Abby Epplett, Historian

On Thursday, November 2, and Friday, November 3, I attended Historic New England Summit 2023 , a two-day event held at The VETS , or Veterans Memorial Auditorium, in Providence, Rhode Island that brought together members of Historic New England (HNE) and others interested in the history and preservation of the area. Yesterday, I posted a summary for Day 1 . My summary for Day 2 is adapted from 10 pages of notes. If you would like to learn more about any of the sessions, please let me know, and I can post a more detailed write-up or share my notes. Opening Keynote: Built for Zero: Ending Homelessness After an introduction by Vin Cipolla , President & CEO of HNE, Rosanne Haggerty opened Day 2 of the Summit with a keynote describing solutions to the public housing crisis. Haggerty is President & CEO of Community Solutions , headquartered in New York City, which assists 107 communities in their initiative Build for Zero . Since 2015, the project has housed over ...

Historic New England Summit 2023 just finished earlier today! Held at The VETS , or Veterans Memorial Auditorium, in Providence, Rhode Island on Thursday, November 2, and Friday, November 3, this two-day event brought together members of Historic New England (HNE) and others interested in the history and preservation of the area. I also attended the first HNE Summit last year, in 2022, and summarized both Day 1 and Day 2 for that conference. This post summarizes Day 1 of this year’s event based on my fifteen pages of notes. Day 2 is coming soon. If you would like to learn more about any of the sessions, please let me know, and I can post a more detailed write-up or share my notes. Opening Welcome The Summit began with an introductory view that reviewed ongoing HNE projects such as the reimagination of the Haverhill Center and the Recovering New England’s Voices project. Danikah Chartier , Indigenous Community Liaison and Researcher at HNE, gave a land acknowledgemen...

On February 28, 2023 at 7:00 p.m., I attended a Zoom talk hosted by Rhode Island Historical Society and focused on the recently published book Black Greys and Colored Giants: A Comprehensive Guide to Black Baseball in Rhode Island, 1870-1949 by Robert Cvornyek , who is professor emeritus and former chair of the History Department at Rhode Island College , along with a professor at Florida State University Panama City . The talk took the form of a conversation moderated by Richard J. Ring , Deputy Executive Director for Collections and Interpretation at Rhode Island Historical Society since 2017 . Cvornyek explained that he wrote the book after researching Black baseball in Rhode Island for over twenty years, starting in the early 2000s. He interviewed men who played baseball in the late 1940s, along with their families, and learned that “Baseball is a critical lens to understand African American history.” He originally planned to donate all his research materials to RIHS...