Delaware
Delaware is one of the 50 states of the United States, in the South-Atlantic or Southern region. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, north by Pennsylvania, east by New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean; the state takes its name from Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr, an English nobleman and Virginia's first colonial governor. Delaware occupies the northeastern portion of the Delmarva Peninsula. It's the sixth most densely populated. Delaware's largest city is Wilmington; the state is divided into the lowest number of any state. From north to south, they are New Castle County, Kent County, Sussex County. While the southern two counties have been predominantly agricultural, New Castle County is more industrialized. Before its coastline was explored by Europeans in the 16th century, Delaware was inhabited by several groups of Native Americans, including the Lenape in the north and Nanticoke in the south, it was colonized by Dutch traders at Zwaanendael, near the present town of Lewes, in 1631.
Delaware was one of the 13 colonies participating in the American Revolution. On December 7, 1787, Delaware became the first state to ratify the Constitution of the United States, has since been known as "The First State"; the state was named after the Delaware River, which in turn derived its name from Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr, the ruling governor of the Colony of Virginia at the time Europeans first explored the river. The Delaware Indians, a name used by Europeans for Lenape people indigenous to the Delaware Valley derive their name from the same source; the surname de La Warr is of Anglo-Norman origin. It came from a Norman lieu-dit La Guerre; this toponymic could derive from the Latin word ager, from the Breton gwern or from the Late Latin varectum. The toponyms Gara, Gaire appear in old texts cited by Lucien Musset, where the word gara means gore, it could be linked with a patronymic from the Old Norse verr. Delaware is 96 miles long and ranges from 9 miles to 35 miles across, totaling 1,954 square miles, making it the second-smallest state in the United States after Rhode Island.
Delaware is bounded to the north by Pennsylvania. Small portions of Delaware are situated on the eastern side of the Delaware River sharing land boundaries with New Jersey; the state of Delaware, together with the Eastern Shore counties of Maryland and two counties of Virginia, form the Delmarva Peninsula, which stretches down the Mid-Atlantic Coast. The definition of the northern boundary of the state is unusual. Most of the boundary between Delaware and Pennsylvania was defined by an arc extending 12 miles from the cupola of the courthouse in the city of New Castle; this boundary is referred to as the Twelve-Mile Circle. Although the Twelve-Mile Circle is claimed to be the only territorial boundary in the United States, a true arc, the Mexican boundary with Texas includes several arcs, many cities in the South have circular boundaries; this border extends all the way east to the low-tide mark on the New Jersey shore continues south along the shoreline until it again reaches the 12-mile arc in the south.
To the west, a portion of the arc extends past the easternmost edge of Maryland. The remaining western border runs east of due south from its intersection with the arc; the Wedge of land between the northwest part of the arc and the Maryland border was claimed by both Delaware and Pennsylvania until 1921, when Delaware's claim was confirmed. Delaware is with the lowest mean elevation of any state in the nation, its highest elevation, located at Ebright Azimuth, near Concord High School, is less than 450 feet above sea level. The northernmost part of the state is part of the Piedmont Plateau with rolling surfaces; the Atlantic Seaboard fall line follows the Robert Kirkwood Highway between Newark and Wilmington. A ridge about 75 to 80 feet in elevation extends along the western boundary of the state and separates the watersheds that feed Delaware River and Bay to the east and the Chesapeake Bay to the west. Since all of Delaware is a part of the Atlantic coastal plain, the effects of the ocean moderate its climate.
The state lies in the humid subtropical climate zone. Despite its small size, there is significant variation in mean temperature and amount of snowfall between Sussex County and New Castle County. Moderated by the Atlantic Ocean and Delaware Bay, the southern portion of the state has a milder climate and a longer growing season than the northern portion of the state. Delaware's all-time record high of 110 °F was recorded at Millsboro on July 21, 1930; the all-time record low of −17 °F was recorded at Millsboro on January 17, 1893. The transitional climate of Delaware supports a wide variety of vegetation. In the northern third of the state are found Northeastern coastal forests and mixed oak forests typical of the northeastern United States. In the southern two-thirds of the state are found Middle Atlantic coastal forests. Trap Pond State Park, along with areas in other parts of Sussex County, for example, support
Franco-American alliance
The Franco-American alliance was the 1778 alliance between the Kingdom of France and the United States during the American Revolutionary War. Formalized in the 1778 Treaty of Alliance, it was a military pact in which the French provided many supplies for the Americans; the Netherlands and Spain joined as allies of France. The French alliance was possible once the Americans captured a British invasion army at Saratoga in October 1777, demonstrating the viability of the American cause; the alliance became controversial after 1793 when Britain and Revolutionary France again went to war and the U. S. declared itself neutral. Relations between France and the United States worsened as the latter became closer to Britain in the Jay Treaty of 1795, leading to an undeclared Quasi War; the alliance was defunct by 1794 and formally ended in 1800. France had been left alarmed by the British success in the Seven Years War which they feared gave the British naval superiority. From 1763 both France, their allies Spain, began to rebuild their navies and prepare for a future war in which they would construct an alliance to overwhelm and invade Britain.
