Newport Historical Society

Current Exhibits

Hold Fast: Newport’s Enduring Bond with the Sea
At the Newport County Visitor’s Center (Gateway)
23 America’s Cup Avenue, Newport, Daily
This exhibit offers visitors to this City a reminder that Newport’s story begins before the American Revolution and continues  to develop today.  A glimpse of how the sea has been integral to our history is combined with suggestions of “Where to Go From Here.” Exhibit created with the support of the Alletta Morris McBean Foundation.

  

Handwritten History: Correspondence of Great Americans from the Collections of the NHS
Available to borrow; please call 401-846-0813
An exhibit of large-scale facsimilies of significant documents written or signed by Presidents and signers of the Declaration of Independence. This exhibit underwritten by BankNewport.
 

Cases and Types: The Lives and Works of Printers in Early Newport.
At the Colony House through Winterfest.
The history of the James Franklin Press — housed at the Museum & Shop at Brick Market — features large-scale facsimiles of a diverse range of documents that were printed on the press. Documents include early newspapers, including two of the oldest papers in the country, Newport Mercury and Rhode Island Gazette, almanacs from the 1750s to the early 19th century, broadsides, discourses and sermons, advertisements, pamphlets and other official documents printed for the colony of Rhode Island.

  

 

 

Their Manners Pleasing, and Their Education Complete: Newport Samplers 1728-1835 
Seventh Day Baptist Meeting through Winterfest, 2012.
This selection of 18th and early 19th century local samplers, from the Newport Historical Society’s collections, reflects the evolution of Newport needlework over the course of a century and includes examples of the different types of samplers that a girl might produce during her lifetime.

You can also see paintings from the Collections at the Newport Historical Society at the Newport Art Museum, 76 Bellevue Ave. Griswold House staircase

Past Exhibits

The Many Faces of George Washington
 Colony House, Washington Square, every day June 25 – July 9 from 1pm – 4 pm. $6.
July 4^th free from 10-4.

The exhibit is an examination of our Nation’s first president as a military and political leader but also as an intriguing and accomplished man. Washington visited the Colony House several times as Commander of the Continental Army and as President.

The Many Faces of George Washington is a traveling exhibit produced by the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association in conjunction with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and generously supported by the F. M. Kirby Foundation.

 

 

Set for the Holidays

Museum and Shop at Brick Market

December, daily, 10-5

On display for the holiday season at the Newport Historical Society’s Museum & Shop at Brick Market is an elegant table setting in a recreated corner of an 18th century merchant’s parlor.

The large and beautiful dining table was made in Newport for the Marchant family. Henry Marchant was a lawyer and farmer who practiced law in Newport and farmed in South County. He was State Attorney General of Rhode Island in the 1770s, a delegate to the Continental Congress, a delegate to the Rhode Island General Assembly after the war, and was the first judge of the US District Court for Rhode Island. Marchant’s son, William, practiced law in Providence, and this table stood in his office there. It was passed down from father to son until 2010, when it was donated to the Newport Historical Society by Jane Cole.

The table was recently added to the Society’s museum. Laid out on the table is the dessert course of a period holiday meal, featuring items such as Chinese export porcelain and Newport-made pewter from the 18th century.