Minor Cooper Keith (19 January 1848 – 14 June 1929) was an American businessman whose railroad, commercial agriculture, and cargo liner enterprises had a major impact on the national economies of the Central American countries, as well as on the Caribbean region of Colombia. Keith's work on the Costa Rican railroad to the Caribbean, a project begun by his uncle Henry Meiggs, led him to become involved in the large-scale export of bananas to the United States. In 1899, Keith's banana-trading concerns were absorbed into the powerful United Fruit Company, of which he became vice-president. Keith was also involved in a number of other business ventures, including gold mining in Costa Rica and real estate development in the US. Early life Keith was born in Brooklyn, New York, to the lumber merchant Minor Hubbell Keith and his wife Emily, sister of railroad entrepreneur Henry Meiggs. After private schooling, the sixteen-year-old Keith was employed as a store clerk on Broadway. Some months later, he quit clerking and became a lumber surveyor. Having saved $3,000 in a year, Keith bought a cattle ranch located on a river island near the mouth of the Rio Grande, in southern Texas, which he administered until 1871. He then accepted his uncle's invitation to help manage the construction of a railroad in Costa Rica, in Central America. Costa Rican railroad In 1871, Keith's uncle Henry Meiggs had signed a contract with the government of Costa Rican president Tomás Guardia Gutiérrez for the construction of a railroad from the capital city of San José to what was to become the Caribbean port of Limón. Minor Keith was involved in the project from the start and took it over after Meiggs's death in 1877. At the time, Costa Rica's economy was based primarily on the export of coffee, which was grown in the country's central valley and transported by oxcart to the Pacific port of Puntarenas. Since the main market for Costa Rican coffee was in Europe and no canal connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic existed, creating a reliable transportation route to the Caribbean was a priority for the Costa Rican government and business class. The construction of that railroad proved extraordinarily challenging due to inadequate financing, compounded by the rugged terrain, thick jungle, torrential rains, and prevalence of malaria, yellow fever, dysentery, and other tropical diseases. As many as four thousand people, including Keith's three brothers,