Aram J. Pothier

Pothier was born in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada, the son of Jules Pothier and Domiltilde (Dallaire) Pothier.[2] He attended the common schools in Canada and graduated from Nicolet College in Quebec.[3] At the time of his graduation, his parents had already moved to Woonsocket, Rhode Island, and he moved to Woonsocket to join them.

Pothier's house in Woonsocket

Pothier's father purchased a home on Pond Street around 1881, and Aram Pothier lived in the modest 1.5-story home until his death (while serving as governor) in 1928.[4]

He was a clerk for former Congressman Latimer W. Ballou at the Woonsocket Institute for Savings.[5]

Pothier met his wife Françoise de Charmigny in Paris at the 1900 Paris Exhibition. They were married in 1902 in Bridgeport, Connecticut.[6] He is a descendant of Zacharie Cloutier.

He began his political career in 1885 as a Republican member of the Woonsocket School Committee.[7] He was appointed by Governor Taft to the 1889 Paris Exposition.[8] Pothier was a member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives from 1887 to 1888,[9] and served as city auditor from 1889 to 1894.

He was mayor of Woonsocket from 1894 to 1895, and declined renomination.[10] From 1897 to 1898 he served as Lieutenant Governor of Rhode Island, during the first year that Elisha Dyer, Jr. was governor.[11] After his term as lieutenant governor, he retired from public office, but returned as a member of the Rhode Island Board of Education in 1907. Governor Dyer appointed him to the 1900 Paris Exhibition.[12]

Pothier was elected Governor of Rhode Island in 1908 and entered into service on January 5, 1909. He was reelected to three more one-year terms. At that time, biennial elections replaced annual elections for state officials, and Pothier won the first election for a two-year term as governor in 1912. He retired after this term, on January 5, 1915, when he was succeeded by fellow Republican Robert Livingston Beeckman.[13] In 1915, retiring from politics, he became President of the Woonsocket Institute for Savings and the Providence Union Trust Company.[14] He was again drafted by the Republican Party to run for governor in 1924.[15] He won that election and reelection in 1926, serving from January 6, 1925, until his death on February 4, 1928.[16] He was the first Rhode Island governor of French Canadian descent.

He died on February 4, 1928, in Woonsocket and is interred in Precious Blood Cemetery in Woonsocket.[17]

In 2010, he was inducted into the American-French Genealogical Society Hall of Fame.[18]

• Pothier House
• List of U.S. state governors born outside the United States

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Aram J. Pothier.

• Aram Jules Pothier Monument
• National Governors Association
• Aram J. Pothier at Find a Grave