Rhode Island Computer Museum

Rhode Island ( (listen), like road) is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly less than 1.1 million residents as of 2020; but Rhode Island has grown at every decennial count since 1790 and is the second-most densely populated state, after New Jersey. The state takes its name from the eponymous island, though nearly all of its land area is on the mainland. Rhode Island borders Connecticut to its west; Massachusetts to its north and east; and the Atlantic Ocean to its south via Rhode Island Sound and Block Island Sound; and shares a small maritime border with New York, east of Long Island. Providence is its capital and most populous city. Native Americans lived around Narragansett Bay for thousands of years before English settlers began arriving in the early 17th century. Rhode Island was unique among the Thirteen British Colonies in having been founded by a refugee, Roger Williams, who fled religious persecution in the Massachusetts Bay Colony to establish a haven for religious liberty. He founded Providence in 1636 on land purchased from local tribes, thereby creating the first settlement in North America with an explicitly secular government. The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations subsequently became a destination for religious and political dissenters and social outcasts, earning it the moniker "Rogue's Island".Rhode Island was the first colony to call for a Continental Congress, which it did in 1774, and the first to renounce its allegiance to the British Crown, which it did on May 4, 1776. After the American Revolution, during which it was heavily occupied and contested, Rhode Island became the fourth state to ratify the Articles of Confederation, which it did on February 9, 1778. Because its citizens favored a weaker central government, it boycotted the 1787 convention that had drafted the United States Constitution, which it initially refused to ratify; it finally did ratify it on May 29, 1790, the last of the original 13 states to do so.The state was officially named the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations since the colonial era, but came to be commonly known as "Rhode Island". In November 2020, the state's voters approved an amendment to the state constitution formally dropping "and Providence Plantations" from its full name. Its official nickname is the "Ocean State", a reference to its 400 mi (640 km) of coastline and the large bays and inlets that make up about 14% of its total area.

Warwick Musical Theatre was a musical theater located on Route 2 in Warwick, Rhode Island.Buster Bonoff opened the theater in 1955 on an open field. Initially, it hosted touring Broadway shows but, by the 1970s, "big-name" entertainers became its standard offering.In 1967, the original tent was replaced with a 3,300-seat theater in the round that used a building from the 1964 New York World's Fair. It also hosted yearly summer shows by World Wrestling Entertainment until 1999.

Station Fire Memorial Park is a park located in the state of Rhode Island. It was created and dedicated following The Station nightclub fire that occurred on February 20, 2003, resulting in 100 deaths and 230 injuries, and is located on the same property where the fire took place. It was officially dedicated and opened to the public on May 21, 2017.

The Station nightclub fire occurred on the evening of February 20, 2003 at The Station, a nightclub and hard rock music venue in West Warwick, Rhode Island, United States, killing 100 people and injuring 230. During a concert by the rock band Great White, a pyrotechnic display ignited flammable acoustic foam in the walls and ceilings surrounding the stage. Within six minutes, the entire building was engulfed in flames. The fire was the fourth-deadliest at a nightclub in U.S. history, and the second-deadliest in New England, behind the 1942 Cocoanut Grove fire, which resulted in 492 deaths. After the fire, multiple civil and criminal cases were filed. Daniel Biechele, the tour manager for Great White who had ignited the pyrotechnics, plead guilty to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter in 2006 and was sentenced to fifteen years in prison with four to serve. Biechele was released from prison in 2008 after some families of the victims expressed their support for his parole. Jeffrey and Michael Derderian, the owners of the Station, pleaded no contest and avoided a trial: Michael received the same sentence as Biechele and was released from prison in 2009, while Jeffrey received a sentence of 500 hours of community service. Legal action against several parties, including Great White, were resolved with monetary settlements by 2008. Station Fire Memorial Park, a permanent memorial to the victims of the fire, was opened in May 2017 at the site where the Station once stood.

Crompton is a community in West Warwick, Rhode Island, United States. It is named after Samuel Crompton, inventor of the spinning mule. The Crompton Mill was set up in 1807, on the east bank of the Pawtuxet River, and is thought to be the first stone mill built in Rhode Island. The original structure still stands on the original site, although extensive modifications to add a further two stories by 1881 were carried out, allowing for the production of corduroy and print cloth at the site.Crompton is home to Old St. Mary Church, the oldest Roman Catholic church building in the state of Rhode Island, built in 1844.

West Warwick is a town in Kent County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 31,012 at the 2020 census.West Warwick was incorporated in 1913, making it the youngest town in the state. Prior to 1913, the town, situated on the western bank of the Pawtuxet River, was the population and industrial center of the larger town of Warwick. The town split because local Democratic politicians wanted to consolidate their power and isolate their section of town from the Republican-dominated farmland in the east.

Toll Gate High School is a public high school in Warwick, Rhode Island on Centerville Road. It serves education to grades 9-12 and has approximately 1100 students and 97 teachers.

The Centreville Mill is an historic textile mill at 3 Bridal Avenue in West Warwick, Rhode Island. The mill complex is located on a site that has been used for textile processing since 1794, only four years after Samuel Slater's successful mill operation was established in Pawtucket. The oldest surviving buildings on the east side of the Pawtuxet River date to the 1860s.The mill was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2005.

Westcott is a village in the town of West Warwick in Kent County, Rhode Island. It is located between the two Pawtuxet River bridges on Providence Street, at the juncture of New London Avenue, Tollgate Road, and Providence Street in northeastern West Warwick. It get its name from the Westcott family that lived on 341 Providence Street.

St. Mary's Church and Cemetery is a historic Roman Catholic church building and cemetery in Crompton, a village of West Warwick, Rhode Island.

The Maskerchugg River is a river in the U.S. state of Rhode Island. It flows approximately 6 km (4 mi). There are four dams along the river's length.

West Warwick High School (abbreviated as WWHS) is a public high school in West Warwick, Rhode Island, United States. In 2022, the school ranked 29th out of 62 in Rhode Island by US News.