Gaspee Day 2009

In Warwick and Cranston, Rhode Island, Gaspee Day commemorates the sinking of the HBMS Gaspee by Rhode Islanders in 1772. From Wikipedia:

In early 1772, Lieutenant William Dudingston sailed HBMS Gaspée into Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay to aid in the enforcement of customs collection and inspection of cargo. Rhode Island had a reputation for smuggling and trading with the enemy during wartime. Dudingston and his officers quickly antagonized powerful merchant interests in the small colony. On June 9, the Gaspée gave chase to the packet boat Hannah, and ran aground in shallow water on the northwestern side of the bay. Her crew were unable to free her immediately, but the rising tide could allow the ship to free herself. A band of Providence members of the Sons of Liberty rowed out to confront the ship's crew before this could happen.^[5]

At the break of dawn on June 10, the ship was boarded. The crew put up a feeble resistance and Lieutenant Dudingston was shot and wounded, and the vessel burned to the waterline.

That's the short version, be sure to go to Gaspee.org for MUCH MORE.

And every year, about this time, we still hold the Gaspee Days Parade. Here are some pics (many more to be found at official websites):

The Kentish Guards









Minutemen (including Rehoboth)



Colonial Navy of Massachusetts



Ancient Mariners of Connecticut




The Patuxet Rangers

Rhode Island Historical Society Goes Online

Good idea:

The Rhode Island Historical Society is about to jump into the digital age.

No longer will local history buffs have to drive to Providence to thumb through the society’s 600,000-item card catalogue to do research.

The group plans to abandon its 185-year-old card catalogue system later this month, launching an electronic database that will allow anyone with Web access to search for items stored in the society’s museum and library.

“Now we’ll have a catalog on the Web that people from all over the world can search,” said Karen Eberhart, special collections curator for the historical society. “It’s like going from the 18th century right into the 21st all in one fell swoop.”

Digital reproductions of the historical items will not be available online, Eberhart said. But for the first time, computer users will be able to comb through the historical society’s extensive collection and determine the location of an item from the convenience of home.

***

When the database goes online on Sept. 27, about one quarter of the total collection — about 150,000 items — will be searchable through the historical society’s Web site. Among the items initially listed will be John Brown’s papers, paintings by the renowned American portrait painter Robert Feke, Rhode Island maps dating back to the 1700s and an extensive collection of textiles — bonnets, dresses, and a cashmere shawl imported in the 18th century.

The historical society also boasts a unique collection of news footage from WJAR-TV Channel 10 collected between the 1950s and 1980s, according to Eberhart.

The historical society plans to continue cataloguing the rest of its holdings with help from grants and individual donations. The next batch of artifacts to be catalogued includes genealogical objects, such as diaries and 19th-century books...

Providence Journal Wins EPPY

And the awards keep coming....

The Providence Journal has won an EPPY in the category of "Best Special Feature in a Web Site - Enterprise, fewer than 1 million unique monthly visitors" for it's series "Unrighteous Traffick: Rhode Island's slave history." If you haven't checked it out, do so. It's really well done and shiny and all that.

Pawtucket "Officially" Historic

Now downtown Pawtucket, Rhode Island is more than just of old buildings. It's officially a bunch of old, "historical" buildings.

Downtown Pawtucket has been named to the National Register of Historic Places, the R.I. Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission announced today.

“The architectural and civic character of Downtown Pawtucket is preserved in this collection of solid historic buildings,” Edward F. Sanderson, the commission’s executive director, said in a statement. “Downtown’s historic core is important to Pawtucket’s heritage, and these structures are a resource for attracting new investment and revitalization.”

The district comprises 50 buildings on about 14 acres of land in the city’s central business district, two blocks to the west of the Blackstone River. “With its collection of architecturally significant banks, shops, offices and civic buildings, the Downtown Pawtucket Historic District represents the city’s growth as a prosperous industrial city between the Civil War and World War I,” the Preservation & Heritage Commission said in its announcement.

...the Blackstone’s 30-foot drop at Pawtucket Falls had made the region a magnet for early industrial efforts including Slater Mill, and the booming manufacturing economy attracted housing, institutional and civic buildings and commercial development.

The 1870s through 1890s, the state Preservation & Heritage Commission said, saw the replacement of horse-drawn streetcars with a street railway system, the advent of public utilities and the beginnings of a new central business district where small wood-frame shops and houses gave way to masonry structures up to five stories tall.

“The Downtown Pawtucket Historic District encompasses examples of all of these building types,” the commission said.

“North of Exchange Street stand three wood-frame residences that predate Pawtucket’s urban boom: two Italianate-style cottages on Grant Street and a Second Empire-style house on Montgomery Street.

“Fine examples of commercial buildings include the Late Victorian-style Beswick Building (1891) and the massive Summer Street Stables (1892) with its terracotta plaque containing the biblical verse, ‘How Do The Beasts Groan.’

“Municipal and institutional buildings like the Deborah Cook Sayles Memorial Library (1899-1902, designed by the Boston firm of Cram, Goodhue and Ferguson) and the Colonial Revival-style Pawtucket Boys Club (1902) embody the wealth and civic ambitions of this maturing city.”

Quick Spot the Russian Submarine!

Can you find the Russian Submarine in this picture?


Yup....it's under water! But it wasn't until the recent storm that hit Providence, RI this past week. Here's what the Juliett 484 looks like:


Here's the story:

“The Russian Sunken Sub Museum” is how engineer Damon Ise answered the phone this morning.

Yes, sometime in the evening, the listing submarine laid over on its side and sank, Ise said.

