WHEATLAND – Local rancher and entrepreneur Charles Hoskinson hosted a town hall last Friday at the Platte County Agriplex in an effort to be “neighborly” and avail himself to the community for questions and comments regarding his efforts – or perceived lack thereof – in renovating the former Hilltop restaurant in Wheatland.
The billionaire owner of the Twin Pine Ranch west of El Rancho had purchased the Hilltop restaurant two years ago with the plan to renovate it and turn it into a Scottish restaurant complete with an authentic dinosaur bone skeleton to represent the famous Lock Ness monster. Things didn’t work out as he planned, Hoskinson confessed.
First, since the Hilltop restaurant owners were only partial owners of the building, there was litigation and paperwork to be done before construction could begin.
Then, a restaurant manager he had hired to help him convert the building and oversee the direction of the construction suddenly quit after renovation was underway. Almost immediately after that, Hoskinson said the project was shut down by the state because of asbestos concerns. After a year-long pause with the resulting paperwork and abatement, and after looking at various options and cost scenarios, he determined it would be better to build a new, modern structure in its place.
Sharing his enjoyment of cigars and whiskey, Hoskinson said he would like to make the upper portion of the building into a restaurant open during the day, and the bottom portion a type of cigar club or gathering place in the evening. Hoskinson has also invested in genetically modified plants that glow, which he plans to eventually sell at major store chains for people to utilize in landscaping. When the Wheatland restaurant is completed, he said he’ll use the plants in its landscaping, suggesting it could be one of the first places the plants will be used.
People from the community who attended Hoskinson’s town hall were able to see a computer-generated rendition of his vision for the new restaurant he plans to build in the building located on Wheatland’s Golf course. They were also introduced to information on the state-of-the-art Hoskinson Health and Wellness medical clinic he started in Gillette, the Twin Pine Ranch, and the Hoskinson Construction Company (HCC).

Hoskinson told Friday’s gathering in Wheatland, he started the construction company because he was tired of spending $1,000 per square foot for construction when he was building the medical building. When HCC is done with their current projects, he plans to begin on the restaurant project – possibly sometime after July.
Sharing some of his background, Hoskinson – who has begun multiple companies and, as a pioneer of crypto blockchain technologies is a founder of Cardano, CEO and founder of Input Output Global, and co-founder of Ethereum – told of his love for Wyoming, and why he chose to buy the ranch near Wheatland three years ago.
Hoskinson said both his grandfather and father are doctors, but his family was big on ranching. Hoskinson’s grandfather (William) had a ranch in Big Timber, Montana, where he raised his son, Charles’ dad, Scott. When Scott retired, he moved to Gillette. “When we’d ask him why he chose Wyoming…he’d reply, ‘because Montana changed and Wyoming didn’t,’” Hoskinson recalled.
Then, in 2021, when Hoskinson was looking for a ranch to call ‘home,’ he had a tempting choice of either the beautiful 800-acre Piiholo Ranch in his birthplace of Maui, Hawaii, or the Twin Pine Ranch in Platte County – both for the same price. In the end, Hoskinson said after he visited the Twin Pine, the choice became easy.
In spite of the warning of extremely high winds that often close down the interstate, and sub-zero cold weather, he had no doubt he had found “home.”
“It’s not the wind – it’s the people,” he explained. People on the Oregon Trail passed through Wyoming for a reason. Those who chose to stay wanted to, and they had to fight hard to make it. That kind of people are the people he has found in the local arear, and the kindness and generosity of the local community is who he wants to call his neighbors.
Those neighbors, and his desire not to be a stranger, are what prompted the town hall last week, where he served a free meal of bison chili and samples of cured bison salami and bologna.
During the explanation of who he is and how he ended up in Wheatland, Hoskinson shared his dreams, his greenhorn mistakes and stumbles along the way as he has learned new industries in his trials-by-fire. He also shared his desire to be a part of the community and contribute to it in a positive way to help it thrive long into the future.
Questions from the community were asked on a variety of topics Hoskinson discussed during his introduction of himself to the community, including crypto, blockchain, government policy and the ideology of a free market system, dollar-to-dollar conversion rates, public audit transparency, and keeping Wyoming crypto investment strategies protected from foreign manipulation. There were questions regarding his interest in providing state-of-the-art, modern healthcare with worldwide experts in medicine and a focus on healing patients while investing the proper amount of time in them to reach that goal.
Other topics included his interests in animal science and veterinary medicine, his dreams of fabricating mechanical parts for a Blackhawk helicopter, creating a stable of dozens of quality horses for youth to learn how to rodeo, creating an ammunition factory that produces ammo made entirely out of biodegradable carbon. Hoskinson was also asked his thoughts on how to find resources for the 4H shooting sports, if he is willing to work with local schools and meet with youth to encourage young entrepreneurs (short answer: yes), and from his years of world travel and conversations with leaders in every continent around the world, what is his view of the perceived reach of China worldwide and into the U.S. (Four words: “Belt and Road Initiative” – and a willingness to have a very long-term and well-thought-out game plan combined with unrelenting patience.)
Hoskinson re-iterated, he doesn’t want to be a stranger, and he hopes to make the “meet your neighbors” town hall an annual tradition.