High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Boston Fruit Company (1888-1899) was a fruit production and import business based in the port of Boston, Massachusetts. Andrew W. Preston and nine others established the firm to ship bananas and other fruit from the West Indes to north-eastern America. At the time, the banana was "considered a rare and delicious treat in the United States. The major challenge for all banana importers was to get the highly perishable fruit to the American market before it spoiled." Lorenzo Dow Baker served as president of the company and manager of the tropical division. By 1895, "the corporation own nearly 40,000 acres, included in 35 plantations, and deep-water frontage in the harbors of Port Antonio and Port Morant. They own their own lines of steamships, which they operate between those ports and Boston, Philadelphia and Baltimore. Besides carrying their own fruits, they carr some outside freight, and afford passenger accommodations for many tourists visiting the West-India Islands."