Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. II, Part 77

Author: Carroll, Charles, author
Publication date: 1932
Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 716

USA > Rhode Island > Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. II > Part 77

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The greatest present value of the "Rhode Island Book" is its demonstration of the number of Rhode Islanders who were capable of and were doing excellent literary work before 1840. There were two names in the list-Hoppin and Hazard-that were definitely related to unusual family talent. The Hoppin family produced four artists in a single generation, one of whom was trained in art, another of whom deserted law for art, and two who followed art as an avocation. Besides painting and illustrating the writings of others, Augustus Hoppin was himself an author, his published works including "Carrot Pomade," "On the Nile," "Ups and Downs on Land and Water," "Crossing the Atlantic," "Hay Fever," "Recollections of Auton House," "A Fashionable Sufferer," "Two Compton Boys," "Jubilee Days," and "Married for Fun." In the Narragansett Country in the South County lived the Hazards, a family represented by distin- guished members through several generations -- successful farmers and manufacturers, sound administrators of the family properties, genuine aristocrats maintaining time-honored traditions, generous philanthropists aiding community projects for the improvement of social living, and withal themselves scholarly gentlemen and ladies. Rowland Gibson Hazard's philosophical and economic writings have been mentioned above. Thomas Robinson Hazard, known as "Shepard Tom," thus to distinguish him from other "Toms" among the Hazards, wrote the brilliant "Johnny Cake Letters," an economic treatise under the title "Facts for the Laboring Man," and miscellaneous essays. Caroline Hazard, who became president of Wellesley College, edited the "Works of Rowland G. Hazard," and wrote "Thomas Hazard, Called 'College Tom,'" "Narra- gansett Poems," "Brief Pilgrimage in the Holy Land," "From City Gates," "Songs of the Heart," "Yosemite and Other Verse," "Anchors of Tradition," "The Homing," and other verse. Her "Anchors of Tradition" was awarded a medal for literary excellence. The volume of Rhode Island literature, prose and verse, additional to the historical and other serious writ- ings already mentioned, is extraordinary.

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The poets include Leonard Bacon, "Animula Vagula," "Guinea Fowl and Other Poetry," "Legend of Quincibald"; William Whitman Bailey, occasional .poems; Virginia Baker, "Fair Flag of Rhode Island," a patriotic song; Anna C. Lynch Batti; Benjamin Francis Brown, "Poems of Life in the Country and by the Sea"; George H. Calvert, "Joan of Arc"; Anna Page Child; George H. Comer ; Reverend Julian S. Cutler, "Roger and I," acclaimed by Kip- ling as the greatest of dog poems ; L. Foster Damon, "Tilted Moons," and "Astrolabe"; James H. Darlington, "Little Rhymes for Little Folks," and four series of "Verses by the Way"; Anne Marjorie Day, "The Guiding Light ; "Abby De Wolf, "Heart Songs"; Antony De Wolf ; Job Durfee, "What Cheer"; Thomas Durfee, "Village Picnic and Other Poems"; Mrs. E. N. Gladding, "Leaves from an Invalid's Journal and Poems"; Albert G. Greene, "Old Grimes" and other poems; Annette Mason Ham, "There Was One Who Gave a Lamb," a Nativity poem ; Ellen Hedge, "Heart Songs"; Mark Martin Antony DeWolfe Howe, "Yankee Ballads"; Jules Jordan, occasional poems, besides songs and musical compositions ; Harry Lyman Koopman, a most prolific writer of verse in various mood; Courtney Langdon, sonnets on the World War ; John H. Larry, "Life of Christ," in verse; Augustus M. Lord, "Hampton Beach"; Sonia Lustig, "Roses of the Wind"; John Hill Luther, "Old Baylor and Other Poems"; John H. McGeough, occasional verse ; George T. Marsh; Susanna Paine, "Roses and Thorns," "With- ered leaves," "Wait and See"; Fanny Purdy Palmer ; Henry Robinson Palmer, "The Country by the Sea"; Samuel W. Peckham, "Verses in Various Moods and on Various Occasions"; . Nora Perry, "After the Ball and Other Poems," "Her Lover's Friend and Other Poems," "Lyrics and Legends," "New Songs and Ballads," "My Nannie O"; Henry Niles Pierce, "The Agnostic and Other Poems"; Dr. W. H. Peters, "My Rhode Island," a patriotic song ; Myron T. Pritchard, "Poetry of Niagara"; Albert Gallatin Remington ; W. C. Richards, hymns, "The Lord is My Shepherd"; Grace Slocum and Grace M. Sherwood, occasional verse; William Adams Slade, "Star Dust" and other sonnets and poems ; Charlotte Perkins Stetson, "Ballads of the Summer Sun," "In This Old World," "On the Pawtuxet"; Reverend John Sullivan, "Lincoln Woods"; Marianna Tallman; Joseph A. Thomas; Constance Witherby, "Sunshine and Star Dust"; Lillie Buffum Wyman, "Syringa at the Gates," "Interlude and Other Poems"; Alice Waterman ; Sarah Helen Power Whitman ; Ann Williams, "Poems of Every Day Life"; Catherine R. Williams. John R. Rathom found little time in his busy life to write poetry, yet his "Unknown Soldier" will endure as one of the finest tributes in verse. John Hay wrote the greatest of Commencement poems while a student at Brown University. Hezekiah Butterworth, whose name is associated more with the "Youth's Companion" as editor when it was the leading American periodical for juvenile readers than with his native town of Warren, found inspira- tion for several of his finest poems in the Rhode Island which he knew so well in boyhood. Edgar Allen Poe might have become a Rhode Island writer had his suit for the hand of Sarah Helen Power been successful. Julia Ward Howe did not write the "Battle Hymn of the Repub- lic" in Rhode Island, but she lived on the Island of Rhode Island after the death of her famous husband, Samuel Gridley Howe, and published her later poems in "From Sunset Ridge" and "Later Lyrics," besides original poems and verses which she set to music.

