Rhode Island

Westminster Street, Providence, RI

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Looking southwest on Westminster Street from the bridge over the Providence River, in 1865. Image courtesy of the New York Public Library.

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The scene in 2016:

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One of the main commercial streets in downtown Providence is Westminster Street, which begins here at the College Street Bridge and continues southwest through downtown Providence and toward the Federal Hill neighborhood. When the first photo was taken, this area consisted primarily of low-rise brick commercial buildings, some of which dated as far back as the early 19th century. The oldest was probably the Union Bank Building on the left, which dated back to 1816. Just to the right of it is Merchants Bank Building, completed in 1857, and on the other side of Westminster Street is part of the large Washington Building, which was built in 1843. Also partially visible in this scene is the 1857 Customhouse, whose dome can be seen in the distance on the far left.

Today, this streetscape has completely changed. Only the Merchants Bank Building remains, now seeming oddly out of place. It has actually gained an additional floor in the intervening years, but despite this it is still completely dwarfed by modern skyscrapers, being literally overshadowed by its neighbor to the left. The Union Bank Building is long gone, as is the Washington Building, which died a slow death in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was partially demolished around 1889 to build a Romanesque building for the Rhode Island Hospital Trust Company. Both this new structure and the remainders of the old one were demolished by 1919, when a new, much larger building was completed for the company on the same site. This building is still standing, dominating the right side of the 2016 photo, but it is now owned by the Rhode Island School of Design as part of their campus. The only other survivor from the first photo is the Customhouse building. It is hidden behind modern buildings, but is still standing on Weybosset Street and is in use as a courthouse.

Rhode Island Normal School, Providence, RI

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The Rhode Island Normal School, seen from Francis Street in Providence, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

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The scene in 2016:

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The building in the first photo was once the home of the Rhode Island Normal School, a teacher preparatory college that has since become Rhode Island College. The school was established in 1854, and was housed in several different buildings in the city until 1898, when the building in the first photo opened. Here, it enjoyed a prominent location just south of the Rhode Island State House, with a large lawn on the Francis Street side of the building.

During its time here, the school steadily grew. In 1920, it became the Rhode Island College of Education, offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees for the first time. By the 1950s, though, there were talks of merging the school into the University of Rhode Island. However, the school remained independent, and in 1958 they moved to a new campus in the outskirts of the city. A year later, with the school expanding beyond just education degrees, the name was changed to simply Rhode Island College.

After the college moved to its current campus, the old 1898 building remained here in downtown Providence for many more years. It was finally demolished in the late 1990s to build Providence Place, the large shopping mall that stands on the site today. I don’t known whether it was deliberate or not, but the Nordstrom section of the building appears to pay homage to the design of the old Normal School, with its yellow brick exterior and the similar-looking cornice with dentils at the top of the building.

Rhode Island State House, Providence, RI

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The south side of the Rhode Island State House in Providence, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

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The scene in 2016:

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Rhode Island is known for having the smallest land area of any US state, but despite its diminutive size, it had an unusual state capital arrangement for many years, with the legislature alternating sessions between the five county courthouses, effectively giving the state five capital cities. While much larger states managed to make do with just one capital city, this practice continued until 1854, when the rotation was reduced to just two, Providence and Newport. Having joint capitals was not unique to Rhode Island – neighboring Connecticut did the same for many years – but Rhode Island continued the practice until 1900.

At this point, when the legislature was in Providence, they were still meeting in the small colonial-era courthouse on Benefit Street. It hardly compared to the far grander capitol buildings other New England states such as Connecticut and Massachusetts, so in 1895 construction began on the present-day Rhode Island State House. It was built on Smith Hill, a hill that overlooks downtown Providence on the other side of the Woonasquatucket River. Its architecture resembles the US Capitol Building, with wings on either side for the two legislative houses and a large rotunda in the center, and it was designed by the prominent firm of McKim, Mead and White in their distinctive Classical Revival style.

The Rhode Island legislature began meeting in the new building in 1901, although it was not completed until 1904, after nearly a decade of construction. Today, the area around the State House has seen some dramatic changes. Interstate 95 now passes just west of here, and just to the east is the Northeast Corridor, the busiest passenger rail line in the country. To the southwest is Providence Place, a large shopping mall with adjacent parking garages. However, here on the State House grounds, very little has changed. The grounds retain a park-like atmosphere, and the historic building itself is still the seat of Rhode Island’s state government.