Fields Point (also known as Field's Point) is a historic park in the Washington Park neighborhood of

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay ...

jutting into

Narragansett Bay Narragansett Bay is a bay and estuary on the north side of Rhode Island Sound covering , of which is in Rhode Island. The bay forms New England's largest estuary, which functions as an expansive natural harbor and includes a small archipelago. Sma ...

right near the

Providence River The Providence River is a tidal river in the U.S. state of Rhode Island. It flows approximately 8 miles (13 km). There are no dams along the river's length, although the Fox Point Hurricane Barrier is located south of downtown to protect th ...

and

Route 95 Route 95, or Highway 95, may refer to routes in the following countries: __TOC__ International * European route E95 Australia * Great Northern Highway (Western Australia) * Fossickers Way (New South Wales) Canada * British Columbia Highway 95 * ...

History

The point was named after William Field, a British colonist who settled in Providence, RI with an acreage and a house on what is now South Main Street. In the 19th century, Fields Point Farm, a park, developed as the major recreational area in the city until

Roger Williams Park Roger Williams Park is an elaborately landscaped city park in Providence, Rhode Island and a historic district listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is named after Roger Williams, the founder of the city of Providence and the pr ...

was created in 1871. Visitors came to the Point to visit Colonel Atwell's Clam House, Edgewood Beach, The Washington Park Yacht Club and Kerwin's Beach. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the US Maritime Commission selected Field's Point as a location for a shipyard as part of the

Emergency Shipbuilding Program The Emergency Shipbuilding Program (late 1940 – September 1945) was a United States government effort to quickly build simple cargo ships to carry troops and materiel to allies and foreign theatres during World War II. Run by the U.S. Maritime ...

. Much of what had previously been there was sacrificed to wartime necessity. The yard was eventually taken over by the

Walsh-Kaiser Company Walsh-Kaiser Co., Inc. was a shipyard in both Cranston, Rhode Island, Cranston and Providence, Rhode Island. It was built during World War II and financed by the Maritime Commission as part of the country's Emergency Shipbuilding Program. It was ori ...

. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, one of the piers of the former shipyard was used to house a US Naval Reserve center. The Submarine USS Lionfish was berthed at the pier for use as a training vessel from 1960 until circa 1970. She now lies only a few miles away at

Battleship Cove Battleship Cove is a nonprofit maritime museum and war memorial in Fall River, Massachusetts, United States. Featuring the world's largest collection of World War II naval vessels, it is home to the highly decorated battleship . It is located at ...

Fall River, Massachusetts Fall River is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. The City of Fall River's population was 94,000 at the 2020 United States Census, making it the tenth-largest city in the state. Located along the eastern shore of Mount H ...

. The facility is now a (combined Army, Navy, Marine) Armed Forces Reserve Center. In the 1950s, Providence started using Fields Point as a

landfill A landfill site, also known as a tip, dump, rubbish dump, garbage dump, or dumping ground, is a site for the disposal of waste materials. Landfill is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of the waste ...

, eventually connecting the Point with nearby Starve Goat Island. In the 1960s, entrepreneur, Melvin Berry started "bar, marina, swim club, amusement park, bowling alley, drive-in theatre, indoor ice skating rink and a nightly Hawaiian dance show" in Fields Point. Circa the mid to late 1960s, Fields Point was also utilized as an operations base for high speed testing between Westerly and

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

of the Gas turbine Turbo Train, before acting as a train graveyard for the three trainsets after September 1976. In 1973,

Johnson & Wales University Johnson & Wales University (JWU) is a private university with its main campus in Providence, Rhode Island. Founded as a business school in 1914 by Gertrude I. Johnson and Mary T. Wales, JWU enrolled 7,357 students across its campuses in the fa ...

established a facility in Fields Point, but by 2001, the university leased land to

Save The Bay Save The Bay is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving San Francisco Bay and its related estuarine habitat areas. Founded by Catherine Kerr, Sylvia McLaughlin, and Esther Gulick in 1961, the organization grew into a body that not onl ...

for an educational center. In late 2012 a three-turbine wind farm was installed at Fields Point to provide energy for the waste water treatment plant.

References

Parks in Rhode Island Geography of Providence, Rhode Island Protected areas of Providence County, Rhode Island Tourist attractions in Providence, Rhode Island {{ProvidenceRI-stub

History

See also

References