JUVENILES-Of writers for children and juvenile readers Rhode Island claims Mary Hunter Austin, "The Basket Woman"; Margaret Emerson Bailey, "Robin Hood's Band"; Mary Elizabeth Bannicle, "Mr. Hermit Crab"; Hortense A. Boynton, "Dove Colored Twins"; Ethel Crowningshield, "Mother Goose Songs for Little Ones"; William Henry Frost, "Wagner Story Book," "Court of King Arthur," "Knights of the Round Table"; Anna Ward Power, "The Sleeping Beauty," "Cinderella"; Eleanor W. Talbot, "Jack O'Lantern." "The Moth Town Goslins"; M. Eloise Talbot, "The Story of the Little Christmas Tree"; Helen Sherman Griffith, the ten "Letty" books, the four "Virginia" books, two "Louie Maude" books, "Aboard the May Ann," "Her Father's Legacy," "Her Wilful Way," "The Lane," "Her Books," "The Roly Poly Family," "Rosemary for Remembrance," the titles including an occasional novel and

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thirty plays for amateurs. "The Adventures of Miltiades Peterkin Paul," a very great traveler, although he was small, were written by Charles Remington Talbot, an Episcopal clergyman, who concealed his identity under the pseudonym "John Brownjohn." Miltiades Peterkin Paul caught Santa Claus at work. The travels of "Marjorie Dean," familiar in another generation, were written by a daughter of Rhode Island.

TRAVEL TALES-Jessie Barker Gardner wrote "From Land's End to John O'Groat's"; Lester George Hornby, "Balkan Sketches," which he illustrated with original etchings; Fred- erick Hoppin Howland, "The Chase of DeWet," as a war correspondent in the Boer War; Jesse Metcalf, "Wandering Among Forgotten Isles"; James Irving Manatt, sketches of pictur- esque places in Greece while on a tour of Homeric lands ; Marianna Tallman, "Pleasant Places in Rhode Island and How to Reach Them"; Annie S. Peck, "Industrial and Commercial South America."

SHORT STORIES-Mrs. Stebbins, daughter of Gilbert Stuart, was one of the earliest Amer- ican writers of folklore and short stories, her books including "Tales of the Emerald Isle," "Tales of The Fireside," and "Stories for Children." Avis Howland of Newport wrote "Tales of Rhode Island." Other short story writers are : Mrs. Mary Hunter Austin, "Lost Borders"; Virginia Baker, "Prince Carrotte" and several other tales, including stories of old Warren; H. W. Chaplin, "Five Hundred Dollars and Other Stories"; William Henry Frost, "Fairies and Folklore of Ireland"; Henrietta R. Palmer, "In Dixie Land," "Rhode Island Tales"; Harriet F. Thomas, "Three Stories of the Old Mill," "Along the Shore Stories," "Old Houses with Stories."