As Britain's troubles with its American colonies intensified during the 1760s and led to open rebellion in 1775, France began to anticipate the American rebels joining such an alliance. In September 1775 the Continental Congress described foreign assistance as "undoubtedly attainable" and began to seek supplies and assistance from European powers hostile to Britain; the French leadership sought the "humiliation of England" and began giving covert aid to the rebels. The American Declaration of Independence was advocated by some as necessary in order to secure European support against Britain. Silas Deane, an American envoy in Paris, proposed a major anti-British alliance and French invasions of Hanover and Portugal which were both British allies; the alliance was promoted in the United States by a Francophile. Based on the Model Treaty of 1776, Jefferson encouraged the role of France as an economic and military partner to the United States, in order to weaken British influence. In 1776, Latouche Tréville transferred ammunition from France to the United States of America.
Numerous French supplies as well as guns of the de Valliere type were used in the American War of Independence the smaller 4-pounder field guns. The guns were shipped from France, the field carriages provided for in the US; these guns played an important role in such battles as the Battle of Saratoga, the Siege of Yorktown. George Washington wrote about the supplies and guns in a letter to General Heath on 2 May 1777: I was this morning favored with yours containing the pleasing accounts of the late arrivals at Portsmouth and Boston; that of the French ships of war, with artillery and other military stores, is most valuable. It is my intent to have all the arms that were not wanted by the Eastern States, to be removed to Springfield, as a much safer place than Portsmouth …. I shall write Congress and press the immediate removal of the artillery, other military stores from Portsmouth. I would have you forward the twenty-five chests of arms arrived from Martinico to Springfield. On 13 June 1777, the Marquis de Lafayette reached America and joined George Washington in the Continental Army as Major General.
He participated to the Battle of Brandywine where he was wounded, served at the Battle of Rhode Island. Lafayette would return to France during the war in order to advocate more support for the American cause; the alliance was formally negotiated by Benjamin Franklin, but it progressed until after news of the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga arrived in France. On February 6, 1778 two treaties were signed; the first, the Franco-American Treaty of Amity and Commerce, recognized the independence of the United States and established commercial relations between them. The alliance gave open support from the French Army and Treasury, spelled that the United States was obligated to guarantee "from the present time and forever, against all other powers the present Possessions of the Crown of France in America", in exchange for a promise not to increase French possessions anymore in America; the combined strength of the Americans and the French guaranteed victory against Great Britain. France supported the American War of Independence, managing to expel the British and obtain recognition of American independence through the intervention of Rochambeau, Lafayette, de Grasse, Suffren.
Naval conflict started in European waters with the First Battle of Ushant in July 1778, continued with the attempted invasion of Britain by the Armada of 1779. In the summer of 1778, French Admiral d'Estaing arrived with a fleet and infantry reinforcements for the war with a fleet of twelve ships of the line and fourteen frigates. After declining to attack Richard Howe's inferior British force outside New York, the French fleet sailed to Rhode Island where they were to take part in an attack on Newport. On 6 July 1779, he fought the Battle of Grenada against Admiral Byron, but failed at the September 1779 Siege of Savannah before returning to France. Actions continued in April 1780 with Guichen against Admiral Rodney in the Battle of Martinique. In 1780, Rochambeau arrived with a fleet and 6,000 French troops to join the Continental army, under George Washington, in the "Expédition Particulière", landing in Newport, Rhode Island, on 10 July. In the Ohio valley, French Americans would combine with
Rhode Island
Rhode Island the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest state in area, the seventh least populous, the second most densely populated, it has the longest official name of any state. Rhode Island is bordered by Connecticut to the west, Massachusetts to the north and east, the Atlantic Ocean to the south via Rhode Island Sound and Block Island Sound, it shares a small maritime border with New York. Providence is most populous city in Rhode Island. On May 4, 1776, the Colony of Rhode Island was the first of the Thirteen Colonies to renounce its allegiance to the British Crown, it was the fourth among the newly independent states to ratify the Articles of Confederation on February 9, 1778; the state boycotted the 1787 convention which drew up the United States Constitution and refused to ratify it. Rhode Island's official nickname is "The Ocean State", a reference to the large bays and inlets that amount to about 14 percent of its total area.
