August 2017
The Nine Cities of Newport
Theopholus North – Thornton Wilder
Wilder is probably best known for a play – Our Town. Theopholus North was his last novel in 1973. It was made into a movie in the 1980s. Wilder spent a lot of time in Newport researching, especially at the Redwood Library. The book was a Pulitzer Prize winner written in the 1970s and set in the 1920s.
There are many good micro studies regarding Newport and its founding, colonial history, triangular trade, architecture, military presence, John Hattendorf’s History of Trinity Church, the catboat era, Crane’s Newport in the Revolutions Era and a number of macro-studies such as Rocky Stunstrudts’ massive work. But Wilder’s work presents a unique view on how does Newport really work or a pulse on it ticks, its formal and informal power flows.
I know of no other single work that could explain the nuances of Newport Society to a newcomer than Theopholus North. The nine cities, as I see it, are still here, with maybe an addition or two.
The Nine Cities
First City
What remains of the town’s earliest life
Historic homes with cornices and clapboard built by English settler (founded in 1639)
More drama – The Old Stone Mill -24-foot fieldstone structure in Touro Part: Vikings, Knights Templar, Gov Benedict Arnold, Runic stones
An 18th Century Town
Touro Synagogue – US Oldest
Quaker Meeting House
George Washington Letter – Peter Harrington – Brick Market – Redwood Library – Palladium style
Houses, especially Historic Hill, the Point
Furniture – Townsend Goddard – “best US”
Silver – Ralph Carpenter’s Arts and Crafts of Newport, 1954
Newport Restoration Society
Yachts and Regattas
2015 Volvo Race – NY Yacht Club – others
America’s Cup – Yachting Capital – Boat Shows
Local races – Boat builders, restoration
Military Presence
Naval War College, Naval Undersea Warfare Center, Officer Candidate School, other Navy schools
Fort Adams, nation’s largest coastal fortification – Civil War, Spanish American War, WWI, WWII, now a music mecca
Literary
Greenwich Village artist style colony
Henry James, Julia Ward Howe, Boston/Cambridge Literati
Channing, Longfellow, Unitarians, Transcendentalists, Summer Cambridge Profs, Castle Hill and Labs
Today’s music festivals
Gilded Age
Mansions, Astors, Vanderbilts, etc. Breakers and others
Newport Reading Room, The Casino, Newport Preservation Society
Major tourist drive
The Servants
Cliff Walk, 40 steps
Preservation Society behind the scenes
Builders, Irish and Italian stone workers
5th Ward
Butler and footmen – 2 snippets from movie, Mr. North: English butler and Fish Stew
Many descendants are still here – 5th ward largely dispersed.
Gate Crashers
Fortune hunters and “prying journalists” or gold seekers
At Bannisters Wharf – Clarke Cooke House – but more likely to find at Newport Creamery
Fall River debs
American Middleclass Town
“American middle-class town – with little attention to spare for the 8 cities so close to it.”