Anne Crosby Emery Allinson's stories of Roman life include "Children of the Way," "Juventus Christi," "Credo," "Roads from Rome," "Friends with Life"; with Francis G. All- inson she collaborated in writing "Greek Lands and Letters." Julia Ward Howe's facile pen was busy throughout her life time. Besides poetry she wrote, while living in Rhode Island, "Is Society Polite and Other Essays," a memoir of Margaret Fuller, a sketch of "Maria Mitchell" for "Our Famous Women," and "Reminiscences." Maud Howe Elliott is a prominent figure in the cultural life of Newport, in art and letters. Her books include "Lord Byron's Helmet," "Roma Beata," "Sicily in Shadow and in Sun," "Some Recollections of Newport Artists," "Sun and Shadow in Spain," "Three Generations," "A Newport Aquarelle," "The San Rosario Ranche," "Atalanta in the South," "Mammon," "Phylida," "Louise Bridgeman," "The Eleventh Hour in the Life of Julia Ward Howe," "Life and Letters of Julia Ward Howe." Maude Howe Elliott was awarded the Pulitzer prize for the best American biography teaching patriotism.

ESSAYS -- Rhode Island essayists include Leonard Bacon, "Ph. D.'s: Male and Female Created He Them"; Margaret Emerson Bailey, essays on gardens at Tiverton; Henry R. Barker, who wrote frequently on the civic, aesthetic and physical improvement of municipality and countryside, the Metropolitan park system being one of his dearest projects ; Henry Wal- cott Boynton, "Life of Washington Irving," "Golfer's Rubaiyat," "Bret Harte," "Reader's His- tory of American Literature," "Journalism and Literature," "World's Leading Poets," besides "Guenever-A Romantic Play"; William Ellery Channing, "Intellectual Force" and "Experi- ence and Observation"; Mrs. Theodora DeWolf Colt, "Stray Fancies"; Samuel Foster Damon, "William Blake-His Philosophy," and other essays ; Sarah J. Eddy, "Alexander and Anne," "Other Cats"; Harry Lyman Koopman, a long list of essays on books and printing ; Margaret B. Stillwell, also on books and printing, besides her "General Rush Hawkins as he revealed Himself to His Librarian"; Lawrence Counselman Wroth, "Parson Weems, a Biographical and Critical Survey," "Description of Federal Documents," "History of Printing in Colonial Mary- land," "William Parks, Printer and Journalist of England and Colonial America," "Abel Bitell of Connecticut, Silversmith, Typefounder and Engraver," "Thomas Cresap, a Maryland Pio-

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neer"; Lillie Buffum Chace Wyman, "American Chivalry." Mrs. Elizabeth Buffum Chace wrote "Moral Lessons Incidentally," and "Anti-Slavery Reminiscences"; Lillie Buffum Chace Wyman, a biography of Mrs. Chace. John R. Rathom created a new character in Rhode Island literature, Colonel Linkaby Didd, and Bishop Thomas M. Clarke found time to write the adventures of "John Whopper," a newsboy.

Miscellaneous literature by Rhode Islanders includes "Prue and I" and "A Rhyme of Rhode Island and the Times," by George William Curtis, who went from the State to become editor of Putnam's and Harper's Magazines, and "Harper's Weekly"; "History of Women's Rights and Movements," by Paulina Wright Davis; "Adventures of a Sub-Deb," by Sara M. Algeo; "Memoirs of a Negress," by Eleanor Eldredge ; "Facing Life" and "Moral Factors in Education," by W. H. P. Faunce ; "Just Between Us Girls," by Lloyd Mayer; "Fifty Years in Exile," by Israel R. Potter, which was made the basis for a tale by Herman Melville; "Silver- smiths of Little Rest," by William Dorr Miller ; "Letters of a French Soldier to His Mother," by Henrietta R. Palmer; "The Gardners of Rhode Island," by Mrs. C. Elizabeth Rodman Robinson ; "A Grand Army Man of Rhode Island," by Lillie Buffum Wyman; "Wild Birds in City Parks," by Herbert Eugene and Alice Hall Walter. Alfred M. Williams, while in Ireland, became familiar with Irish literature; editor of the Providence "Journal," he had much to do with the Irish literary revival by the encouragement which he gave to Irish writers by inviting them to contribute to the columns of the newspaper, and published "Poets and Poetry of Ire- land." Professor Horace Reynolds has written a monogram on the Irish literary revival, the first publication of the Study Hill Book Club, the latter so named for William Blackstone's home in Lonsdale.