Despite its name, most of Rhode Island is located on the mainland of the United States. Its official name is State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, derived from the merger of four Colonial settlements; the settlements of Newport and Portsmouth were situated on what is called Aquidneck Island today, but it was called Rhode Island in Colonial times. Providence Plantation was the name of the colony founded by Roger Williams in the area now known as the city of Providence; this was adjoined by the settlement of Warwick. It is unclear how the island came to be named Rhode Island, but two historical events may have been of influence: Explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano noted the presence of an island near the mouth of Narragansett Bay in 1524 which he likened to the island of Rhodes. Subsequent European explorers were unable to identify the island that Verrazzano had named, but the Pilgrims who colonized the area assumed that it was this island. Adriaen Block passed by the island during his expeditions in the 1610s, he described it in a 1625 account of his travels as "an island of reddish appearance,", "een rodlich Eylande" in 17th-century Dutch, one popular notion is that this Dutch phrase might have influenced the name Rhode Island.
The earliest documented use of the name "Rhode Island" for Aquidneck was in 1637 by Roger Williams. The name was applied to the island in 1644 with these words: "Aquethneck shall be henceforth called the Isle of Rodes or Rhode-Island." The name "Isle of Rodes" is used in a legal document as late as 1646. Dutch maps as early as 1659 call the island "Red Island". Roger Williams was a theologian, forced out of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, seeking religious and political tolerance, he and others founded Providence Plantation as a free proprietary colony. "Providence" referred to the concept of divine providence, "plantation" was an English term for a colony. "State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations" is the longest official name of any state in the Union. In recent years, the word plantation in the state's name became a contested issue, the Rhode Island General Assembly voted on June 25, 2009 to hold a general referendum determining whether "and Providence Plantations" would be dropped from the official name.
Advocates for excising plantation claimed that the word symbolized an alleged legacy of disenfranchisement for many Rhode Islanders, as well as the proliferation of slavery in the colonies and in the post-colonial United States. Rhode Island abolished slavery in 1652, but the law was not enforced and, by the early 18th century, it was "the epicenter of the North American slave trade", according to the Brown Daily Herald. Advocates for retaining the name argued that plantation was an archaic synonym for colony and bore no relation to slavery; the referendum election was held on November 2, 2010, the people voted overwhelmingly to retain the entire original name. In 1636, Roger Williams was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for his religious views, he settled at the top of Narragansett Bay on land sold or given to him by Narragansett sachem Canonicus, he named the site Providence Plantations, "having a sense of God's merciful providence unto me in my distress", it became a place of religious freedom where all were welcome.
In 1638, Anne Hutchinson, William Coddington, John Clarke, Philip Sherman, other religious dissenters settled on Aquidneck Island, purchased from the local tribes who called it Pocasset. This settlement was governed by the Portsmouth Compact; the southern part of the island became the separate settlement of Newport after disagreements among the founders. Samuel Gorton purchased lands at Shawomet in 1642 from the Narragansetts, precipitating a dispute with the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In 1644, Providence and Newport united for their common independence as the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, governed by an elected council and "president". Gorton received a separate charter for his settlement in 1648 which he named Warwick after his patron. Brown University was founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, it was one of nine Colonial colleges granted charters before the American Revolution, but was the first college in America to accept students regardless of religious affilia
Scituate, Rhode Island
Scituate is a town in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 10,329 at the 2010 census. Scituate was first settled in 1710 by emigrants from Massachusetts; the original spelling of the town's name was "Satuit", a native Indian word meaning "cold brook" or "cold river." The town was a part of Providence until 1731. Scituate's first town meeting was held at the Angell Tavern in South Scituate, with Stephen Hopkins elected as the first moderator and Joseph Brown as clerk. Stephen Hopkins became a governor of Rhode Island and was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, his brother, Esek Hopkins, was Commander in Chief of the Continental Navy beginning in 1776. In 1788 Scituate representative, militia general and Supreme Court Justice William West led an armed anti-federalist mob of farmers into Providence to protest the U. S. Constitution. In 1791 the U. S. Supreme Court decided West v. Barnes, regarding a farm in Scituate. Scituate was once made up of a multitude of small villages, including North Scituate, Ashland, Elmdale, Glenn Rock, Jackson, Ponaganset, Richmond, Rockland and South Scituate.
