home Page 2: Chronology Page 3: The History of Quakerism Page 4: Giving War a Chance Page 5: Captain John Brown at Harpers Ferry Page 7: Additional Materials Page 8: Henry Thoreau Page 9: The People of WALDEN, A WEEK, and CAPE COD Page 10: The Orient Page 11: The People of Concord

Page 6: The View from Greater Rhode Island  Rhode Island through the 17th Century, including its Great Race War of 1675-1676   Rhode Island in the 18th Century   Rhode Island in the 19th Century   Rhode Island in the 20th/21st Centuries Rhode Island has a marvelously detailed history. Race war, pirates, privateering, slavery, the international slave trade, hangings, witches...  The Baptists of Rhode Island such as the Reverend John Comer The Baptists of Rhode Island (for better or worse).   The Touro Synagogue Have you ever visited Touro Synagogue in Newport? Has anybody ever told you that it was a station on the Underground Railroad? Do you know what a crock that is?  Aaron Lopez, America's Merchant Prince  Aaron Lopez of Newport, Rhode Island was so empowered by America's freedoms that he could buy you and sell you.  The Great Meetinghouse of the Friends in Newport, Rhode Island Information about the Quaker silent "Great Meetinghouse" and jiving black dancehall at Newport, Rhode Island.   The town of Tiverton RI (Pocasset) OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town (not to be confused with Pocasset, Massachusetts). Nevertheless, it has a past.   The town of Warren RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  The town of Scituate RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  Saylesville/Smithfield  The Slater Mill in Pawtucket Some information about the beginning of the Industrial Revolution here in America. Why child labor was so important. Why workers jumped into the river.  The history of Brown University The early history of Brown University, before it was moved to Providence, while it was a Baptist institution known as Rhode Island College, while its edifice atop College Hill was being used for other purposes during the Revolution, and later.  New Bedford, in "Greater Rhode Island" Yes, I do know that technically, New Bedford is in Massachusetts. Nevertheless, much of its history is closely tied in with Rhode Island.  Providence, Rhode Island A strictly chronological history of the municipality of Providence in Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.  The Reverend James Manning, first President of what would become Brown University It used to be called the College of Rhode Island, back when it was a Baptist institution. Now it is called Brown University. Here is the guy who did the deed -- and it seems clear that he was a regular decent fellow.   William J. Brown, shoe repairman of beautiful downtown Providence, Rhode Island Providence, Rhode Island is the sort of home town were, after you've spent your life repairing shoes in a little shop, and gone blind -- you're permitted to write your own autobiography and support yourself in your old age by selling copies of it. Read all about William J. Brown, intrepid grandson of a manumitted slave. He has some things to tell us about race riots, nearly dying in a storm at sea, and how to get educated without any help from anybody at all. He can tell us what it is like to live in amongst a bunch of white people who need for you as a person of color to be free -- but who, also, don't much care whether as a person of color you are alive or dead.   Paulina Wright Davis Two famous feminists, actually: Thomas Davis and Paulina Wright Davis of Providence, Rhode Island.  Charley Parkhurst Was he a man's man one-eyed California stagecoach driver, or was she the first female voter? --Let's have a closer peek at those genetalia, please.  George William Curtis George William Curtis, from Providence, Rhode Island by way of Brook Farm, helped Henry David Thoreau raise the rafters of his cabin on Walden Pond. Later he became the first publisher of Thoreaus' materials on Cape Cod, and did a poor job of it.  Burrill Curtis George William Curtis's elder brother James Burrill Curtis also assisted at the raising of Thoreau's beams, and was also almost mentioned, or mentioned by implication, in Walden; or, Life in the Woods.  Commodore Matthew Calbreath Perry  Captain Oliver Hazard Perry Nautical hero types for whom Rhode Island wasn't big enough.   Thomas Allen Jenckes US Representative Thomas Jenckes of Rhode Island took on the nation's inconsistent local bankruptcy laws as a challenge, and rendered them national and rational. (Along the way, we learn something about the freeing of the enslaved -- and about the deeper nature of American racism.)   Transcendentalism in Rhode Island Transcendentalism didn't just happen in Massachusetts. It also happened in Rhode Island -- consider, for instance, the lives of Christopher A. Greene and Sarah Chace Greene.   The Butler Hospital on Blackstone Avenue in Providence It used to be called Butler Hospital for the Insane. It was founded in part with proceeds from the international slave trade (shhhh). Once upon a time the distressed people of Rhode Island could stay there for a mere two dollars a day --which sounds like a bargain until you realize that in those times a laboring man might work from daybreak before sunup until dusk after sunset for just one of those two dollars, and with that feed and house his entire family.   