All that’s visible is the submarine’s periscope, sticking up out of the water at an angle, a radio antenna and one of the sub’s orange life buoys, Ise said.

“One of those [buoys] is bouncing and dancing on the surface, and then there’s just a trail of bubbles coming from the front,” he said. “It’s very sad.”

No fuel is leaking from the vessel, Ise said, and crews are working already on a salvage plan with a professional from New York.

Exactly what shape that salvage plan would take is, well, murky at this point, museum officials said today.

The vessel, berthed at Collier Point Park, had been battered by the storm that hit the region early this week. It had been restored as a floating museum after being bought in 2002.

By midday, TV crews and other members of the press joined several Coast Guard officers and staff of the submarine museum at the small, windswept park overlooking Providence Harbor.

Lines ran along the dock, down to the sub, holding it in place on the bottom. The antenna, and a small, pipelike-protusion stuck up from the relatively calm surface of the water.

Off in the distance, only one other vessel could be scene, a tanker.

Nearby, a sign for Cardi's Furniture -- featuring the three Cardi brothers in sailor suits – urged visitors to follow safety tips, some of which were painfully obvious today:

"Be sure to use caution when in the sub" and "Appropriate footwear required; decks may be slippery."

At least they're keeping a sense of humor about it all!

Providence Named to"Dozen Distinctive Destinations"

Providence, Rhode Island has been named to the National Trust for Historic Preservation "Dozen Distinctive Destinations" (via 7to7, the Providence Journal's news blog):

The capital of one of the nation's 13 original colonies, Providence, R.I., has a colorful four-century history proudly and prominently displayed for 21st century visitors. Once a major New World seaport, Providence became an industrial center during the 19th century, but later fell on hard times. Thanks to a sustained preservation and rebuilding effort, the waterfront city has undergone a renaissance with its Venetian-style waterways and landmark structures impeccably preserved....

"Blending the sophistication of a big city with the charm of a small one, Providence offers so many exciting attractions for the eager visitor," said Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. "From historic colleges and beautifully preserved architecture to a vibrant restaurant scene, there is something for every age and interest to experience."

Searching for Local History

Sarah Sutton of the Warwick Beacon (a local paper) writes:

When Steve Insana, Buckeye Brook activist and champion of environmental preservation in the Conimicut area, stepped out of his truck with a chainsaw in hand, I wondered what I had gotten myself into.

I’d agreed to meet him Saturday morning at the fire station on West Shore Road and Sandy Lane, which was to be the starting point for his attempt to uncover a 200-year-old burial plot located somewhere in the brambles near Buckeye Brook. I hadn’t realized we’d be blazing a trail through tangles of vines, climbing over logs and ducking under branches to make our way to the site.

They found it!

Brown University Slavery Report

Around 3 years ago, Brown University president Ruth Simmons organized a commission to investigate the school's ties to slavery. As anyone who has read Charles Rappleye's Sons of Providence knows, the Brown brothers benefitted from the slave trade and some of that money undoubtedly went towards the founding and expansion of the University. Yesterday, the commission released its report. According to the Providence Journal:

About a third of the report focuses on Brown’s deep ties to slavery and the slave trade; a third explores modern day slavery and reparations; and the remainder is recommendations and footnotes.

The recommendations include:

•Publicly acknowledging the participation of Brown’s founders and benefactors in the slave trade by revising Brown’s history to incorporate its connection to slavery and by the creation of an on-campus memorial.

•Establishing a university center for research on slavery.

•Adopting a more transparent and socially responsible investment strategy and policy for accepting gifts.

•Recruiting more economically disadvantaged students and diverse faculty, and offering more financial aid to diverse and international students. This includes actively recruiting students from Africa and the West Indies, “the historic points of origin and destination for most of the people carried on Rhode Island slave ships.”

The ProJo also termed "surprising" the recommendation that "Brown intensify and consolidate its efforts to improve education in Rhode Island, particularly the public schools in Providence." I don't know if it's surprising, but it's certainly a case of putting your money where your angst is. Instead of simply saying your sorry, it sounds like Brown is going to take some of the millions they make/have in their endowment and help out under-priveleged kids in Providence.

“To appreciate the dimensions of the crisis, one need look no further than Providence, where 48 of the city’s 49 public schools currently fail to meet federally prescribed minimum standards for academic achievement,” the report states. “This situation represents a direct challenge to Brown University. One of the most obvious and meaningful ways for Brown to take responsibility for its past is by dedicating its resources to improving the quality of education available to the children of our city and state.”

Brown’s previous and current efforts — tutoring and mentoring programs, arts and literacy initiatives and teacher training programs — are well intentioned, but “highly decentralized,” “ill-coordinated,” and “chronically underfunded,” the report states.

“If Brown is to make a meaningful impact in local schools, it will require a sustained, substantial commitment of energy and resources for many years,” the report states.

The committee suggests that Brown create more classes for teachers and allow public school teachers to take one Brown course a semester free of charge. The group also wants the university to expand its Brown Summer High School program, which prepares Rhode Island students for college-level work. The committee recommends an increase in financing for the university’s master’s degree in teaching program, including full tuition waivers for students who commit to teaching in local public schools for three years. The group also recommends that Brown faculty offer enrichment courses in local schools and help schools develop new programs.

The committee urges the university to expand its new urban education policy program. The committee also advocates expanding internships for Brown undergraduates interested in teaching; coordinating with other colleges in Providence that are active in the schools; and providing administrative and staff support for the education initiatives.

Good for them. I hope the University follows through.