Around 1730, Casper Lipe constructed a stone house overlooking a stream. From this modest beginning, construction expanded and within about a decade the hilltop above Lipe’s house was transformed into a fortified complex. The fort was used in the French & Indian War and the Revolutionary War, but its military significance declined; in 1810, the fort’s final remaining buildings were dismantled.
The end of the fort was not the end of Fort Plain. It incorporated as a village in 1832 and partook of the economic benefits of the Erie Canal. During the nineteenth century, Fort Plain was a center of textile and furniture manufacturing.
Fort Plain is the birthplace of Bud Fowler (1858-1913), the first professional African American baseball player.
The Table at Fort Plain 