BATH – The Plant Memorial Home is launching a series of fundraisers to help offset the rising costs of maintaining the 102-year old nonprofit assisted and independent living facility in Bath.
“My goal is for this place to be here for another 100 years,” said Liz Wyman, executive director. “I realize I won’t see that goal through, but I’ll at least get the ball rolling.”
The first fundraiser is a gala on Saturday from 5-9 p.m. All money raised goes to the home’s endowment fund, which offsets the costs of care the nonprofit provides and covers maintenance and repairs to the 102-year-old building.
Plant Memorial Homes offers financial subsidies to residents who have exhausted their own financial assets. Thirty-two of the home’s 37 units are subsidized. The average monthly cost to subsidize the residents is $16,000, according to Wyman, executive director of the Plant Memorial Home.
The nonprofit has a handful of cottages, five of which opened in 2016, which are private-pay independent living. The rent from the independent living units helps support the home, but it isn’t enough to cover the total cost the facility accrues, said Wyman.
According to local historian Robin Haynes, Thomas Plant, the founder of Plant Memorial Home, was born in 1859 in Bath to an impoverished French-Canadian immigrant family. As an adult, he left to find work in Boston in the shoe manufacturing business. He amassed a grand fortune and returned home to Bath where he purchased 24 acres in 1917. He built The Plant Memorial Home in memory of his family and endowed the home with 3,300 shares of his shoe company, equating to $400,000 at the time.
“This home is founded on my sincere belief that those who have lived honest, industrious lives and are without means or friends to care for them, have earned the right to be cared for,” said Plant on Oct. 1, 1917.
Plant died penniless in 1941.
Betsy Jones, a resident of the home’s independent living cottages for the past two years, said Plant’s mission to provide the older generation with a safe place to live is one of the things that attracted her to the facility.
“(Plant) founded a place for older people who did not have family or the means to support themselves. That’s what he started it for, and that’s what it continues to be,” said Jones. “This is a very special place that I want to see continue doing the good work it does.”
Ticket prices range from $55 to $100 and can be purchased online at planthome.org or by calling (207) 442-9583. The theme of the gala is “the roaring 20s.” Wyman said the night will be filled with live jazz music, a champagne fountain, and a 1929 Mercedes to take pictures with.
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