The East Greenwich Academy (originally known as Kent Academy) was a private

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's b ...

boarding school A boarding school is a school where pupils live within premises while being given formal instruction. The word "boarding" is used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals. As they have existed for many centuries, and now exten ...

in East Greenwich, Rhode Island, USA that was in existence from 1802 until 1943.

History

The school was founded in 1802 by eight prominent men from East Greenwich and Warwick, who served as stockholders of the school. The campus was built on five acres of farmland belonging to Ethan Clark, which overlooked Narragansett Bay. In 1841 the Providence Conference Seminary of the

Methodist Episcopal Church The Methodist Episcopal Church (MEC) was the oldest and largest Methodist denomination in the United States from its founding in 1784 until 1939. It was also the first religious denomination in the US to organize itself on a national basis. In ...

took over the school and by the mid-nineteenth century nearly three fourths of all Rhode Island teachers were alumni of the academy. After dwindling enrollment during the Great Depression and World War II, the academy closed in 1943. The town of East Greenwich purchased the buildings and used them as a school for several years until many of them were demolished in the 1960s. Around the same time, St. Luke's Episcopal Church purchased and demolished two of the other buildings. The headmaster's house with its ornate

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, most often dome-like, tall structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome. The word derives, via Italian, from ...

still survives at 112 Peirce Street. The school's gymnasium, Swift Gymnasium, also survives and is used for local events and is the site of the "Academy Players," a theater group named after the old academy.

Prominent alumni and faculty

Nelson W. Aldrich Nelson Wilmarth Aldrich (/ ˈɑldɹɪt͡ʃ/; November 6, 1841 – April 16, 1915) was a prominent American politician and a leader of the Republican Party in the United States Senate, where he represented Rhode Island from 1881 to 1911. By the 1 ...

, Republican U.S. Senator 1881-1911 * William Daniel Brayton, Republican U.S. Representative 1847-1861 *

Marietta Stanley Case Marietta Stanley Case (, Stanley; August 22, 1845 – 21 July 1900) was a 19th-century American poet and temperance advocate. Her very best poems were entitled, "The Waning Century" and "Amorpatioe", the latter being written for the Daughters of ...

(1845-1900), poet and temperance advocate * Mary H. Gray Clarke (born 1835), correspondent * Isaac T. Goodnow, former professor of Natural Sciences at the Providence Conference Seminary (aka, East Greenwich Academy) 1848-1854, co-founded the town of Manhattan, Kansas and the school that became known as Kansas State University. * Albert C. Greene, U.S. Senator from RI (1845–1851) *

George Washington Greene George Washington Greene (April 8, 1811 – February 2, 1883) was an American historian. He was also the grandson of Major-General Nathanael Greene, a hero of the American Revolutionary War. Biography Greene was born in East Greenwich, Rho ...

, professor at Brown University, historian * Charles Phelps, first Connecticut attorney general (1899–1903) *

Harry A. Richardson Harry Alden Richardson (January 1, 1853 – June 16, 1928) was an American businessman and politician from Dover, in Kent County, Delaware. He was a member of the Republican Party, and was U.S. Senator from Delaware. Early life and family Richar ...

, U.S. Senator from Delaware (1907–1913) * Raymond S. Thatcher (1903–1988), Connecticut State Comptroller

References

External links

Historical informationHistory of the town of East Greenwich and adjacent territory: from 1677 to 1877
(J. A. & R. A. Reid, 1877) pg. 202-207
Academy Players website
{{authority control 1943 disestablishments in Rhode Island Protestant educational institutions Defunct schools in Rhode Island Seminaries and theological colleges in Rhode Island Educational institutions established in 1802 Buildings and structures in East Greenwich, Rhode Island Schools in Kent County, Rhode Island Educational institutions disestablished in 1943 1802 establishments in Rhode Island