The American Sugar Refining Company is incorporated…

The American Sugar Refining Company is incorporated in the state of New Jersey on January 10, 1891, with $50 million in capital. Henry Osborne Havemeyer and Theodore A. Havemeyer are elected as chairman and president, respectively.

In 1892, the ASR Company gains control of the E. C. Knight Company and several others, which results in a ninety-eight percent monopoly of the American sugar refining industry.

President Grover Cleveland, in his second term of office (1893–1897), directs the national government to sue the Knight Company under the provisions of the Sherman Antitrust Act to prevent the acquisition.

The question the court has to answer is, "could the Sherman Antitrust Act suppress a monopoly in the manufacture of a good, as well as its distribution?"

The court's 8-1 decision, handed down on January 21, 1895 and written by Chief Justice Melville Weston Fuller, goes against the government.

Justice John Marshall Harlan dissents.

In May 1896, American Sugar becomes one of the original twelve companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

In 1779, William Frederick Havemeyer, who had been an apprentice of a London sugar refiner, began running Mr. Seaman's refinery in New York City; his brother had joined him in 1802.

The brothers had opened a new plant as Wm. and F.C. Havemaker on January 1, 1807.

Another plant that superseded this one in 1859 was known as Havemayer, Townsend & Co Refinery, and by 1864 had become the most modern refinery of its time.