Tagged: scott mackay

The Dynamo House, the century-old onetime Narragansett Electric power station, now sits as a forlorn reminder of what once thrived along Providence’s downtown waterfront.  And as Rhode Island Public Radio political analyst Scott MacKay notes, it now stands as a guard to the old Jewelry District that state and city officials are trying to rebrand as a Knowledge District.

Richard Walton was an unforgettable presence for decades in our cozy state. An activist, he was in the forefront of so many campaigns for social justice and peace during his 84 years on this earth that even his friends couldn’t do a full accounting. A graduate of Brown in the 1950s, at a time when most of his WASP classmates went into banking, law or joined the CIA, Richard took the path less traveled. He became a reporter for the Providence Journal, then worked in New York newspapering during the Golden Age of print journalism.

Rhode Island hasn’t had enough to celebrate lately. RIPR political analyst Scott MacKay brings us an anniversary all Rhode Islanders can take pride in next month.

Three hundred and fifty years ago, Rhode Island struck a blow that would reverberate around the globe when England granted the colony a charter that for the first time in the modern world put in place a government that granted absolute religious freedom to its people.

Roger Williams University kicks off the state celebration of the 350th anniversary of the Rhode Island Colonial Charter tomorrow with a panel discussion about the 1663 charter on campus.

Five members of Governor Lincoln Chafee’s Rhode Island 1663 Charter Commission will bring their perspectives to a discussion of the landmark document and how the ideas of Roger Williams influenced American constitutional development and indeed, resonate to the 21st century.

If ever there was a Rhode Island tradition that never wanes, it is `May Breakfast,’ that old fixture where church fellowship meets scrambled eggs, bacon and coffee. It has an old-timey feel, even when it resembles a political ``time’’ as any gathering of pols was once referred as, especially when the eats were accompanied by a campaign dollar or two.