Robert Dollar

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Robert Dollar (1844-1932)

Called the “Grand Old Man” of the Pacific, Captain Robert Dollar was born in Falkirk, Scotland. He worked as a boy in the logging in the forests of Canada. In the process, he made money in the logging industry and bought up timberlands around the northwest, including what is now the Bohemian Grove

In 1895 he acquired his first vessel, a single steam schooner called Newsboy, to move his lumber from the Pacific Northwest to markets down the coast. In the process he becomes a San Francisco shipping magnate who entered the lumber trade in Canada. His freighters plied the Pacific in the inter-war years, and were a common sight from Canada to Canton, San Francisco to Shanghai, Tacoma to Tokyo. In 1923, the purchase of seven “president” ships owned by the U.S. government allowed Dollar, then age 80, to pioneer his successful round-the-world passenger service.

Pacific Mails, a US company going back to the 1850’s with the Panama-California run, is taken over by Dollar. Dollar also signs a contract with Grace Lines. In 1925, Dollar Line acquired the Pacific Mail Steamship Company and its trans-Pacific routes.

The Canadian Robert Dollar Lmt. had a sawmill in Vancouver at Dollarton and logging operations on Hernando Island and other places.

The death of the founder, the Great Depression and the Pacific War ravaged the company's viability.

In 1937, under Robert Dollar’s son, Dollar Lines goes bankrupt and is sold to the US government to re-emerge as American President Lines. In 1945, Stanley Dollar files a lawsuit to re-take ownership of the line.