Foster was incorporated as a separate town in 1781. In 1915, the Rhode Island General Assembly voted to take 14,800 acres of land in Scituate to create a reservoir to supply fresh water to greater Providence; this project resulted in the condemnation of "1,195 buildings, including 375 houses, seven schools, six churches, six mills, thirty dairy farms, eleven ice houses, post offices, an electric railway system, the Providence and Danielson Railway system". The hamlets of Kent, Rockland, South Scituate, Saundersville and parts of North Scituate and Clayville disappeared forever. Scituate has played an important role in many of the United States wars. During the Revolutionary War, 76 cannons were forged at the Hope Furnace in the village of Hope in southern Scituate. During World War II, a Federal Communications Commission Radio Intelligence Division monitoring facility on Darby Road near Chopmist Hill intercepted German HF communications; because of this, in 1946, the Chopmist Hill area was considered as a candidate for the location of the headquarters of the United Nations.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 54.8 square miles, of which, 48.7 square miles of it is land and 6.1 square miles of it is water. One of the most prominent features of the town is the Scituate Reservoir; the large reservoir has forever changed the face of the town. During construction of the reservoir, numerous villages were flooded along the former banks of the Pawtuxet River; some foundations of the old structures are still visible today during times of drought. The reservoir, a large portion of land surrounding, it is owned and maintained by the Providence Water Supply Board; the main Scituate reservoir was formed by the construction of a dam across the Pawtuxet River at the former village of Kent. The dam, principally of earth, is 100 feet high. Water storage in the reservoir began on November 10, 1925. An aqueduct from the dam feeds the nearby treatment plant, placed in operation on September 30, 1926; the Scituate Reservoir is the largest artificial freshwater body of water in the state of Rhode Island.
It has an aggregate capacity of a surface area of 5.3 square miles. It and its six tributary reservoirs—which make up a total surface area of 7.2 sq mi —supply drinking water to more than 60 percent of the state population. The surrounding drainage basin that provides water to the reservoir system covers an area of about 94 sq mi, which includes most of the town of Scituate and parts of Foster, Glocester and Cranston; the Scituate Reservoir is operated by Providence Water Supply Board. The original treatment plant was state-of-the-art at the time of its construction; the plant was considered to be among the most technologically advanced of its day, for many years the filtration system was the only plant of its type in New England. As demand continued to grow, the treatment plant underwent major expansions and renovations in the 1940s and again in the 60s. Today, the plant has a maximum treatment capacity of 144 million US gallons of water per day and still remains the largest treatment facility in New England.
In the 2008 U. S. Presidential election, Scituate was the only town in Rhode Island to vote for John McCain, 51%–47% over Barack Obama, it is the only town in Rhode Island to vote Republican in every presidential election since 2000. As of the census of 2000, there were 10,324 people, 3,780 households, 2,929 families residing in the town; the population density was 212.1 people per square mile. There were 3,904 housing units at an average density of 80.2 per square mile. The racial makeup of the town was 98.13% White, 0.29% African American, 0.07% Native American, 0.58% Asian, 0.03% Pacific Islander, 0.32% from other races, 0.58% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.75% of the population. There were 3,780 households out of which 36.2% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 67.3% were married couples living together, 7.5% had a female householder with no husband present, 22.5% were non-families. 18.5% of all households were made up of individuals and 7.7% had someone living alone, 65 years of age or older.
