Brown University officials signed over 255 acres of land at Mt. Hope in Bristol, RI that they have owned since 1953 to the Pokanoket Tribe on November 15, 2024. This action followed over seven years of negotiation between the University and the Tribe after an occupation of the land by Tribe members in 2017 that resulted in a promise by the University to return the land. Click here for a televised report that aired on WPRI Channel 12 News the next day. Click here for a 5-minute video of the 2017 occupation.

(Above) Po Pummukoank Anogqs (Dancing Star), Sachem of the Tribe, opens the gates to the property as Sagamore Po Wauipi Neimpaug, Winds of Thunder, and his wife walk onto their land that they now own for the first time in 344 years.

(Above) Dancing Star hold the keys to the property aloft as members of the Tribe look on. The property was first occupied by the Tribe and supporters in August, 2017 in an effort to demand that Brown return their sacred land. An agreement was eventually reached, and negotiations have taken place since.

(Above) The property contains the Seat of Metacom at Potumtuk (“The Lookout”), a huge quartz outcropping that sits over 200 feet above Mount Hope Bay as well as the location where Metacom (King Philip) was slain at the end of King Philip’s War.