By age fourteen Thad had ventured out on his own first to Portland, Maine, then back to Boston where he joined his older brother Joseph in the shoe cutting trade. At eighteen Thad became quite ill and returned home. While he was still recuperating, his younger brother invited him to attend a chemistry lecture by one Professor Reginald Dinkelhoff featuring the phenomenon of lighter-than-air gases, specifically hydrogen. When the Professor requested a volunteer from the audience, an eager Thaddeus jumped to the fore. Dinkelhoff could see the interest in his eyes and after the show offered to take him on the road with him as an assistant. Lowe did so and after two years, upon the professor's retirement, bought out the show using the appellation "Thaddeus Sobieski Coulincourt Lowe, Professor of Chemistry."