Resumen 

We explore the role of historical elites for development and in particular for the spread of cooperative creameries in Denmark after 1882, which is often cited as a major factor behind that country’s rapid economic catch-up. We demonstrate empirically that the location of early proto-modern dairies, so-called hollænderier, introduced onto traditional landed estates by German-speaking elites from the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein in the eighteenth century, can explain the location of cooperative creameries in 1890, more than a century later, after controlling for other relevant determinants of cooperation. We interpret this as evidence that areas close to a hollænderi witnessed a gradual spread of modern ideas from the estates to the peasantry. Moreover, we identify a causal relationship by utilizing the nature of the spread of hollænderier around Denmark, and the distance to the first hollænderi. These results are supported by evidence from a wealth of contemporary sources.