The average household size was 2.72 and the average f
White Plains, New York
White Plains is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States. It is the county seat and commercial hub of Westchester, a suburban county just north of New York City, home to one million people. White Plains is located in south-central Westchester, with its downtown 25 miles north of Midtown Manhattan; as of 2013, the city's total population was estimated to be 57,866, up from 53,077 at the 2010 census. According to the city government, the daytime weekday population is estimated at 250,000; the city was ranked third in the top 10 places to live in New York for 2014, according to national online real estate brokerage Movoto. At the time of the Dutch settlement of Manhattan in the early 17th century, the region had been used as farmland by the Weckquaeskeck tribe, a Wappinger people, was called "Quarropas". To early traders it was known as "the White Plains", either from the groves of white balsam which are said to have covered it, or from the heavy mist that local tradition suggests hovered over the swamplands near the Bronx River.
The first non-native settlement came in November 1683, when a party of Connecticut Puritans moved westward from an earlier settlement in Rye and bought about 4,400 acres from the Weckquaeskeck. However, John Richbell of Mamaroneck claimed to have earlier title to much of the territory through his purchase of a far larger plot extending 20 miles inland from a different tribe; the matter wasn't settled until 1721, when a Royal Patent for White Plains was granted by King George II. In 1758, White Plains became the seat of Westchester County when the colonial government for the county left West Chester, located in what is now the northern part of the borough of the Bronx, in New York City; the unincorporated village remained part of the Town of Rye until 1788 when the town of White Plains was created. On July 9, 1776, a copy of the Declaration of Independence was delivered to the New York Provincial Congress, meeting in the county courthouse; the delegates adopted a resolution approving the Declaration, thus declaring both the colony's independence and the formation of the State of New York.
The Declaration itself was first publicly read from the steps of the courthouse on July 11. During September and October 1776, troops led by George Washington took up positions in the hills of the village, hotly pursued by the British under General Sir William Howe, who attacked on October 28; the Battle of White Plains took place on Chatterton Hill, the Bronx River. Howe's force of 4,000–6,000 British and Hessian soldiers required three attacks before the Continentals, numbering about 1,600 under the command of Generals Alexander McDougall and Israel Putnam, joining Washington's main force, which did not take part in the battle. Howe's forces had suffered 250 casualties, a severe loss, he made no attempt to pursue the Continentals, whose casualties were about 125 dead and wounded. Three days after the battle Washington withdrew north of the village, this was occupied by Howe's forces, but after several inconclusive skirmishes over the next week Howe withdrew on November 5, leaving White Plains to the Continentals.
One of Washington's subordinates, Major John Austin, drunk after having celebrated the enemy's withdrawal, reentered the village with his detachment and proceeded to burn it down. Although he was court-martialed and convicted for this action, he escaped punishment; the first United States Census, conducted in 1790, listed the White Plains population at 505, of whom 46 were slaves. By 1800, the population stood at 575 and in 1830, 830. By 1870, 26 years after the arrival of the New York Central Railroad, it had swollen to 2,630 and by 1890 to 4,508. In the decades that followed the count grew to 7,899 and 26,425. White Plains was incorporated as a village in 1866 and as a city in 1916. Following World War II, White Plains' downtown area developed into what amounted to a "destination" shopping district featuring branch stores of many famous New York-based department and specialty stores; some of these retail locations were the first large-scale suburban stores built in the United States and ushered in the eventual post-war building boom.
Construction of nearby parkways and expressways in the 1940s through the 1970s only enhanced White Plains' role as a retail location. With a city opening ceremony, Macy's launched a grand White Plains store on Main Street across from City Hall in 1949; as the mayor said at the time, this was a significant event in the life of White Plains. Other prestigious stores followed, such as B. Altman & Co. Rogers Peet, Saks Fifth Avenue, Lord & Taylor, Alexander's, a short-lived branch of Bergdorf Goodman, converted to sister chain Neiman Marcus in 1981. White Plains is still a huge retail destination in the area with Bloomingdale's, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom Rack, Macy's, Burlington Coat Factory, over 1000 other small and mid-size stores in four malls. During the late 1960s, the city of White Plains developed an extensive urban renewal plan for residential and mixed-use redevelopment that called for the demolition of its entire central business district from the Bronx River Parkway east to Mamaroneck Avenue.
