RICH Awards Four Mini Grants in April

RICH Provides $8,000 in Mini Grants for April

The following received mini grants for public humanities programs in Rhode Island.

Organizations
The Barrington Preservation Society will receive $2,000 for the creation of six interpretive signs along the East Bay Bike Path in Barrington. The signs, which will include text and photographs, will serve as site-specific historical markers along the popular bike path.

The George Wiley Center will receive $2,000 for Capturing the Story. The funds will support the agency in transcribing and archiving oral histories conducted by Ricardo Pitts-Wiley about George Wiley, the prominent civil rights activist from Rhode Island. The Center will establish and maintain an archive and index so that the research materials may be accessed by the general public.

The Warren Preservation Society will receive $2,000 for Warren’s Mills Project. The funds will support the creation of public displays and events devoted to the history of Warren’s mills, the community of workers who settled in Warren, and the impact that closing and redeveloping the mills has on the current community.  Research conducted at state archives and other resources, along with interviews with descendents of Warren mill workers, will culminate in a digitally-rendered document that will be made available to libraries, schools, and museums, an exhibition, and a potential lecture series.

Individual
Ricardo Pitts-Wiley from Pawtucket will receive $2,000 for The Man with 10,000 Wives: The George Wiley Story. The funds will support research on George Wiley, a Rhode Island-born civil rights leader and advocate for welfare mothers and the poor. The research – which will include oral histories with people who knew Wiley in New York; Washington, D.C.; Chicago; Boston; and Rhode Island – will serve as the basis for writing, producing, and presenting a stage dramatization about Wiley’s life and times.