A four-legged visitor will be the honored guest at this year’s Cider Social celebration at the Little Compton Historical Society on Monday, October 9 (Columbus Day) from 1 to 4 pm. For the fourth year the Society has expanded its annual Cider Social to include local vendors, a Cow Pie Bingo Fundraising event, and a booth selling vintage and antique items donated by the community.

The Little Compton Historical Society is proud to partner with Preserve Rhode Island and Ferguson & D’Arruda Antiques to present the Little Compton Antiques Festival on the grounds of the Wilbor House Museum and to host, for the first time, a Classic Car Show featuring approximately 30 vehicles.

Antiques Festival Preview Party – Fri., Aug. 4 from 6 to 8 pm.

Antiques Festival & Classic Car Show – Sat. Aug. 5 from 9 to 4.

Proceeds from the festival will benefit both the Little Compton Historical Society and Preserve Rhode Island.

The Antiques Festival kicks off with a Preview Party on Friday evening featuring a sunset supper, complimentary beverage, live music and early buying privileges. Admission to Saturday festival included with Preview Party ticket.

For more information, visit http://www.preserveri.org/little-compton-antiques-festival

Antique or vintage donations for the sale are welcome anytime before the event.

The Samuel Church Estate
Adamsville
Thursday, July 27
6:30-8:30 p.m.

 
Gather with friends old and new to tour the Samuel Church mansion
and explore Adamsville’s famous Spite Tower. Our hosts Kristin and
Adam Silveira have been working for months to renovate and restore
these important historic buildings in preparation for a new chapter
in their history as vacation rental properties. All proceeds from this
community event benefit the Little Compton Historical Society.
$30 per person — Enjoy two complimentary drinks and a picnic supper on the lawn.
Call 401-635-4035 for tickets or click here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/spite-tower-social-tickets-36039465010

Reservations required by July 25.

NASHVILLE, TN—July 2017—The American Association for State and Local History (AASLH) proudly announces that the Little Compton Historical Society is the recipient of an Award of Merit for its recent project entitled “If Jane Should Want to Be Sold: Stories of Enslavement, Indenture and Freedom in Little Compton, Rhode Island.” The AASLH Leadership in History Awards, now in its 72nd year, is the most prestigious recognition for achievement in the preservation and interpretation of state and local history.

“If Jane Should Want to be Sold” is a multi-faceted local history project that restored the true stories of over 200 enslaved people of African and Native American descent to the history of Little Compton. It also explored the lives of fifty people of all races, mostly children, forcibly indentured by the town of Little Compton in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as well as the stories of free people of color who lived and worked in the community from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries. The project corresponded with the 200^th anniversary of the end of slavery in Little Compton when the town’s last enslaved person, Kate Hilliard, received her freedom in her owner’s will in 1816. The Historical Society conducted three years of primary source research in archives throughout Rhode Island and Massachusetts in order to produce a book and a special exhibition, both entitled “If Jane Should Want to be Sold.” The project also included a variety of public programs connecting the local history of slavery with contemporary issues of racism and human trafficking. The exhibition is now on display at the John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities at Brown University and is free and open to the public. The book is available at the Little Compton Historical Society and local retailers, the Brown University Library, and amazon.com. In the fall, the historic data collected throughout the project will be available to the public via a database produced in partnership with the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and George Mason University.

This year, AASLH is proud to confer forty-eight national awards honoring people, projects, exhibits, and publications. The winners represent the best in the field and provide leadership for the future of state and local history. Presentation of the awards will be made at a special banquet during the 2017 AASLH Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas, on Friday, September 8. The banquet is supported by a generous contribution from the History Channel.

The AASLH awards program was initiated in 1945 to establish and encourage standards of excellence in the collection, preservation, and interpretation of state and local history throughout the United States. The AASLH Leadership in History Awards not only honor significant achievement in the field of state and local history, but also bring public recognition of the opportunities for small and large organizations, institutions, and programs to make contributions in this arena. For more information about the Leadership in History Awards, contact AASLH at 615-320-3203, or go to http://www.aaslh.org.

The American Association for State and Local History is a not-for-profit professional organization of individuals and institutions working to preserve and promote history. From its headquarters in Nashville, Tennessee, AASLH provides leadership, service, and support for its members who preserve and interpret state and local history in order to make the past more meaningful in American society. AASLH publishes books, technical publications, a quarterly magazine, a monthly newsletter, and maintains numerous affinity groups and committees serving a broad range of constituents across the historical community. The association also sponsors regional and national training workshops and an annual meeting.

Exhibit Preview Party          Friday, June 30           6-8 pm

Family Day Celebration       Saturday, July 1         1-4 pm

We Need Your Help!

Almost 30 volunteers have been working for months researching the lives and work of Little Compton’s 20th-century artists. Thanks to your suggestions, we’ve complied a list of over 30 professional artists and talented Sunday Painters  to be included in this season’s special exhibition. Though we can only display a few pieces from each artist, we are creating an archive for each participant and would like to have digital images of as many pieces of their work as possible. If you own a piece by one of these artists, please send a photograph of it to lchistory@littlecompton.org and please indicate whether or not it is available for loan this season.

The Exhibit Committee is making decisions on which pieces will hang in the exhibit throughout April.

We are especially in need of artwork by C. Gordon Harris, Lloyd Goodrich, Edwin Blashfield, Eric Denard, Gus Kelley, Hazard Durfee and Tom Sullivan, but photos of artwork from any of the artists will help improve our archival collection.

Artists must have a strong connection to Little Compton, must have done a significant body of work in the 20th century, and must be deceased.

The painting above is by David Aldrich and is in a private collection.

List of Artists

David Aldrich

Doris Beattie

Edwin Blashfield

Jane Carrott Boardman

Deborah Bodington

Sydney Burleigh

Bryson Burroughs

Eleanor “Nunnie” Atwater Byers

Eric Denard

Hazard Durfee

Bill Ferguson –

Jennie Furbish

Lloyd Goodrich

C. Gordon Harris

Hope Hudner

Blackmer Humphrey

Ann Jewell

Augusta Kelley

Gus Kelley

Richard Kinnicutt

Molly Luce

Fred Dana Marsh

Reginald Marsh

Virginia Moore

Audrey Buller Parsons

Lloyd Parsons

Mary E. Post

Katherine Schmidt Shubert

Elsie Straight

Tom Sullivan

Brooks Wall

Lois Wilcox

Susan Wise Walker

Betts Burroughs Woodhouse