Providence, RI news and local guide

Without a royal charter, the settlers governed themselves, and in 1638 they laid out home lots of about six acres each running from Towne Street, now South Main Street, to Hope Street. Providence Plantations became a small farming and fishing settlement whose borders were disputed with Connecticut and Massachusetts. In 1652 it limited indentured servitude to ten years, described as the first anti-slavery law in the United States, though there is no evidence it was enforced. Rhode Island legalized African and Native American slavery in 1703, and the slave trade helped make Providence a major port. By 1755 enslaved people were 8 percent of its population. The Narragansett burned Providence to the ground in March 1676, during King Philip's War, and later that year the Rhode Island legislature formally rebuked the other colonies for provoking the war. In 1770 Rhode Island College, now Brown University, moved to Providence from Warren and occupied a single building on College Hill. Sources Wikipedia: Providence, Rhode Island