Arkwright is a village in the northeastern corner of Coventry, Rhode Island touching Cranston and

Scituate Scituate is the name of some communities in New England in the United States: *Brunswick, Maine, formerly named Scituate *Scituate, Massachusetts, a New England town **Scituate (CDP), Massachusetts, an area in the town of Scituate *Scituate, Rhode ...

, now connected by Route 115. In the 1700s the Remington family owned a large parcel of land in the area, and the village became known as "Remington’s Run." In the early nineteenth century, the area was known as "Burlingame Mills" after the saw mill and grist mill run by Jabez and James Burlingame. In April 1809 the Burlingames, Elisha Arnold, and Nathan Potter sold the land to the Arkwright Manufacturing Company, which was owned by

James DeWolf James DeWolf (March 18, 1764December 21, 1837) was a slave trader, a privateer during the War of 1812, and a state and national politician. He served as a state legislator for a total of nearly 25 years, and in the 1820s as a United States senat ...

, a slave trader, estimated to have financed nearly 30 slaving voyages and transported 11,000 Africans to the United States; Doctor Caleb Fiske, Philip Fiske, and Asher Robbins. The company was named after

Richard Arkwright Sir Richard Arkwright (23 December 1732 – 3 August 1792) was an English inventor and a leading entrepreneur during the early Industrial Revolution. He is credited as the driving force behind the development of the spinning frame, known as t ...

, a British mill entrepreneur who had trained Samuel Slater. Arkwright Manufacturing constructed its first

textile mill Textile Manufacturing or Textile Engineering is a major industry. It is largely based on the conversion of fibre into yarn, then yarn into fabric. These are then dyed or printed, fabricated into cloth which is then converted into useful goods ...

in 1810. After a fire it was rebuilt in 1822, with various buildings being added later in the nineteenth and twentieth century. It was the beginning of the textile industry in New England, leading to strong economic ties with the Deep South, whose slave labor supplied the cotton. The mill passed through various owners. In 1883 it was sold and organized as the Arkwright–Interlaken Company to produce book cloth. The mill and various related buildings still survive today in the village; the mill is the last to operate in the villages of Coventry.Andrew D. Boisvert, "Coventry Roots: Arkwright"
''Coventry Patch,'' 26 March 2011

References

Villages in Kent County, Rhode Island Coventry, Rhode Island Census-designated places in Kent County, Rhode Island Providence metropolitan area Villages in Rhode Island Census-designated places in Rhode Island {{RhodeIsland-geo-stub