The Life of Henry Bradley Plant / Founder and President of the Plant System of Railroads and Steamships and Also of the Southern Express Company

by G. Hutchinson Smyth

From the Atlanta Constitution, October 27, 1895.

“No more important day will be celebrated during the present Cotton States and International Exposition than to-morrow, which has been set aside in honor of Mr. Henry B. Plant, the head of the great Plant railway and steamship lines. The importance of the day will spring not only from the successful life of which Mr. Plant is an example, but from the fact that above any other man living he represents the great industrial revolution which has come over the face of the Southern States, and which marks the success of free over slave labor.

“To-day Mr. Plant might be called an international developer. Of this, however, the story of his life will be the best witness. To-morrow he will have completed his seventy-sixth year, forty-one of which have been spent in the South, during which time the twin powers of steam and electricity have wrought wonders in the conditions of life. To-day he is the president of a railway system which embraces twelve different corporations, and whose mileage extends to 1941, with a list of employees numbering 5506. He is also president of the Plant steamship and steamboat lines, the one covering the coasts of the Gulf and going to Cuba and Jamaica, the other skirting the coasts of the North, running from Boston and along Nova Scotia to Cape Breton and the maritime provinces of Canada. In addition to these interests, he is still president of the Southern and the Texas Express Companies, which do a business as express forwarders over 24,412 miles of railway; have lines in fifteen States, employing 6,808 men, and using 1,463 horses and 886 wagons. As a complement to the handling of railroads, and the sailing of ships, and the expressing of freightage, Mr. Plant has erected four winter resort hotels in Florida, one of which, the great Tampa Bay Hotel, is probably the largest winter resort hotel of its kind on the continent. It will thus be seen that this great man, who is to be the toast at the Exposition to-morrow, does service under three flags, those of America, England, and Spain.

“Such developments as these are enough to make his life history of interest to the old and of profit to the young, as showing the vast possibilities which our country affords, and the immense rewards which come to industry, tact, and intelligence.

“The coming of Mr. Plant to the Southern States really marked the opening of Florida to the people of this country as a winter resort. It was in 1853, the year of Mr. Plant’s arrival, that he visited Florida for the sake of his invalid wife, when access could only be had by steamboat, by the St. John’s River. The mild climate of that State prolonged Mrs. Plant’s life for years. He saw the necessity of railroads in the State, and it was in this way that he began buying stock in various Florida and Georgia railroads, though he did not engage in any railroad enterprise as a manager until 1879. In that year Mr. Plant purchased the Atlantic and Gulf Railroad of Georgia, and subsequently reorganized the company as the Savannah, Florida, and Western Railway, of which he is still the head. The Savannah and Charleston Railway was next purchased in 1880, and the story of the completion of the Plant System—now extending to Charleston on the one side, to Montgomery, Alabama, on the other, covering Florida and forming a perfect network—would be to repeat the story of railroad development in that entire section.

“In these enterprises it was the purpose of Mr. Plant and his associates to extend and add to the various properties, and they believed this could best be accomplished under a single organization with ample powers. With this object in view, several of his associates being residents of Connecticut, the birth-place of Mr. Plant, a charter was obtained in 1882 from the legislature of that State, and the Plant Investment Company organized. Mr. Plant became president, and remained such to the present time. Among his associates were W. T. Walters and B. F. Newcomer, of Baltimore; E. B. Haskell, of Boston; Henry M. Flagler and Morris K. Jessup, of New York, and Lorenzo Blackstone, Henry Sanford, Lynde Harrison, H. P. Hoadley, and G. H. Tilley, of Connecticut. Since the formation of the Plant Investment Company, several properties have been acquired by purchase. In 1885, they bought the South Florida Railroad, at the time running only between Sanford and Kissimmee, which was changed from narrow to broad gauge, with an extension of the line to Port Tampa, Florida, which is the port of entry for the West India fast mail steamers (Plant Steamship Line) between Port Tampa and Havana, Cuba. Subsequently the line was extended north from Lakeland to a connection with the Savannah, Florida, and Western Railway (Gainsville division) at High Springs, thus completing the line from Charleston, South Carolina, to Port Tampa, Florida. Thereafter the company acquired, in 1887, the Brunswick and Western Railroad, between Brunswick and Albany, Georgia, via. Waycross, which road was rebuilt; in 1889, the Alabama Midland Railway, from Montgomery, Alabama, to Bainbridge, Georgia; and in 1892, the Silver Springs, Ocala, and Gulf Railroad, extending from Ocala to Homosassa and Inverness, Florida. In 1893, the Tampa and Thonotosassa Railroad was constructed, from Tampa to Thonotosassa, and the Winston and Bone Valley Railroad was purchased to accommodate the people of the phosphate mining districts. In 1894, the Abbeville Southern Railway, from Abbeville, Alabama, to a junction of the line of the Alabama Midland Railway, was built. The system has been extended in 1895 by the purchase of the Florida Southern Railway and the Sanford and St. Petersburg Railroad, both narrow gauge roads, and preparations are now being made to change them to standard gauge.

“In addition to the railway properties enumerated, Mr. Plant established two lines of steamboats: one, in 1880, to run between Sanford and Jacksonville, which was discontinued upon the completion of the railway between these two points; the other on the Chattahoochie River, known as the People’s Line, plying between Columbus and Bainbridge, Georgia, and Apalachicola, Florida. In 1886, he established the Plant Steamship Line for regular service between Port Tampa, Key West, and Havana, Cuba, under contract with the United States Post Office Department, for the carriage of the Key West and Havana mails, and for occasional service between Port Tampa and the island of Jamaica, with regular service between Port Tampa and Mobile, and Port Tampa and points on the Manatee River.

“Subsequently the line of the Atlantic, Canada, and Plant Steamship Line, Limited, running between Boston and Halifax, was acquired by purchase, and chartered under the Dominion Government as the Canada, Atlantic, and Plant Steamship Company, Limited. In 1893, the North Atlantic Line of steamers was added to the line through purchase, and the route between Boston, Cape Breton, and Prince Edward Island is now operated by the company of which he is at the head.

“The Plant Investment Company had widened the gauges of its various roads to the standard measure, has organized the fast mail steamships between Port Tampa and Havana, and has in many other ways developed the country and revolutionized the face of nature in that section. A reading of the names of the directors of the Plant Investment Company shows that through Mr. Plant other men, such as Mr. Flagler, have been led to investments in the Gulf States, which are of incalculable value, and which will perpetually influence the destiny of the South.

“Without entering into the statistical and prosaic relation of railroad names and technical details, it may be said Mr. Plant stands foremost as a developer, and that while honor is due him for the creation of so much wealth, for the integrity of his life, for the energy with which he has built up the country, yet it is as a public benefactor and as one who has contributed vastly to the possibility of such an Exposition being held in the South, that he will be spoken of to-morrow. When he came here, in 1854, he found the country wedded to a slave-labor system, which necessarily meant a purely agricultural condition, and under which it would be impossible to develop manufacturing and other corporative industries. Without having been connected in any way with the war or with the politics which preceded it or followed after it, yet he was the pioneer of that new business which the war made possible, and which marks the end of the old and the beginning of the new. His career is a remarkable example of what can be accomplished by untiring industry and indomitable will. The people of Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and Alabama cheerfully acknowledge the great obligations under which they have been placed by the labors of this energetic and capable man.