The Dexter Asylum on Hope Street in Providence Right now, even as you read this, an attempt is being make by the administrators of the Moses Brown School (right across Lloyd Avenue from the ball fields of what used to be, for the longest time, the Dexter Asylum, before the bequest of Ebenezer Knight Dexter at last was broken) to break the deed of trust of Friend Moses Brown that originally set up their school. It might be useful for us to examine how the bequest of Mr. Dexter has been broken in the 1950s, so that we can understand how it is that one goes about breaking the terms of such a donation. Understanding how this is done may help us predict the tactics of these Moses Brown administrators, who are presently struggling to eliminate whatever is left of the influence that the New England Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends once had over this once Quaker school.   Cudgoe Gosh, what an honor to almost be present for the signing of the Declaration of Independence!   Cato Pearce A Rhode Islander who was threatened with the whip, and jailed, for preaching.   The Reverend Clement Clarke Moore Is it better to be caught in one's lie before, or after, one dies? People connected with (Greater) Rhode Island:   Thomas and Alice Angell of Providence Why is Angell Street?   Bishop George Berkeley The good Bishop was with us for awhile, preaching in Newport, Rhode Island   Gabriel Bernon, refugee Huguenot businessman   James Franklin, printer   Samuell Gorton   Blackbeard the pirate   Thomas Tew, the pirate   Captain Thomas Paine of Newport, the pirate    Captain Adriaen Block I thought the Island of Rhodes was in the Mediterranean?   John Brown of Providence RI Like a Chesterfield cigarette, he was so round, so full, so densely packed.   Friend Moses Brown and his School He had a wart on the end of his nose the size and color of a small cherry, and it didn't slow him down one little bit.   Nicholas Brown, Jr. of Providence RI Junior's name got attached to Brown University as a result of their naming fund drive not because he gave so much --it wasn't nearly as much as they wanted--  but because he was the only one to give any significant amount.   Friend Arnold "the Hatter" Buffum The Quaker Arnold Buffum was called "the hatter." You see, mercury was used in the processing of felt for hats, and so hatters tended to dementia on account of prolonged contact with poisonous fumes. Likewise, a person like Friend Arnold, who was concerned for the wellbeing of black Americans to the extent that he was actually helping them steal themselves away from their obligated service, must be the victim of some sort of dementia caused by incautious exposure to UnAmerican ideas.   The Reverend William Blackstone or Blaxton   Sachem Canonicus of the Narragansett   The history of the Narragansett people   The Unitarian Reverend William Ellery Channing   Elder John Clarke   Governor Walter Clarke of Rhode Island   Governor William Coddington of Rhode Island   Samuel B. Comstock  Michele Felice Corne of Newport  Friend Paul Cuffe of Westport   Governor Thomas Wilson Dorr  George Thomas Downing George Thomas Downing of Newport, Rhode Island was the friend and benefactor of Frederick Douglass, and in all likelihood this is why his hotel was destroyed after the raid of Captain John Brown at the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry.  Friend Mary Dyer of Newport  William Dyer of Newport  Friend Stephen Gould of Newport, Rhode Island The mild-mannered watch repairsman of Newport.  Major General Nathanael Greene A Quaker who quit.   Governor Stephen Hopkins   Commodore Esek Hopkins   Friend John R. Kellam of Providence   Captain Kidd the pirate   Sam Patch of Pawtucket    The Reverend John Sassamon, "Indian John" As the First World War came about because of the murder of an archduke in Serbia, so King Philip's War came about because of the murder of a minister between Plymouth and Bristol. They called him "Indian John." He was a Harvard man.   Samuel Slater and water power Some information about the beginning of the Industrial Revolution here in America. Why child labor was so important.   The Pawtucket or Blackstone River The venue of the beginning of the Industrial Revolution here in America. Why workers jumped into the river.   The pirate Thomas Tew  The Dighton Rock  The Reverend Ezra Stiles   Robert Voorhis the hermit The hermit of Pawtucket -- this was before the law, in its magnificient impartiality, forbade both the rich and the poor from sleeping under bridges.  President Francis Wayland of Brown University   Benjamin West, philomath   Publik Universal Friend Jemimah Wilkinson   Captain Palsgrave Williams, the Pirate  Reverend Roger Williams A Baptist -- not.  Reverend Frederic Henry Hedge I bet you never associated Transcendentalism with Rhode Island!   Providence’s favorite draft dodger   What was "Transcendentalism"? When Waldo Emerson came to Providence, Rhode Island to deliver a lecture on "Transcendentalism," some local guy explained what "transcendentalism" meant. It meant "operations on the teeth." --If Waldo had hit Mr. Local Guy on the head with his microphone, would it have made a dent?   