(7.21) If you are planning a visit to Roger Williams Park this weekend, try to work this into your plans. Step back in time and explore the Betsey Williams Cottage, home to Roger Williams’ great-great-great granddaughters, Betsey and Rhoda Williams. And it’s free. Raising chickens and tending to farmland, the sisters occupied the house until 1850. But life on the farm was not all hard work; these gals knew how to have a good time:
In the 1773 cottage that today sits beneath a massive sycamore tree, Betsey Williams, the great-great-great granddaughter of Roger Williams, was born and raised with her sister Rhoda. The surrounding fields and marshes were their playground, and as adults their livelihood. It was in the cottage that the sisters wove cloth to supplement their income and also invited neighbors to dine and dance with them. Upon her death in 1871, Betsey bequeathed the cottage and 102 acres of surrounding farmland to the city of Providence, which became the foundation of Roger Williams Park.
The cottage is just past the Casino as one enters from the Elmwood Avenue side . . . parking available right there. From the informational plaque:
Upon donating 102 acres of her family’s farmland, Betsey Williams stated that the site must be for public use, carry the name of Roger Williams, and include a monument in his name. [see below]
Free open house events, 10am to 1pm, Saturday & Sunday, July 20 & July 21, Betsey Williams Cottage, RWP, 1000 Elmwood Avenue, (directions)
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Dedicated in 1877, the Roger Williams Monument was sculpted by Franklin Simmons who had already executed a statue of Roger for Statuary Hall in the US Capitol.
From “Hidden Treasure: Public Sculpture in Providence”:
The 27-foot-high park monument is crowned by a 7 1/2 foot bronze version of the Capitol Roger Williams . It stands above a six-foot bronze sculpture of Clio, the Muse of history, who is literally inscribing Williams’s name on the Westerly granite base and thus figuratively entering him into history.