By 1978, the urban renewal program centered around the construction of the Westchester County Courthouse, the Westchester One office building, the Galleria at White Plains mall, a number of other office towers, retail centers and smaller commercial buildings. At the time of its construction, the West
John Singleton Copley
John Singleton Copley was an Anglo-American painter, active in both colonial America and England. He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Richard and Mary Singleton Copley, both Anglo-Irish, he is famous for his portrait paintings of wealthy and influential figures in colonial New England, depicting in particular middle-class subjects. His portraits were innovative in their tendency to depict artifacts relating to these individuals' lives. Copley's mother owned a tobacco shop on Long Wharf; the parents, according to the artist's granddaughter Martha Babcock Amory, had come to Boston in 1736, were "engaged in trade, like all the inhabitants of the North American colonies at that time". His father was from Limerick. Letters from John Singleton, Mrs. Copley's father, are in the Copley-Pelham collection. Richard Copley, described as a tobacconist, is said by several biographers to have arrived in Boston in ill health and to have gone, about the time of John's birth, to the West Indies, where he died.
William H. Whitmore gives his death the year of Mrs. Copley's remarriage. James Bernard Cullen says: "Richard Copley was in poor health on his arrival in America and went to the West Indies to improve his failing strength, he died there in 1737." No contemporary evidence has been located for either year. Except for a family tradition that speaks of his precocity in drawing, nothing is known of Copley's schooling or of the other activities of his boyhood, his letters, the earliest of, dated September 30, 1762, reveal a well-educated man. He may have been taught various subjects, it is reasonably conjectured, by his future stepfather, besides painting portraits and cutting engravings, eked out a living in Boston by teaching dancing and, beginning September 12, 1743, by conducting an "Evening Writing and Arithmetic School", duly advertised, it is certain that the widow Copley was married to Peter Pelham on May 22, 1748, that at about that time she transferred her tobacco business to his house in Lindall Street, at which the evening school continued its sessions.
In such a household young Copley may have learned to use the engraver's tools. Whitmore says plausibly: "Copley at the age of fifteen was able to engrave in mezzotint; the family lived next to the house occupied by japanner Thomas Johnston and his family, Copley became friends with Thomas's son William to become a painter himself. The artistic opportunities of the home and town in which Copley grew to manhood should be emphasized because he himself, as well as some of his biographers taking him too have made much of the bleakness of his early surroundings, his son, Lord Lyndhurst, wrote that "he was self taught, never saw a decent picture, with the exception of his own, until he was nearly thirty years of age." Copley himself complained, in a letter to Benjamin West, written November 12, 1766: "In this Country as You rightly observe there is no examples of Art, except what is to met with in a few prints indifferently exicuted, from which it is not possable to learn much." Variants of this thesis are found everywhere in his earlier letters.
They suggest that, while Copley was industrious and an able executant, he was physically unadventurous and temperamentally inclined toward brooding and self-pity. He could have seen many good prints in the Boston of his youth; the excellence of his own portraits was not miraculous. A book of Copley's studies of the figure, now at the British Museum, proves that before he was twenty, whether with or without help from a teacher, he was making anatomical drawings with much care and precision, it is that through the fortunate associations of a home and workshop in a town which had many craftsmen, he had learned his trade at an age when the average art student of a era was only beginning to draw. Copley was about fourteen and his stepfather had died, when he made the earliest of his portraits now preserved, a likeness of his half-brother Charles Pelham, good in color and characterization though it has in its background accessories which are somewhat out of drawing, it is a remarkable work to have come from so young a hand.
The artist was only fifteen when he painted the portrait of the Rev. William Welsteed, minister of the Brick Church in Long Lane, a work which, following Peter Pelham's practise, Copley engraved to get the benefit from the sale of prints. No other engraving has been attributed to Copley. A self-portrait, depicting a boy of about seventeen in broken straw hat, a painting of Mars and Vulcan, signed and dated 1754, disclose crudities of execution which do not obscure the decorative intent and documentary value of the works; such painting would advertise itself anywhere. Without going after business, for his letters do not indicate that he was aggressive or pushy, Copley was started as a professional portrait-painter long before he was of age. In October 1757, Capt. Thomas Ainslie, collector of the Port of Quebec, acknowledged from Halifax the receipt of his portrait, which "gives me great Satisfaction", advised the artist to visit Nova Scotia "where there are several people who would be glad to employ You."
