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Coast Guard Machine-Guns Monolola and Other Rumrunners in Narragansett Bay
7 years ago

Coast Guard Machine-Guns Monolola and Other Rumrunners in Narragansett Bay

[Note from the editor:  An updated version of this article is in a chapter of my book Machine Guns in Narragansett Bay: The Coast Guard’s War on Rumrunners (History Press, 2023).  The …
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Recollections of a Rhode Island Bootlegger
7 years ago

Recollections of a Rhode Island Bootlegger

[Editor’s note: When interviewed in 1991, Ron Deaver was 97 years old and resided in a nursing home. Some sixty years earlier, in early 1930s Rhode Island, he actively participated …
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Extravagant Barnaby’s Castle and Murder Most Foul
7 years ago

Extravagant Barnaby’s Castle and Murder Most Foul

To our contemporary eyes the Victorian mansion at 299 Broadway in Providence is an ostentatious mash-up of architectural styles—a little bit of Gothic, a little Romanesque, with a four-story octagonal …
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Caleb Eddy and an African Slave Voyage Gone Awry
7 years ago

Caleb Eddy and an African Slave Voyage Gone Awry

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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Rebecca Chase Herreshoff, Whirlwind from Bristol
7 years ago

Rebecca Chase Herreshoff, Whirlwind from Bristol

Rebecca Chase Herreshoff was born on December 2, 1894, on Prudence Island, Rhode Island, the daughter of Captain Halsey Chase and Lizzie Kelly Studley. Also called Becky, she was …
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An Idyllic Sunday Afternoon on Prudence Island in 1906 and Then a Deadly Storm
7 years ago

An Idyllic Sunday Afternoon on Prudence Island in 1906 and Then a Deadly Storm

[From the editor: This charming article is short, but packs a powerful punch. Its author, Rachel Chase Boynton, was born in December 1894, the daughter of Captain Halsey Chase, the …
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Pittsburgh Steelers Make Rhode Island Their Summer Home, 1964 to 1966
7 years ago

Pittsburgh Steelers Make Rhode Island Their Summer Home, 1964 to 1966

By  •  Sports

On March 14, 1964, the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League announced they would hold their training camp that summer at the University of Rhode Island.[1] It was an …
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Middletown Historical Society Produces Study of the August 1778 Siege of Newport
7 years ago

Middletown Historical Society Produces Study of the August 1778 Siege of Newport

[From the Editor: In December 2016, the Middletown Historical Society published a 364-page report for the National Park Service, “The Siege of British Forces in Newport County by Colonial and …
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Beavertail’s Top Secret Spraycliff Observatory During World War II
7 years ago

Beavertail’s Top Secret Spraycliff Observatory During World War II

Spraycliff Observatory, located on the Beavertail peninsula on Conanicut Island (the town of Jamestown), was a top secret World War II facility. The activities of Spraycliff Observatory provided a …
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Interview with Maury Klein about his Book,  A Call To Arms, Mobilizing America for World War II
7 years ago

Interview with Maury Klein about his Book, A Call To Arms, Mobilizing America for World War II

[From the editor: Maury Klein is one of Rhode Island’s most prominent authors writing history books for a national audience. A long-time professor at the University of Rhode Island, he …
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