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Hamilton Disston (August 23, 1844 – April 30, 1896),〔"He Died Without Warning", ''The Washington Post'' (May 1, 1896).〕 was an industrialist and real-estate developer who purchased four million acres (16,000 km²) of Florida land in 1881, an area larger than the state of Connecticut, and reportedly the most land ever purchased by a single person in world history. Disston was the son of Pennsylvania-based industrialist Henry Disston who formed Disston & Sons Saw Works, which Hamilton later ran and which was one of the largest saw manufacturing companies in the world. Hamilton Disston's investment in the infrastructure of Florida spurred growth throughout the state. His related efforts to drain the Everglades triggered the state's first land boom with numerous towns and cities established through the area. Disston's land purchase and investments were directly responsible for creating or fostering the towns of Kissimmee, St. Cloud, Gulfport, Tarpon Springs, and indirectly aided the rapid growth of St. Petersburg, Florida. He furthermore oversaw the successful cultivation of rice and sugarcane near the Kissimmee area. Although Disston's engineered canals aided water transport and steamboat traffic in Florida, he was ultimately unsuccessful in draining the Kissimmee River floodplain or lowering the surface water around Lake Okeechobee and in the Everglades. He was forced to sell much of his investments at a fraction of their original costs. However, his land purchase primed Florida's economy and allowed railroad magnates Henry Flagler and Henry Plant to build rail lines down the east coast of Florida, and another joining the west coast, which directly led to the domination of the tourist and citrus industries in Florida. Disston's immediate impact was in the Philadelphia area, where he was active in Republican politics and a philanthropist, but his legacy is often associated with the draining and development of Florida. ==Early life and business== Hamilton Disston was born in Philadelphia, the eldest son of nine children born to Mary Steelman and Henry Disston, an English immigrant and descendant of French nobility.〔Grunwald, p. 83.〕〔Wilson, Mary Ellen. ("Disston, Henry" ) (February 2000); American National Biography Online. Retrieved on July 1, 2009.〕 Disston's father was a successful industrialist who rose from being orphaned just days after arriving in the United States to running the Keystone Saw Works when Hamilton was a child.〔〔Hartzell, p. 24.〕 Henry Disston was responsible for multiple machining and saw patents, and in the spirit of Victorian-era paternalism, envisioned and engineered a community around his steel factory in Tacony, Pennsylvania.〔Silcox, Henry (October, 1990). "Henry Disston's Model Industrial Community: Nineteenth-Century Paternalism in Tacony, Philadelphia", ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'', 114 (4) p. 483–515.〕 After attending public school, Hamilton left at 15 years old, opting for an apprenticeship at the saw factory which, by that time, was a $500,000-per-year international venture.〔 His father threatened to fire him for repeatedly leaving the factory to work for a volunteer fire department. Hamilton twice joined the Union Army only to have Henry purchase his release, but Hamilton organized a Company of saw factory employees during the Gettysburg Campaign. Henry finally agreed to support the "Disston Volunteers" financially.〔 After the American Civil War, Disston returned to work in his father's factory as an executive.〔 In 1878, following the death of Henry Disston, Hamilton and his brothers Horace, William, and Jacob inherited the company which had been renamed to Henry Disston & Sons.〔〔 Hamilton became the controlling member of the 2,000-employee company and expanded production to 1.4 million hacksaws and three million files per year.〔〔Grunwald, p. 84.〕 Only a month after Henry's death, Hamilton gave President Rutherford B. Hayes a tour of the factory where an unshaped piece of steel was manufactured into a hand saw in only 42 minutes, and was presented to the president at the end of the tour—etched with his name.〔 While the saw manufacturing business continued growing, Disston branched out, investing in a chemical firm, a Chinese railroad, real estate in Atlantic City, New Jersey and mining in the western United States.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Hamilton Disston」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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