When it came to getting your hair done on Broad Street, Kandy’s Of Course Beauty Salon was the place to go. The owner, Kandy Rainey, lived above her beauty salon in a building named the Lola Apartments. Together, these two spaces bravely created an important nexus of community and a safe haven for trans and gender-nonconforming people in Providence. Kandy Rainey opened Kandy’s Of Course Beauty Salon in 1968. The salon was first located at 246 Broad Street at the intersection of Wickham Street, where the Upper South Providence and West Side neighborhoods meet. Providence was undergoing a massive shift at that time. The population of the city was decreasing and the city government’s hostile urban renewal policies began to push Black people and families in South Providence to the outskirts of the city. Kandy’s was located near the newly-constructed Interstate Highway 95 (I-95), which split the city of Providence in two. I-95 demarcated communities along the lines of race and class in the city. For most of Kandy’s time there, Broad Street was considered the declining outskirts of the city; but for LGBTQ+ people, the outskirts were safer than the so-called thriving parts of the city. The city itself was not a safe place for LGBTQ+ people in the 1960s, and while things improved slightly with communal events like the city’s first Pride March in 1976, LGBTQ+ people were still being harassed and assaulted by police and average citizens alike. As a sanctuary for trans people and drag performers, the Lola was more than just an apartment building; it was a family. Former resident Brian Belovitch wrote in his book, Trans Figured, “the Lola was an education at best in how to survive a life that was going to be extremely challenging.” This feeling of family and care extended to Kandy’s Of Course Beauty Salon. In its early years, below the Lola Apartments, the salon was known by the neighborhood kids who would, in Belovitch’s words, “watch the drag queens running in and out of the beauty salon.” Eventually, in the 1980s, Kandy’s moved to 802 Broad Street, a mile south of the Lola. As the only beauty salon along Broad Street for a long time, Kandy’s became an important part of the community. As so many beauty salons in Black neighborhoods do, Kandy’s Of Course provided a gathering space, a center of care, and a place of refuge. Kandy’s longstanding dedication to the neighborhood was even noticed by the local government, and Kandy received a commendation from the State of Rhode Island House of Representatives in 2005 for “outstanding and dedicated service to improve the quality of life.” Kandy’s went on for another decade and, after 49 years of serving the community, closed in 2017.

For more view the original article

Excitement buzzed in the lecture hall at the opening of the 21st Annual Exhibition of the Rhode Island School of Design. Members of the RISD class of 1900 were awarded their diplomas, while other students received prizes. Among the award recipients was young Thomas R. Lewis (1880-1958), a student artist who earned a scholarship based on his abilities in the evening life drawing class. Addressing the lively crowd was Professor Poland of Brown University, and at the time President of RISD, who proclaimed, “The people of Providence and of Rhode Island are beginning to feel that we have made for ourselves a place that nothing else can fill, and that we are essential to the public wealth.” If anyone in the building manifested the words of Prof. Poland that night, it was Thomas R. Lewis, who later broke the status quo as a Black entrepreneur and made essential contributions to RI’s economy through jewelry making and philanthropy.  Born on April 5, 1880, in Providence, Lewis was raised in the pre-World War II caste system where Black men were largely limited to work in physically demanding fields. As a popular athlete in high school, Lewis could certainly find work as a waiter or bellhop. However, while employed as an errand-runner at Gorham Manufacturing Company, Lewis became interested in a career as a silversmith. A Black jeweler in the early 20th century had little hope of being hired, and Lewis’s family was not supportive. Lewis’s mother died during his childhood, and his father and sister thought his goal of becoming a jeweler was not viable. Eventually, Lewis was forced out of his home. He continued to practice his craft and attended evening classes at RISD while living in a small room with a friend.  Lewis graduated with a certificate from RISD in 1902. He worked as a laborer for at least another year at Gorham before finding a place with a small manufacturer where he produced, according to his employer, designs of “extraordinary quality.” After six years there, Lewis ventured into forming his own company. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the Thomas R. Lewis Company employed an integrated workforce, with upward of 65 employees, and created designer goods that sold in luxury stores such as Saks and to the high-end cosmetics manufacturer Richard Hudnut. Lewis’s designs included lavish cigarette cases, powder compacts, and exquisite dog collars.  In 1925, a lacquer explosion in Lewis’s shop at 171 Eddy Street sparked a fire and led to damage throughout the building. Despite this, Lewis enjoyed continued success in the jewelry industry by producing great designs and giving back to his community. Most notably, the Lewis Company aided in the employment of men and women from Providence’s Black communities. Lewis knew many of his employees from their childhood, and taught them the skills they needed to work with diligence. A philanthropist, Lewis was involved in the YMCA and What Cheer Tennis Club where he sponsored social events and helped to put up tennis courts on Willett Avenue in East Providence.  At one point in his career, Thomas Lewis was reported to be one of the highest paid jewelry manufacturers in Providence. He was a respected member of the New England Manufacturing Jewelers and Silversmiths Association. While wider acclaim proved elusive, Lewis took pride in his work, his designs, and his community. In pursuing his dream, Lewis became a pioneer in the jewelry design and manufacturing industry. He died in 1958.