PLAYS-One of America's most successful playwrights and producers, George M. Cohan, author of fifty plays, has been almost as proud of being a native son of Rhode Island as Rhode Island has become proud of him and his achievements. Other Rhode Island playwrights include Stephen Sheldon Colvin and Albert Ellsworth Thomas, "Priscilla, a Maid of Brown"; Helen Sherman Griffith, "Her Service Flag," "An Alarm of Fire," "The Scarlet Bonnet"; Thatcher Howland Guild, "A New Drama," "Power of God" and other one-act plays ; Frederick P. Ladd, "The Woman Pays," "Last of the Puritans"; Albert Ellsworth Thomas, besides his "Cynthia's Rebellion," "Her Husband's Wife," "The Rainbow," "Little Boy Blue," and a long list of plays in which he has been a collaborator ; Frederick William Arnold, who writes a play annually for the University Club; Lillian Foster Barrett, "The Sinister Revel," "Gibbeted Gods," and in collaboration with her brother, Richmond Brooks Barrett, "The Hobby House," "The Fledg- ling," "Birds of Passage"; Richmond Brooks Barrett, "Rapture," and "The Enemy's Gates"; Arthur A. Penn, comic operas "Yokohama Maid," "Your Royal Highness," "Captain Cross- bones," "Mam'zelle Taps," "The China Shop," and the songs, "Carissima," "Smiling Through," "Sunrise and You," "The Lamplit Hour," "When the Sun Goes Down," "Across the River"; Brayton Eddy, "Strangeways," "Shallow Wells," "The Way Out," the skits "The Pick-up" and "A Couple of Brokes," a book of children's stories "Night Caps," a novel "Rock Bottom," besides "Plenty Palaver," "Personality of Insects" and "Personality of Water Animals"; Rev- erend Clarence M. Gallup, "Conscience-Freedom," "The High Calling," "From Tarsus to Rome," besides poems and essays. The line of playwrights is not easy to follow, since so many depart for New York, as a theatrical centre offering larger opportunity. The same is true gen- erally of novelists.

NOVELS-Rhode Island writers of novels have been identified as follows : M. V. Anderson, "The Merchant's Wife"; Walter S. Ball, "Carmella Commands," a prize novel ; Charles Brack- ett, "The Counsel of the Ungodly," "Week End," "That Last Infirmity"; Sarah Warner Brooks, "Blanche : The Legend of the Angel Tower"; Garrett D. Byrnes and James S. Hart, "Scoop"; Robert J. Casey, "Cannoneers Have Hairy Ears," a diary of the front lines, "Four

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Faces of Siva : The Detective Story of a Vanished Race," "The Gentleman in Armor," "The Land of Haunted Castles," "Lost Kingdom of Burgundy"; Joseph P. Choquet, "Under Cana- dian Skies"; James Lippitt Clark, "Trails of the Hunted"; Mrs. Lucy Bonetti Cobelles, whose pen name is Lucille Corbey, "Sadie, a Thief's Daughter," "Joan, the False Friend," "Dangers of Beauty," "The Adventurers," "Count Vurenski"; Edward Fuller, "The Complaining Mil- lions of Men"; May Emery Hall, "The Beckoning Glory," besides "Whiteford's Masterpiece," a short story, and a popular biography of Roger Williams ; George T. Marsh, tales of the Hud- son Bay country, "Flash, the Lead Dog," "Heart of the King Dog," "Men Marooned," "Toilers of the Trail," "The Valley of Voices," "Under Frozen Stars," "The Whelp of the Wolf," "Sled Trails and White Waters"; Edith Warren Mason ( Mrs. Pfizenmayer), "The Treasure Hunt"; Mary E. Pratt, "Rhoda Thornton's Girlhood"; Edith Ballinger Price, "Blue Magic," "Us and the Bottle Man," "Silver Shoal Light," "The Happy Venture," "The Fortunes of the Indies." "Garth, Able Seaman," "My Lady Lee," "John and Suzanne," "Gervais of the Gar- den," "Ship of Dreams," "The Four Winds," "A Citizen of Nowhere," "The Luck of Glen- lorn," the list including poetry as well as fiction; Grace S. Richmond, "The Indifference of Juliet," "The Second Violin," "With Juliet in England," "Around the Corner in Gay Street," "On Christmas Day in the Morning," "On Christmas Day in the Evening," "A Court of Inquiry," "Red Pepper Burns," "The Enlisting Wife," "Red and Black," "Rufus." "Cherry Square," "Strawberry Acres," "Mrs. Red Pepper," "The Twenty-fourth of June," "Under the Country Sky," "Under the Christmas Stars," "Brotherly House," "Red Pepper's Patients," "The Whistling Mother," "The Brown Study," "Four Square," "Red of the Redfields," "Lights Up"; S. G. A. Rogers, "Sombre Flame"; Mary H. Wilbur, "Violet : A True Story." "Phillippa" was written anonymously by a Rhode Island woman. Oliver La Farge, descendant of the Rhode Island Perry family and maintaining residence at Saunderstown, although an extensive traveler, wrote "Laughing Boy," a novel which won the Pulitzer prize, was selected by the Literary Guild, and ranked among the ten best sellers in 1930. "Death in the Mail," by Martin C. Day, was based on the murder of Mrs. J. B. Barnaby and the trial of Dr. Graves. Other fiction partly historical or biographical, written by Rhode Islanders, includes "Candlelight in Colonial Times," and "The Dubertus Caught," by F. C. Clark; "The Star of La Rochelle," the wife of Gabriel Bernon, by Elizabeth Nichols White; "Gertrude of Denmark," by Lillie Buffum Wyman; "Genevieve of Babrant" by Mrs. Charles Tillinghast. George Spink wrote "Good Night, Pleasant Dreams, God Bless You !"

