One of the most exciting European visitors to colonial America was the Very Reverend Dr. George Berkeley (1685-1753), who spent most of three years in Rhode Island. The rest of …
Read More
In the 1970s, I lived in Newport, Rhode Island, and I had just built full-sized, operational copies of two Revolutionary War ships for the Bicentennial, the 24-gun frigate Rose (that …
Read More
Stanton Hazard was born on January 8, 1743, into the prominent Hazard family of King’s (later Washington) County. He moved to Newport and, as with many young men, he took …
Read More
Contrary to the popular image of Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow character as an amiable buffoon, pirates in their day were usually cruel thugs, petty criminals, and international terrorists. Pirates had …
Read More
Here is my list of the top ten Rhode Islanders from the eighteenth century. My list is not in any particular order. And I found it necessary to include eleven!
Newport Gardner was born Occramer Marycoo, perhaps in Ghana, in 1746. When he was fourteen, he was captured and taken as a slave to Newport, Rhode Island, where he was …
Read More