For more (including 5 images) view the original article

“I would have been a millionaire today if I had bent to prejudice.” So said George Thomas Downing, prominent African American Rhode Island restaurateur and civil rights champion. From behind the curtains of his lavish Sea Girt Hotel, built on this site in 1854 and destroyed by arson just six years later, Downing fought against racial injustice in a life-long struggle that would eventually ruin his fortunes and cause the demise of his hotel.

George T. Downing was born in New York City, in 1819, into a family of successful restaurateurs. His father, Thomas Downing, helped elevate the city’s street snack, the oyster, into the world of fine dining. His luxurious Wall Street oyster house served pickled oysters and jellied turkeys to Charles Dickens, Queen Victoria, and the city’s elite. George owned his own restaurant in New York City before moving to Newport in the 1840s to open an offshoot of his father’s oyster house, catering to big city gentry on holiday.

The oyster house has a long history in African American heritage, particularly in Rhode Island. Emmanuel Manna Bernoon, an emancipated slave, had opened one of the first restaurants in the United States, an oyster and ale house, in 1736 on Towne Street (now Main Street) in Providence. By the 1840s, oysters had become a shared passion for rich and poor. For many black entrepreneurs like Downing, oysters became the foundation on which they built their culinary empire.

Downing’s crowning centerpiece was the Sea Girt Hotel. Catering to a white clientele, the grand five-story building included large stores, a restaurant, accommodation for gentlemen boarders and families, and served as the Downing residence. Martin R. Delany, the African American intellectual, said of Downing’s Newport enterprise: “This fashionable establishment is spoken of as among the best conducted places in the country, the proprietor among the most gentlemanly.”

The Sea Girt served the community until an arsonist burned it down ten days before Christmas in 1860. While the culprit was never caught, many believed that the fires were lit in retaliation for Downing’s staunch advocacy of civil rights. A “race man” like his father and grandfather before him, Downing was keenly interested in the treatment of African Americans. As one of America’s earliest civil rights activists, Downing led the campaign for the desegregation of Newport schools and was instrumental in getting the first African American into the Diplomatic Corps.

His political concerns led him to Washington, where he made alliances with white abolitionists and other African American activists. In 1865, he became the manager of the Members’ Dining Room for the U.S. House of Representatives, a position he held for twelve years. There, he was able to wield his influence through political ties and friendships, such as the one he shared with Charles Sumner of Massachusetts. During his time in Washington, he worked for the passage of public accommodation laws in the capital city.

Downing died in 1903, a “galvanizing and enduring symbol of African American entrepreneurship and culinary excellence.”

For more (including 3 images) view the original article