evaluation should be of the first wiki entry you posted.  Answer the following questions in the comment section of that page.
1.  DESIGN - (a) What is the overall layout of the page? 
It seems to be well balanced, with images as well.
(b) Is it easy to follow? 
The large pictures made it slightly hard to follow.
(c)Visually appealing?
It seems ok.
(d) What is the format of the pictures? 
Some of them are slightly larger, but it is not too unbalanced.
(e) Do they flow with the text?
It seems to.
2.  INFORMATION -
(a) After reading the page do you find that the information is organized? 
The timeline go backs a little, but it is not too distorted.
(b) Do the entries repeat the same information?
It does not seem to do that.
(c) Is there a clear introduction, body and conclusion? 
Yes, but the body could be stronger.
(d) Did you learn anything new from the additional entries to the page after your own?
It was good revision.
3.  OPINION -
(a) What problems did you encounter with the project? 
Some entries were finished when I was about to post them, while I was working on word.
(b) What were some benefits of doing this project? 
It helped with revision.
(c) What would you change?
I would maximize the minimum word number, but decrease the number of entries.

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