Members of the Lifelong Learning Collaborative in Providence, RI came to East Providence on July 25, 2025 for their fourth of eight sessions to learn about the 17th century history of Sowams. The group had already visited the Seat of Metacom, the Bristol Congregational Church, and the Charter Museum at the Rhode Island State House, and plans to visit the Myles Garrison site, Anawan Rock, and the Bristol Historical Society to learn about Native enslavement. Click here for a 16-minute video of Sowams Heritage Area Historian David Weed describing the Newman Church settlement in 1643, and here for a 13-minute video of class member Terry Meyer who summarized the Sassamon murder trial that precipitated the start of King Philip’s War in 1675. Click here for her presentation notes.

(Above) Class members gather at the Newman Congregational Church cemetery where they learned about the Tragedy of the Commons from class member Terry Meyer and the history of the Newman settlement at the Ring of the Green from Dr. Weed, as illustrated below.

(Above) Terry presented a summary of the Sassamon murder trial that precipitated the outbreak of King Philip’s War in June 1675 that devastated New England for both the English colonists and the Indigenous tribes who had been losing their land since the arrival of the settlers 55 years earlier.

(Above) Class members posed questions about the Newman settlement in what was then the Ring of the Green in Rehoboth (click to enlarge) as well as questions about the murder of Praying Indian John Sassamon and the subsequent trial that was detailed in Yashuhide Kawashima’s book, Igniting King Philip’s War.