Mar 7, 2024 – The RI Secretary of State participate din Portsmouth’s celebration of Founders’ Day with Showing of the Original 1638 Compact and 1776 Southwick Copy of Declaration of Independence   The Portsmouth Historical Society hosted a celebration of the Town’s 1638 founding with a ceremony at the Town Hall on March 7.   The

Mar 1, 2024 – Craig Clark, Society President appeared on the local TV series Portsmouth This Week

Feb 29, 2024 -Ten teams gathered at the Gulf Stream Bar & Grille for the 2024 PHS History Trivia Contest. It ended in a first place tie with the ‘The Northenders’ beating out ‘Patriots Posse’ in a sudden death playoff .  The winning team was Lois Ryan, Bob Hamilton , Dave and Deb Duggan, Gerry

Dec 6, 2023 Historical Society held its 2023 Annual Meeting and Holiday Gathering The Society held its annual meeting and holiday gathering that featured showing of recently-digitized color and black and white films of Glen Farm and the Newport County Fairgrounds from the 1920’s and 1930’s. Also, official Portsmouth flag were unveiled.

RIPBS is filming a segment for their very successful series Treasures Inside the Museum at PHS. We can’t wait to see the final results sometime this spring.

Many people may be unaware of the influences and contributions of Indigenous peoples, such as the Narragansett and the Pokanoket, in the early history of Portsmouth. There is a general feeling and misconception that once Aquidneck Island was transferred to the English, Indigenous peoples were no longer a part of Portsmouth history. This lecture shed

Some future historians from the 2nd grade at Highland Charter School in Warren came to visit. The Goodwife (Schoolteacher) talked to them about attending a one-room schoolhouse and they got to ring the old schoolbell. Spending time in the Old Town Hall helped them learn about Portsmouth’s agricultural past and they enjoyed our collection in

The Portsmouth Historical Society Museum hosted a remembrance ceremony of the tragic event. On Sunday, October 23, 1983, at about 6:20 a.m., a yellow Mercedes stake-bed truck crashed into the lobby of the barracks of the 1st Battalion 8th Marines before the driver detonated a suicide bomb. The bomb was the equivalent of about 12,000

NY Times Best Selling Author to Lecture of the War Between the Colonists and Native Americans NY Times bestselling author Michael Tougias gave a presentation on  the war between the Colonists and Native Americans in 1675-76 at the Portsmouth Historical Society on October 19th.  Tougias is the author of the acclaimed Until I Have No

Aquidneck Island has been subjected to a number of devastating hurricanes since colonial days. Over 70 people heard Town Historian Jim Garman talk about what it was like in the aftermath of the ‘38 and ‘54 hurricanes on the 85th anniversary of the 1938 hurricane.  This lecture included numerous photographs showing the serious damage done to