Race Relations

Alfred Niger, a Black voting rights activist from Providence, may have provided the final straw that broke the back of the Dorr Rebellion.  His attempt to vote in an 1841 …
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Benjamin Quarles once wrote that the loyalty of black Americans during the American Revolution “was not to a place nor to a people, but to a principle, freedom.”[1] In late …
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After a slow beginning in the 17th century, the colony of Rhode Island came to dominate the slave trade in British North America in the 18th century.

Slavery by the …
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Posy Wiggins made helped make change happen. I became aware of her at an event at the wonderful Paul Cuffee School in Providence eight years ago when the …
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The 17th century brought enormous changes to the Western Hemisphere, commonly called the Americas. European explorers and settlers claimed land in North and South America for economic, sovereignty, political or …
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Rhode Island has an extensive immigrant history. Evelyn Savidge Sterne’s Ballots and Bibles: Ethnic Politics and the Catholic Church in Providence is a comprehensive story about the discrimination Irish, French …
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Among the gifts that immigrants have brought to the United States are their native cuisines. Indeed, opening a restaurant or food-related business was—and still is—a traditional recipe for financial …
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In colonial times, death was a common occurrence reaching into all families, regardless of wealth, social station and race. In seaport towns such as Newport, Rhode Island, influenza, scarlet …
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This is the third article in a row providing book reviews of recent Rhode Island history books. Surprisingly, each of the three books here is a historical novel that …
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After the French Revolution, while tensions between Great Britain and the new French revolutionary government were growing, the disruption with trade to the West Indies was acute, especially for Rhode …
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