Background
Daniel Chase Corbin, the son of Austin and Mary (Chase) Corbin, was born on October 01, 1832 at Newport, New Hampshire, United States.
Daniel Chase Corbin, the son of Austin and Mary (Chase) Corbin, was born on October 01, 1832 at Newport, New Hampshire, United States.
Corbin received a common-school education.
In 1852 Corbin secured a government contract for surveying lands in Iowa. In 1858 he began similar operations in Nebraska and laid the foundations of a substantial fortune by purchasing land in the latter territory. The important mining developments in Colorado in the early sixties aroused his interest in the overland trade and in 1862 he moved to Denver. He secured important contracts for supplying the quartermaster’s department at Fort Laramie, Wyoming, and operated wagon trains from the Missouri River, via Denver, to places as far inland as Salt Lake City.
After three years in Denver he moved to Helena, Montana, where for the next ten years he was actively engaged in mercantile business and also in banking as cashier and part owner of the First National Bank, one of the pioneer institutions of the Territory. In 1876 he moved to New York and until 1882 was associated with his brother Austin Corbin in the financing and active management of the Manhattan Beach Railway. This project was a success, and Daniel Corbin also established financial connections which were of great importance in subsequent projects.
The approaching completion of the Northern Pacific Railway brought about his return to the Northwest to begin the most significant and constructive part of his career. In 1883 the great importance of recent silver-lead discoveries in the Cœur d’Alene district attracted his attention to the Idaho Panhandle, and, three years later, under contract with the Bunker Hill & Sullivan Mining Company, he constructed one of the first concentrating plants in the region. About the same time he became interested in the transportation problems of the district and organized the Cœur d’Alène Railroad & Navigation Company, operating steamers on Lake Cœur d’Alène, and constructing a railroad from the head of navigation to the adjacent mining town. This line was completed in 1887 and was sold a year later to the Northern Pacific, becoming a feeder of the latter system and making an important contribution to the upbuilding of Spokane, Washington.
Corbin moved to Spokane in 1889 and was associated with its various activities and those of the adjacent region for the rest of his life. He grasped the importance of the site as a strategic center for transportation and distributing developments, based on the great agricultural, mineral, and timber resources of the Inland Empire. In 1889 he began the construction of the Spokane Falls & Northern Railway, building the line northward through Colville to Northport on the Columbia. Within a few years, in spite of the acute financial stringency, he was able to secure capital for the extension of the line to Rossland, British Columbia, thus opening up another great mineral area. In 1899 this line was absorbed by the Great Northern.
Corbin was active in various local projects and developments including British Columbia mining, and organized the Corbin Coal & Coke Company to handle his extensive properties in the southern part of the province. He attempted to promote sugar-beet culture in the lands south of Spokane, but this development proved unsuccessful, largely because of the scarcity of labor. He was a director in the Old National Bank and Union Trust Company, the leading financial institutions in eastern Washington.
In 1905 he began the construction of the Spokane International Railway, extending from Spokane through the Panhandle to Eastport, Idaho, and connecting with the Canadian Pacific Railway at Yahk, British Columbia, thus giving the city another transcontinental outlet, opening up a great stretch of productive territory, and tapping important coal areas. After ten years of independent operation this line was purchased by the Canadian Pacific in 1916.
Corbin had the shrewdness, sound judgment, tenacity of purpose, and integrity characterizing many New England business men in the unprecedented growth of the West. He avoided publicity and was reputed to be irritable and brusque in manner, although his associates testified to his loyalty to friends and employees, and also to a great deal of unostentatious or anonymous charity and kindness on his part.
Corbin married in 1860 Louisa M. Jackson of Iowa, who died in August 1900. In 1907 he married Mrs. Anna (Larsen) Peterson, who survived him.