This request to paint in Canada was repeated from Quebec, Copley replying: "I should receive a singular pleasure in excepting, if my Business was anyways slack, but it is so far otherwise that I have a large Room full
Newport, Rhode Island
Newport is a seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island, located 33 miles southeast of Providence, Rhode Island, 20 miles south of Fall River, Massachusetts, 73 miles south of Boston, 180 miles northeast of New York City. It is known as a New England summer resort and is famous for its historic mansions and its rich sailing history, it was the location of the first U. S. Open tournaments in both tennis and golf, as well as every challenge to the America's Cup between 1930 and 1983, it is the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport, which houses the United States Naval War College, the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, an important Navy training center. It was a major 18th-century port city and contains a high number of buildings from the Colonial era; the city is the county seat of Newport County, which has no governmental functions other than court administrative and sheriff corrections boundaries. It was known for being the location of the "Summer White Houses" during the administrations of Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy.
The population was 24,027 as of 2013. Newport was founded in 1639 on Aquidneck Island, called Rhode Island at the time, its eight founders and first officers were Nicholas Easton, William Coddington, John Clarke, John Coggeshall, William Brenton, Jeremy Clark, Thomas Hazard, Henry Bull. Many of these people had been part of the settlement at Portsmouth, along with Anne Hutchinson and her followers, they separated within a year of that settlement and Coddington and others began the settlement of Newport on the southern side of the island. Newport grew to be the largest of the four original settlements which became the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, which included Providence Plantations and Shawomett. Many of the first colonists in Newport became Baptists, the second Baptist congregation in Rhode Island was formed in 1640 under the leadership of John Clarke. In 1658, a group of Jews were welcomed to settle in Newport; the Newport congregation is now referred to as Congregation Jeshuat Israel and is the second-oldest Jewish congregation in the United States.
It meets in the oldest synagogue in the United States. The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations received its royal charter in 1663, Benedict Arnold was elected as its first governor at Newport; the Old Colony House served as a seat of Rhode Island's government upon its completion in 1741 at the head of Washington Square, until the current Rhode Island State House in Providence was completed in 1904 and Providence became the state's sole capital city. Newport became the most important port in colonial Rhode Island, a public school was established in 1640; the commercial activity which raised Newport to its fame as a rich port was begun by a second wave of Portuguese Jews who settled there around the middle of the 18th century. They had been practicing Judaism in secret for 300 years in Portugal, they were attracted to Rhode Island because of the freedom of worship there, they brought with them commercial experience and connections, a spirit of enterprise. Most prominent among those were Jacob Rodrigues Rivera, who arrived in 1745 and Aaron Lopez, who came in 1752.
Rivera introduced the manufacture of sperm oil which became one of Newport's leading industries and made the town rich. Newport developed 17 manufactories of oil and candles and enjoyed a practical monopoly of this trade until the American Revolution. Aaron Lopez is credited with making Newport an important center of trade, he encouraged 40 Portuguese Jewish families to settle there, Newport had 150 vessels engaged in trade within 14 years of his activity. He was involved in the slave trade and manufactured spermaceti candles, barrels, chocolate, clothes, shoes and bottles, he became the wealthiest man in Newport but was denied citizenship on religious grounds though British law protected the rights of Jews to become citizens. He appealed to the Rhode Island legislature for redress and was refused with this ruling: "Inasmuch as the said Aaron Lopez hath declared himself by religion a Jew, this Assembly doth not admit himself nor any other of that religion to the full freedom of this Colony. So that the said Aaron Lopez nor any other of said religion is not liable to be chosen into any office in this colony nor allowed to give vote as a free man in choosing others."
Lopez persisted by applying for citizenship in Massachusetts. From the mid-17th century, the religious tolerance in Newport attracted numbers of Quakers, known as the Society of Friends; the Great Friends Meeting House in Newport is the oldest existing structure of worship in Rhode Island. In 1727, James Franklin printed the Rhode-Island Almanack in Newport. In 1732, he published the Rhode Island Gazette. In 1758, his son James founded the weekly newspaper Mercury; the famous 18th century Goddard and Townsend furniture was made in Newport. Throughout the 18th century, Newport suffered from an imbalance of trade with the largest colonial ports; as a result, Newport merchants were forced to develop alternatives to conventional exports. In the 1720s, Colonial leaders arrested many pirates, acting under pressure from the British government. Many were buried on Goat Island. Newport was a major center of the slave trade in colonial and early America, active in the "triangle trade" in which slave-produced sugar and molasses from the Caribbean were carried to Rhode Island and distilled into rum, whi
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