LIBRARIES-Inventories of estates in probate reveal the names of a few of the books brought into the wilderness by the early settlers of Rhode Island, usually religious works or practical treatises on husbandry, medicine or law. As economic conditions improved, private collections of books increased in number and size, and included history and literature, poetry and prose, the latter principally. What was probably the first public library in the colony con- sisted of ninety-nine books on theology, fifty-seven for preachers and forty-two for laymen, at Trinity Church in Newport in 1700. Reverend John Lockyer sent six additional religious books in 1701 "to augment the library at Rhode Island in America." This was a parish library, the word "public" being used to indicate that it was a collection for general use by a society, as dis- tinguished from a private library for family use in a home. The word "public" continued to have essentially similar connotation when used with the word library until the General Assembly began to promote free public libraries for use by all the people. In modern usage "Public library" means "free public library," as distinguished from libraries charging fees for loans to the general public, or libraries supported by the annual contributions of shareholders, to whom their patronage is limited.

REDWOOD LIBRARY-Than the Trinity Church library a more pretentious undertaking, from which developed the Redwood Library of Newport, oldest among existing society libraries

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in Rhode Island, began with the Philosophical Society founded by Dean Berkeley for "the pro- motion of knowledge and virtue." From an active debating and discussion club the organization was transformed gradually, after the departure of Berkeley, into a library society, accumulating and maintaining a collection of books for use by its members. The society was incorporated in 1747 as the Redwood Library Company, so named in honor of Abraham Redwood, who had donated £500 for the purchase of books. The charter reads in part as follows : "Whereas Abra- ham Redwood, Esquire, hath generously engaged to bestow £500 sterling, to be laid out in a collection of useful books, suitable for a public library proposed to be erected in Newport . the said Governor and Company do give and grant that the said Abraham Redwood, James Honyman and others be, and are hereby constituted, a body politic incorporate, by the name of the Company of the Redwood Library." Abraham Redwood became the first president of the company. Henry Collins, in 1748, gave land as a site for a building, and the first unit of the series of buildings fronting on Bellevue Avenue was constructed in 1749. Peter Harrison, the English architect who had accompanied Berkeley on his visit to Newport a generation earlier, designed the stone Doric temple in which the Redwood Library was first housed in per- manent quarters. Of the 1300 volumes purchased with the Redwood donation more than half were theological. The library suffered from spoliation, depredation and theft while the British army occupied Newport. The building became a clubroom for soldiers, and half the books were gone when Tories persuaded General Prescott to place a military guard over the remaining vol- umes. Both Kings George IV and William IV, in later years, made donations to repair part of the damage done by the British during the war. The building itself was so substantial that it withstood abuse, and the General Assembly met there in September, 1780, when the State House and other buildings, including churches, had been left by the British unfit for occupation. Newport itself was prostrated, its wharves idle, its shops closed, its population reduced by thousands. its trade dissipated, its wealth replaced by poverty, its culture and luxury laid aside as the inhabitants faced the difficult problem of earning a scanty living. The Redwood Library was closed and remained closed after the war. Even the key was lost for a time, while disuse of building and books continued. Abraham Redwood lived until 1788, but nothing was done until 1790, when the General Assembly revived the charter of incorporation to remedy the suggestion of lapse through failure to maintain succession by the election of members of the society. The Assembly also granted a franchise for a lottery to raise $3000 for the library in 1806 .. Solomon Southwick, son of the Newport printer and publisher, gave 120 acres of land in New York in 1813 as a memorial to Henry Collins, who had given Redwood Library the site for its original building. The older Solomon Southwick had been a protege of Henry Collins, who sent him to an academy in Philadelphia to be educated, and assisted him to establish a business in Newport. Solomon Southwick died December 23, 1797, two years after selling his interest in the Newport "Mercury," which he had printed and published from 1768. Other benefactors were Abraham Redwood of London, grandson of Abraham Redwood, for whom the library had been named, who in 1834 gave the Redwood homestead in Newport, his by inheritance ; Baron Hollinguer of Paris, who in 1837 donated 1000 francs ; Christopher G. Champlin, who gave books and $100 in 1844 ; and Judah Touro of New Orleans, who donated $1000 in 1844 and left the library a legacy of $3000 in 1854. The Touro legacy ended a long period in which the library, open only twice a week from 1812 to 1855, had been little patronized. The librarian once complained that he and General Winfield Scott were the only persons who used the library. A new board of directors was elected in 1858, $10,000 was raised, and the library was opened daily. New con- struction was undertaken in 1876 to meet growing needs, and in 1913 a fireproof stack room was added. The collection in 1930 of this two-century-old library amounts to 78,000 volumes, besides pictures and other works of art in its galleries and museum. Dr. Roderic Terry, libra- rian for the past nearly twenty years, has been a benefactor as well as an active promoter of the interests of Redwood Library.

