Former long-time Bates Mfg. officials were reunited recently at the Franco-American Heritage Collection at L-A College. Pictured left to right are Donat E. Boisvert, Fred Lebel, and Raoul Philippon. Lebel recently donated to the Collection a large number of historic photographs of mill workers taken since the 1940’s.

June 2003

Fred Lebel, former head of Bates Fabrics, who is keeping Lewiston's 150 year-old bedspread-making tradition alive as president of Maine Heritage Weavers, has donated an important compilation of photos of Bates Manufacturing workers to the Franco-American Heritage Collection at USM’s Lewiston- Auburn College. The Collection marked the occasion by reuniting Lebel with long time colleagues, Donat E. Boisvert and Raoul Philippon. The photos span several decades starting in the mid-forties and, in addition to Bates Mill, also include employees of the Hill and Androscoggin Mills as well as the Edwards Division in Augusta and the York Division in Saco.

Lebel noted that these photographs are significant because they focus on the people who worked in the mills, and most of them were Franco Americans. He has given these photos to the Collection in order to preserve them and also make them accessible to the public.

Many of the people in the photos still need to be identified. Lebel, Boisvert and Philippon, who together represent over 125 years of service at Bates, are currently involved in naming these workers and members of the public who worked at Bates are invited to join this effort. The pictures can be examined on Mondays and Wednesdays from 8:30 to 5:00 and on Thursdays till noon at the Collection on Westminster Street in Lewiston. Anyone interested in assisting or who may possess similar material they wish to have preserved is encouraged to call 753- 6545.

The Franco-American Heritage Collection, formerly known as the Centre d’Heritage FrancoAmericain, is the largest repository of Franco-American archival material in the State, with material on politics, religion, language, education, industry and business, theater and music, genealogy, LewistonAuburn history, and civic leaders. All archives are catalogued and preserved in a state-of-the-art climate-controlled facility. An extensive book collection is also maintained in the Madeleine Giguere Reading Room. Anyone interested is encouraged to visit or to check out the Web page at usm.maine.edu/lac/franco.