In 1843 Benjamin Huntting Howell of Long Island, NY (1811-1900), the son of Hampton Howell of Dutch descent and Elizabeth Post of Welsh descent, established a grocery house at Front Street in Manhattan which he operated until 1853. He was then president of the Market Fire Insurance Co. until 1861 when he got involved in the purchase and sale of molasses and sugar in partnership with his son Thomas Andrews Howell (1843-1896) under the name B. H. Howell & Son. In 1887 Benjamin’s other son Frederick Huntting Howell (1849-1929) and his 2nd cousin James Howell Post (1859-1938), a Yale graduate who began working at B. H. Howell Son & Co. at the age of fifteen, were added as co-partners and the firm name changed to B. H. Howell Son & Co. with offices at 129 Front Street, New York, NY. Other prominent members of the firm were Henry Frederick Mollenhauer, George Raymond Bunker (1845-1927) and later his son Ellsworth Bunker (1894-1984) of the Bunker Sugar Refining Co., Lorenzo D. Armstrong, John Farr, James Stillman, William Rockefeller and former Congressman from Texas Robert B. Hawley.

Aside from his responsibilities at B. H. Howell Son & Co., James Howell Post was also board member of the National City Bank of New York from 1898 until his death. He was chairman of the Cuban-American Sugar Co. and president of the New Niquero Sugar Co. and Guantanamo Sugar Co. He was board member of the Fajardo Sugar Co. and of Aguirre Associates. Thomas Andrews Howell with his sons Thomas Andrews Howell II (1902-1985), John Akin Howell, William Huntting Howell and Elena Howell Terry were owners of Comapañia Azucarera Boca Chica in the Dominican Republic.

As the result of excess production capacity and falling margins between refined and raw sugar, in the 1870s and 1880s many small sugar refineries went out of business.  Between 1870 and 1887 the number of sugar refineries in New York fell from twenty eight to twelve[1] but remained New York's most important business processing 68% of all imported raw sugar.  The surviving refineries required large amounts of capital investment and their fight for additional market share was fierce. Refiners thought that an industry consolidation would control prices and allocate market share, resulting in increased prices for refined sugar and profit margins.  Thus the Sugar Refineries Co. or the "Sugar Trust" was born on October 24,1887, the initiative of sugar man Henry O. Havemeyer (1847-1907) and NYC banker John Ennis Searles, Jr.  The Trust united seventeen sugar refineries[2] on the east coast of the US and the American Sugar Refinery in San Francisco, CA acquired in the winter of 1887, into one entity.  

Shortly after its inception in 1887, consolidation within the Trust began. The factories of the North River Sugar Refining Co., Moller, Sierck & Co., Oxnard Brothers, Bay State Sugar Refining Co., Boston Sugar Refining Co. and St. Louis Sugar Refining Co. were closed and some later dismantled.  The Havemeyer Sugar Refinery burned down in 1887 and rebuilt but shut down operations in 1889.  The Dick & Meyer plant burned down in 1889 and was not rebuilt.  The North River Refinery was condemned in 1888 and the site turned into a public park.  The Forest City refinery was closed in 1889 and all three plants owned by DeCastro & Donner were closed in 1889.  In total, only five consolidated facilities continued to operate; The Mathiessen & Weichers plant and Havemeyer Sugar Refinery in New Jersey, the Havemeyer & Elder plant and Brooklyn Sugar Refinery in New York,  the Continental and Standard refineries in Boston, the Planters and Louisiana refineries in New Orleans and the American Sugar Refinery in CA.  Later on other refineries joined the ASRC, the McCahan Sugar Refining Co. incorporated in Philadelphia in 1892 and a late comer the New York Sugar Refining Co. which was incorporated in 1897.   

Government scrutiny of the industry forced the Trust reorganize after the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 outlawed trusts that formed monopolies. The challenge of the trust form of organization in People vs. North River Sugar Refining Co., decided June 24, 1890 by the Court of Appeals of the State of New York resulted in the creation of the American Sugar Refining Co. (ASRC) incorporated in NJ on January 10, 1891 which acquired all the assets formerly controlled by the Trust.  As a holding company its form of organization was challenged but its legality affirmed by the US Supreme Court. The ASRC enjoyed years of industry dominance and high profitability.  But good profit margins and profits attracted new firms to join in and by 1893 the number of new firms and excess production capacity was again an issue.  