The oldest Friends Meetinghouse in Use in America   Rhode Island and the Middle Passage This file on the international slave trade, the "middle passage," documents the many years during which a significant percentage of Africans on the Middle Passage voyages were being brought over in Rhode Island bottoms.   Rhode Island and Piracy This file on piracy contains many fascinating facts about the years during which Rhode Island excelled in privateering, and at piracy. (They didn't term us "Rogue Island" and "the sewer of New England" for exactly nothing.)   The Slave Ship Sally Here are the records for one particularly notable Rhode Island slave ship.   Manumission from Slavery, in Providence RI Here are all the various documents that are on file under the eaves of the Providence town hall, mingled in among the ancient real estate records, by which various local black slaves have been set free. The documents were not destroyed because it was presumed they were non-incriminating.  Also known as "King Phillip’s War" The bloodiest combat we ever fought, happens to have been fought in and around Rhode Island. The blood of this race war cries up to you from the ground. The people who remained alive were sold into slavery, with the assistance of the Reverend Roger Williams. Is it true or is it false, that the Newport Quakers took no part in this killing?  Rhode Island’s "Dorr War" How it came about that, before the civil war, Rhode Island gave the vote to black Americans in order to deny the vote to the Irish.   The Man with the Maggot in his Head You know about fridge magnets -- so how come you don't know about head maggots? Emerson knew who Sam Patch was, Hawthorne knew, Thoreau knew, but you don't know who Sam Patch was! Here, read up on the most famous Rhode Islander, ever. Locations of Rhode Island History:   The town of Bristol RI John Brown of Providence and President Thomas Jefferson conspired to keep the international slave trade functioning in Bristol, Rhode Island for decades after engaging in this trade had become a capital crime.   Mount Hope Near Bristol, Rhode Island, there is a moderate hill with an immoderate history. It had been the center of operations for the headman of the Wampanoag, known to the English of that era as "King Philip," and now known to history as Metacom.  The town of Jamestown RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Or maybe it's an island? Nevertheless, it has a past.  The towns of North Kingstown and South Kingstown RI I've got a real question about the history of the region of Kingston, Rhode Island. My real question is, who exactly was the "Martha Davis of Westerly" who was spoken of in a document dating to 1794? Was she a 77-year-old Quaker woman who was still giving birth, giving birth to a series of illegitimate children -- or was she an enslaved Narragansett maiden, back in the family kitchen,  about whose existence nobody wanted to be too specific?  Martha's Vineyard  Nantucket Island  Block Island  The town of Smithfield RI   The town of Cumberland RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.   The town of Westerly RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  The town of Warwick RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  The town of Cranston RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  The town of Central Falls RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past.  Foster, Rhode Island The Ku Klux Klan, with a rather unexpected agenda, in a rather unexpected locale.   The town of Glocester, Rhode Island OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. But have you seen the elephant in Chepachet?   The town of Wickford RI OK, it's just a little Rhode Island town. Nevertheless, it has a past, some of it fairly sordid.  The town of Portsmouth RI  Newport, Rhode Island Henry David Thoreau famously sneered at the people who were going to vacation in Newport, Rhode Island during his era, as swells who were more interested in "the wine" than in "the brine" (quote unquote). Was that fair? Surely Newport is more than just a bunch of retired pirates who get gold stars from God for founding Episcopal churches, and a bunch of slave traders who get gold stars from God for installing lamps in a place of worship and providing erudite volumes for a municipal library, and a bunch of richie-rich types who build themselves immense "summer cottages" out of marble! So, here is a strictly chronological history of the municipality of Newport in Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, in 560 pages -- colonial Newport, and then Newport as a population center and port of the United States of America.  The Redwood Library of Newport RI My goodness what a cute little library. I wonder what books they have?  The Reverend Samuel Hopkins of Newport RI  The Reverend Samuel Hopkins of Newport, Rhode Island had prepared under the Reverend Jonathan Edwards of Northampton, Massachusetts, and originated a doctrine that would be known as "Hopkinsianism." Will you go to Hell, literally go to Hell, willingly -- if that was is God has marked out for you? The Reverend Paul Litchfield of Carlyle, Massachusetts then helped spread this "Hopkinsian" doctrine.  Cuttyhunk Island in the Elizabeth Islands   Naushon Island in the Elizabeth Islands      (Much More is Coming!)