Built in 1809, Lippitt Mill is one of the most important mills in the state, and was one of the oldest American textile mills still in operation until, in 2011, when a bad main valve flooded the second floor with 300 gallons of water a minute, forcing the operations to move to Westerly. Thankfully, unlike most mills, the wood-frame mill buildings never experienced a fire. The mill is now being redeveloped for low-income housing.
\nThe Lippitt Manufacturing Company built this 106’ x 34’ cotton mill in 1809. The building’s clerestory monitor (the highest windows) is one of the earliest examples of this form of mill lighting. By 1887, the mill ran 10,640 spindles and 238 looms. During the Depression following of War of 1812 the Company survived by supplying yarn to convict weavers in the Vermont prison.
\nIn 1889 all of the Lippitt Company assets were sold to the firm of B.B. & R. Knight.
\nIn 1925, the Knight family sold the Lippitt Mill property to Joseph Hayes, owner of the Riverpoint Lace Works. The Hayes family stopped manufacturing lace here in the early 1970s, but continued with dye and finish work on fabric. They retained ownership of the property until it went into receivership in 2008.
\nPawtucket Development Group LLC is now using low income housing tax credits for the renovation of the mill to be completed by the end of 2021. The project will consist of 65 units, of which 20 will be market rate units and the remaining 45 will be available to tenants at or below 60% of area median income.
","sponsor":null,"accessinfo":"","lede":"","website":"","related_resources":["Gary Kulik and Julia C. Bonham, Rhode Island: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites, (U. S. Department of the Interior Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation Historic American Engineering Record, 1978).
","West Warwick, Rhode Island Statewide Historical Preservation Report, (Rhode Island Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission, 1987).
","National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places Inventory – Nomination Form, Lippitt Mill (National Park Service, 1974).
","Coleman, J. Peter, The Transformation of Rhode Island 1790-1860 (Providence, RI: Brown University Press, 1969), 84.
"],"factoids":["Immigrate! We need workers! The early mills relied on large, local farm families to supply workers, especially children and “mill girls”. But rapid industrial expansion quickly required other sources of workers: immigrants. A sixth of the Rhode Islanders were foreign born in 1850; by 1865 more than a third of them had either been born abroad or had one or more foreign-born parents. Persons of foreign stock constituted approximately half the population in 1875; by 1910 seven out of every ten Rhode Islanders had one or more foreign-born parents, and every third inhabitant was a foreign immigrant, the highest proportion in the Union."],"files":{"https://rhodetour.org/files/fullsize/97c640b759e64b7a7f7cebdc05d8cddd.jpg":{"id":1695,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Current view of Lippitt Mill from Main Street","description":"Lippitt Mill, built 1809, the third earliest mill in Rhode Island, one of the few wood-framed mills remaining. Soon to become low-income and market rate housing. | Larry Manire | 2021","thumbnail":"https://rhodetour.org/files/square_thumbnails/97c640b759e64b7a7f7cebdc05d8cddd.jpg"},"https://rhodetour.org/files/fullsize/ce2263d0de4abbc1a1dea84b5410b8c5.jpg":{"id":1696,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Current aerial view of Lippitt Mill site","description":"Aerial view of the Lippitt Mill site including Pawtuxet River. | Google Maps | 2021","thumbnail":"https://rhodetour.org/files/square_thumbnails/ce2263d0de4abbc1a1dea84b5410b8c5.jpg"},"https://rhodetour.org/files/fullsize/368da1985e8f6c887175c16f76b3da87.jpg":{"id":1697,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Early photo of Lippitt Mill","description":"Rear view of the Lippitt Mill. The Phenix Mill is in the background (upper left). | Wolf, Raymond A., Images of America West Warwick (Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, SC, 2011).","thumbnail":"https://rhodetour.org/files/square_thumbnails/368da1985e8f6c887175c16f76b3da87.jpg"}}}