On April 22, at the Annual Meeting of Bath Historical Society, Dr. Barry H. Rodrigue, Ph.D., will give a presentation on the life and accomplishments of Thomas Plant, an early 20th century entrepreneur of Bath and Boston. Plant donated funds to build the Old Folks Home that later became the Plant Memorial Home on lower Washington Street in Bath. Dr. Rodrigue, a research professor at the University of Southern Maine and with the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Oriental Studies, has written a book about Thomas Plant: “A Castle in the Clouds: Tom Plant and the American Dream.” Thomas G. Plant, whose parents were French-Canadian, was born in Bath in 1859. He first trained as a shoemaker in Bath, and then became a major entrepreneur in the shoemaking industry in the Boston area, where he built a very large and progressive shoemaking factory.
Dr. Rodrigue’s talk will begin at 10:30 a.m., right after a short BHS business meeting, in the Community Room of Patten Free Library, on Saturday, April 22. Doors will open at 10:00 a.m. The talk is free and open to all.