Some refiners resisted joining or being acquired by the ASR. Henry O. Havemeyer using James Howell Post as a front, moved to acquire three remaining independent firms: the Mollenhauer Sugar Refining Co. in Brooklyn established by German immigrant John Mollenhauer (1827-1905) who arrived in the US in 1850 and after being in the grocery business started the refinery in 1869, the National Sugar Co. in Yonkers and the New York Refining Co. in Long Island City. The three refineries were consolidated into the National Sugar Refining Co. of New Jersey (NSRC), incorporated in New Jersey on May 31, 1900 with James Howell Post as president, Henry Frederick Mollenhauer (1866-1931) the son ofJohn Mollenhauer[3] as secretary-treasurer and and B.H. Howell Son & Co. handling the mercantile side of the business. Although independent of the Sugar Trust, the ASRC owned little over 50% of the outstanding preferred stock of NSRC and Henry O. Havemeyer controlled the entire issue of common stock of NSRC which had been issued in the name of James Howell Post and voted by him according to the provisions of a voting trust established by Havemeyer.

By 1924 the B. H. Howell Son & Co./NSRC group owned or controlled seventeen sugar mills in Cuba with total production of 447,972 tons of sugar, more than double the combined production of all the mills in the Dominican Republic.[4] Ownership was under a series of different corporate names some which were reorganized several times, making following its interests somewhat complicated. Through a series of agreements and stock transactions. B. H. Howell Son & Co. first incursion in Cuba was shortly after the end of the Cuban War of Independence when it invested $150,000 in Ernesto A. Longa's Central Mercedita, in 1902 it made an additional investment when it acquired Central Constancia from the Marquis de Apezteguía. The seventeen Cuban sugar mills owned or controlled by B. H. Howell Son & Co. /NSRC group in 1924 included the following:

• Cuban-American Sugar Co. (6) - Central Chaparra, Central Delicias, Central Tingüaro, Central Mercedita , Central Unidad and Central Constancia. Established in 1906

• Guantanamo Sugar Co. (3) - Central Isabel, Central Los Caños and Central Soledad. The Guantanamo Sugar Co., was not part of the NSRC but was controlled by B. H. Howell, Son & Co., was established as a Delaware corporation in 1905 by Brooks & Co. of Ernest and Paul Brooks of British origin.  Later on, James Howell Post was added as investor culminating in its control by the NSRC in the 1920’s.  It had over one hundred thousand acres of land and also owned 81.5% of the Guantanamo Railway that provided transportation to the port of Deseo

• New Niquero Sugar Co. (1) - Central Niquero

• Sugar Estates of Oriente (4) -Central Cupey, Central Alto Cedro, Central Palma, Central América

• Cuban Dominican Sugar Co. (3) - Central Santa Ana, Central Altagracia and Central Hatillo

When the NSRC began an expansion program in May 1920 with the establishment of the Cuba-Santo Domingo Sugar Development Syndicate as an affiliate of West India Sugar Finance Corp., The Louisiana Planter and Sugar Manufacturer edition of September 4, 1920 stated:

The organization of this concern has been reported from New York, and seems to be the largest thing of its kind since the organization of the Cuba Cane Sugar Corp. since it is underwritten at $32,000,000.  The Cuban holdings of the Syndicate include Central Hatillo, Santa Ana, and Palma, and in Santo Domingo it has bought the interests of Bartram Bros. in the Consuelo and San Isidro estates and controls the Barahona factory, which is now under process of development by the West India Sugar Finance Corp.  

The Louisiana Planter and Sugar Manufacturer edition of December 20, 1924 states that negotiations were completed the week prior for the purchase of the NSRC by the ASRC at a cost of $16.5 million in cash.

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[1] Cesar Ayala, American Sugar Kingdom

[2] Havemeyer & Elder, Havemeyer Sugar Refining Co., De Castro & Donner, F. O. Mathiessen & Weichers, Dick & Meyer, Oxnard Brothers, Moller, Sierck & Co., North River Sugar Refining Co., Brooklyn Sugar Refining Co., Standard Sugar Refining Co., Boston Sugar Refining Co., Continental Sugar Refining Co., Bay State Sugar Refining Co., Planters Sugar Refining Co., Louisiana Sugar Refining Co., St. Louis Sugar Refining Co. and Forest City Sugar Refining Co.

[3] His daughter Julia Mollenhauer was married to J. Henry Dick son of William Dick a Director at the ASRC

[4] Cesar Ayala, American Sugar Kingdom