Read the Museum’s Fall Newsletter for more details on our exciting Programs
Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery
Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery, is an eye-opening look at the economic interdependence of Northern manufacturers and Southern plantation owners during the 19th century.
The author, Seth Rockman, the George L. Littlefield Professor of American History at Brown University, examines in detail how factory owners in New England, including brothers Isaac Peace Hazard and Rowland Gibson Hazard Jr. of Peace Dale, provided the
material goods that maintained slavery. The purpose of the book is not to offer examples of Northern complicity in slavery, but to explore how that complicity might have appeared to the people who participated in it, and to examine how it affected the nation’s economic growth. The book was a finalist for the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in History.
Professor Rockman will be at the Peace Dale Museum of Art and Culture on Thursday, October 30 to talk about his book. The program will take place in our Museum Gallery at 7:00 p.m. and will be live-streamed on the Museum’s YouTube channel. The program opens the Museum’s Fall 2025 Lecture Series and is free and open to the public. Watch Live Stream on our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@pdmac6899
Between the end of the Civil War and the early 20th century, Narragansett Pier was the place to be—and to be seen—if you were wealthy and fashionable. At its height, the Pier rivaled Newport as a summer resort that attracted thousands of vacationers from
throughout the country.
On Thursday, November 20, Jim Crothers will be at the Peace Dale Museum of Art and Culture to tell us about Narragansett’s “Gilded Age.” A former high school teacher and college instructor, Jim retired in 2020 after fourteen years as director of South County Museum.
The program will take place in our Museum Gallery at 7:00 p.m. and will be live- streamed on the Museum’s YouTube channel. The event, part of the Museum’s Fall 2025 Lecture Series, is free and open to the public. Watch Live Stream on our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@pdmac6899
From 1896 until 1969, when the Pell Bridge was completed, high school students who lived in Jamestown rode the ferry across the East Passage of Narragansett Bay to get to school in Newport. In 2014, Jamestown resident Bob Sutton produced a half-hour documentary film of audio interviews, photographs, and video clips about the “ferry boat students” so their stories would not be lost.
Louise (Vieira) Weaver, a member of the Board of Trustees of the Peace Dale Museum, was one of those “ferry boat students.” She has vivid memories of the trips she took over the Bay to attend Rogers High School.
