Benjamin Francis Hayes (1830-1906) was a Free Will Baptist pastor, author, principal of the Lapham Institute, and early professor at Bates College in Maine. Benjamin Hayes was born in New Gloucester, Maine in 1830 to Mary (Harmon) Hayes and Rev. Jesse Hayes, a Baptist minister. Benjamin Hayes graduated from Bowdoin College in 1855 and received an M.A. from Bowdoin in 1858. He then taught at the Free Will Baptist Theological Seminary at the New Hampton Institute before becoming a pastor in Olneyville, Rhode Island in 1859 and serving until 1863 when he became principal of the Lapham Institute in Scituate, Rhode Island serving until 1865, when he became a professor at Bates College. He was replaced at Lapham by Thomas Angell in 1865 who later followed him to Bates as a professor of modern la