Henry B. Plant

Henry Bradley Plant ( born October 27, 1819 in Branford, Connecticut, † June 23, 1899 ) was an American railroad magnate and pioneer of the tourist development of the western Florida.

Plant stand from his family ago to study at a prestigious university open, he decided, however, for to work in the transportation industry from the bottom to up. Plant proved particularly successful in organizing package express services and achieved in a relatively young age leading staff positions. Because of their poor health in 1853 Plants wife Elizabeth was recommended primarily reside in the south. This and previous business relationships with the southern states led to the Henry B. Plant in the 1870s interested and bankrupt lines began to buy up cheap for the prostrate railways in the defeated in the Civil War states. Plant also promoted tourism in the western coastal areas of the State of Florida through the construction of railway hotels, like the Henry Morrison Flagler about the same time on the east coast of Florida did. Plants built in 1891 Tampa Bay Hotel with its 13 Moorish towers is here a kind of counterpart to Flagler's Ponce de Leon Hotel in St. Augustine dar. Since 1933, now houses a listed building, the University of Tampa. There is also a museum dedicated to Henry B.Plant housed therein.