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PROVIDENCE LIBRARY-A library society was organized in Providence December 15, 1753, after a canvass for subscribers beginning in March. The books were purchased in England, and the society, on request, was granted permission to keep its collection in one of the rooms of the Colony House, where they were accessible to members of the General Assembly as well as the shareholders. The subscribers included Stephen Hopkins, Nicholas Brown, Joseph Angell and others of the group of men who were active at the time in promoting community projects- many of them identified later with the founding of Rhode Island College and the effort in the second half of the eighteenth century to establish a free public school system. Except seventy books, which were out as loans to members of the society, the library was destroyed in the fire which razed the Colony House in 1758. The General Assembly granted a lottery to replace the library, and the new collection was housed in the new Colony House, which became the State House on May 4, 1776, when independence was declared. There the library remained until 1816, when the society found new quarters for it. The library catalogue of 1768 listed sets of Shakespeare, Milton, Bacon, Pope, Swift, and Addison ; Clarendon, Hume and Burnet, of Eng- lish historians ; Herrera, La Hontan, and Prince's "New England Chronology"; Homer, Thu- cydides, Plato, Xenophon, Plutarch, Sallust and Tacitus, of Greek and Roman classical writers ; works on jurisprudence by Coke, Grote, Puffendorf and Vattel; scientific books, including Baker's "Microscope," Newton's "Principia," Franklin's "Electricity," Woodward's "Fossils," and Boerhave's "Chemistry." The collection was catholic and scholarly; perhaps it demon- strated the wholesome effect of a century and a quarter of toleration and soul liberty in reliev- ing active minds from the obsession of religious controversy. The use of the library was offered to the faculty and students of Rhode Island College in 1770. The library society obtained a charter in 1798 under the name of Providence Library Company, new shares were issued and new books were added, but the library's popularity suffered because of inconvenient location. John Howland attributed "losses" of books to the fact that "the doors being left open to accom- modate the members of the Legislature, other persons, in the absence of the librarian, had access to the books." Removal from the State House in 1816 was incident to a consolidation. in the course of which the Providence Library absorbed or was absorbed by a new organization. The record indicates that the Providence Library acquired "a very respectable literary estab- lishment which had been purchased by a number of gentlemen," and these gentlemen were "admitted as proprietors on their transferring the same to the corporation." The Providence Library lacked in 1809 and again in 1830 the initiative to construct a building on sites tendered for the purpose, and in 1836 was united with the Providence Athenaeum. The latter had on its shelves in 1930 a few of the books included in the Providence Library of 1754, some of the seventy which escaped the fire of 1758.

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Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. II, Part 77

Author: Carroll, Charles, author Publication date: 1932 Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 716

Author: Carroll, Charles, author
Publication date: 1932
Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 716