Location: San Sebastián
Date Established: 1910
Date Ceased Operations: 1996
Annual Production Graph
Average Annual Production: 24,293 Tons
Best Production Year: 1967/63,962 Tons
Family Ownership: Abarca

 
According to Haydée E. Reichard de Cardona in her book Haciendas Agricolas del Triangulo Noroeste de Puerto Rico, on July 21, 1910 Alfredo Rafucci Bayrón, owner of Central Corsica and Attorney Arturo Reichard del Valle, signed the incorporation papers of the La Plata Agriculture Company before notary public Alfredo Blasco Pagán.  This act represented the birth of Central Plata. The Louisiana Planter and Sugar Manufacturer edition of November 4, 1911 states that "...the La Plata Sugar Co. are making use of a good deal of old machinery taken from other factories which have outgrown their capacity. Central Plata was one of the sugar mills started by Eduardo Giorgetti, whose main sugar mill holding was Central Plazuela.  Partners in the venture were controlling members of the foundry Sucrs. de Abarca in San Juan.  It was the largest sugar mill located up in the mountains.  

Central Plata installed a system using a tank to cool and recycle water, thus limiting the water taken from the adjacent Culebrinas River, we did not see this system used anywhere else on the island.  Pictured inside the main building is a big tank which appears to be the "tacho" or vacuum pan where the guarapo or juice was heated to remove impurities.  This system replaced the "tren Jamaiquino" of which you can read about in the Hacienda La Esperanza page.   Also pictured laying on the ground is the press used in the milling process to extract the juice from the sugarcane.  A similar press can also be seen in the Central Roig page.  Clearly identifiable is the weigh station for the incoming trucks loaded with sugarcane from the fields and the mill's administrative offices.  When we visited this sugar mill in 2014, on the premises of the old sugar mill there was now a construction company.

The case People v. Plata Sugar Co. was the action filed by the Government of Puerto Rico to enforce the 500 acre provision included in the Foraker Act.  It was decided by the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico on June 19, 1941.  The complaint alleged that Plata Sugar Co., a corporation organized on November 17, 1910, by deed dated October 8, 1938 ceded and transferred to the trust named Asociados del Pepino not less than 1,709 acres of land which the Plata Sugar Co. had possessed and controlled in violation of law, from the date of its incorporation to the date of the conveyance.

The complaint also alleged that the deed constituting a trust, executed by Spanish immigrant from Huelva, Andalucia Attorney Antonio Lens Cuena (1882-1947), director and stockholder of Plata Sugar Co., as constituent, created the trust by delivering the sum of $15,000 in cash to Spanish immigrants from Fios, Asturias Angel Abarca Portilla (1888-1976) and Juan Abarca Portilla (1894- ), Puerto Rico born Enrique Abarca Sanfeliz (1882-1944), Mechanical Engineer born in Guayama Felipe F. Vidal (1893-1892) and Francisco Ballester, also stockholders and directors of Plata Sugar Co., so that as trustees they could use the amount delivered to them for the purposes and in accordance with the faculties expressed in the deed of trust that included the acquisition of lands devoted to the planting and growing of sugar cane in Puerto Rico.
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In 1971 the Sugar Corporation, a unit of the Government of Puerto Rico leased Central Plata for $300,000 annually.  In 1976 Central Plata was acquired by the Government of Puerto Rico who continued operating it until it was finally shut down in 1996.