Scope and Content Note
The papers of Jean Joseph Maurice Dartigue (1903-1983) span the years 1941-1945 and consist of records relating to the Société haitiano-américaine de développement agricole. Together with President Elie Lescot and Minister of Finance M. Abel Lacroix of Haiti, Dartigue established the Haitian corporation in 1941 and became its vice president. Included in the collection are correspondence, minutes, agreements, financial reports, and studies concerning the organization’s founding and mission as an effort during World War II in cooperation with the United States to produce cryptostegia, a fast growing rubber plant. Lands were cleared and several hundred peasant families were displaced in implementing a contract with the Rubber Reserve Company, a subsidiary of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation.
The records, in French and English, were the personal papers of Dartigue and are organized by type of material.