Fossils R Us

One of the side notes from Jamestown filmmaker Patti Cassidy’s documentary project, “Elephants in Rhode Island,” was that to date there have been no wooly mammoth or mastodon bones discovered in the Ocean State, despite significant findings in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Maine. This doesn’t mean that the primeval elephants weren’t here. Trawlers have scooped up mammoth and mastodon teeth during their hauls in Narragansett Bay, suggesting that the Pleistocene mega-fauna were hanging out when the bay was a basin, as yet unfilled by glacial melt.

Quite likely they were happily camped out in pre-sprawl, Ice Age Rhode Island, blissfully unaware of the mass extinction to come – a condition they shared with short-faced bears, dire wolves, stag-moose, giant beaver and saber-toothed cats.

As Gary Haynes writes in his “American megafaunal extinctions at the end of the Pleistocene”:

The great vanishing act took place in California and Rhode Island and Texas, in the center of Brazil and along the Pacific coast of Chile, in the inland steppes and pampas and plains of both Americas, in the cold southern cone of Argentina, in the lowlands and plains, mountains and foothills, everywhere in both continents and at nearly the same time. It’s a mystery we cannot solve – a true cold case.

Not one we’re likely to solve today, but in the universe that is Rhode Island, there’s a bigger mystery afoot. Why don’t we have a state fossil? Most every other state does, including four of our New England neighbors: Vermont (white whale); Massachusetts (dinosaur tracks – theropod footprints); Connecticut (dinosaur tracks – Eubrontes giganteus); and Maine (Devonian plant).

Rhody, along with both Carolinas, Kansas, Iowa, Indiana, Tennessee and Hawaii, is just a blank space on the official state fossils list.

Marilyn Massaro, curator of collections at the Museum of Natural History and Planetarium at Roger Williams Park in Providence, which houses thousands of state fossils, thinks it’s high time that changed.

“The official state fossil should come from one the plant families of the Carboniferous period,” she said in a phone conversation this morning. “That really is sort of the Rhode Island fossil. In fact, I can’t believe that Calamites aren’t already the state fossil.”

The Carboniferous period, also known as the coal age, occurred between 354 million to 290 million years ago. Calamites were medium-sized trees that grew up to 100 feet or more, located in the understories of coal swamps. Their only living relatives are horsetails. Their fossils are still evident in parts of Rhode Island.

Any other suggestions? What should be the state fossil of Rhode Island? (Note: Assorted media personalities, weather forecasters and ex-governors are not eligible.)

Right-of-way, Wrong-of-way

There was a time when Rhode Islanders could get to every inch of their shoreline. That isn’t true anymore, even though Rhody probably does a better job than the other 22 coastal states of promoting its public rights of way. Making our way to the water’s edge is considered a birthright, a privilege granted to every Rhode Islander by the colony’s original charter, as ordained by King Charles II, and affirmed later in the state Constitution.

Here, people have the right to fish from the shore; leave the shore to swim in the sea; gather seaweed; or merely pass along the shore on their excursions and ramblings. Jim Bedell, whose Coast Watcher’s Journal column appears in the arts section of Independent Newspapers, writes eloquently about the natural beauty, history, science and encounters that can be combed from the southern Rhode Island shoreline while informing citizens of their public access rights.

Unfortunately, not everybody shares the same democratic spirit. Over the years, some public rights of way have been obliterated – marked improperly with Private Property, No Trespassing or No Parking signs; blocked by grown trees or shrubbery, illegal dumping or fencing; even paved over.

I am reminded of what a blessing Rhode Island’s rights of ways are every day, from my little cottage on the cove, where the public access (and parking) are plentiful. People come to sit and watch the waves and the light, the rising moons and the setting suns, the bonfires and fireworks around the Fourth of July. They come to fish, explore the little beaches, swim or launch kayaks.

I often walk to the beach at Allin’s Cove, visiting swans and herons, geese and ducks, gulls and crows, shore birds and songbirds. From there I sometimes ramble through the neighborhood, connecting to the East Bay Bike Path, and wander over to the other side of the cove in a neighborhood once known as Drownville. A little over a mile leads to Mussachuck, where the other day I watched herring run up the creek and two nesting osprey take turns looping through the winds. Not far away, just past Annawamscutt Beach, another pair of osprey has successfully established a nest.

Last week, after visiting Rosecliff for this Thursday’s paper column, I meandered to the Cliff Walk and settled on a small beach between Marine Avenue and Ruggles Avenue, where the waves were wild and white, giving off an “Aquidneck Five-0” vibe. A day later, my commute took me toward Sakonnet, so I dropped by Warrens Point – perhaps my favorite spot in the state. The place is generally inaccessible since the way to it is guarded by a man in a little security booth during the warmer months and, unless you have a boat, you can’t get there without someone claiming you’re trespassing. Some day, when I can afford the jail time, I’ll challenge the blatant abuse of wealth at work here, but that’s a fight for another recession. For now, I’m content to limit my visits to three seasons. Even though signs say the beach is closed; truth is, nature never closes its beaches. Only people do.

As much as we should celebrate every right of way, we should challenge every wrong of way. If I can ever afford to retire (not likely), I’ll start up a Wrong of Way Brigade. We’ll wear buttons that say WOW and march to all of Rhode Island’s inaccessible shore paths, demanding our way to the waves and the wind and the light that belong to nobody but are shared by all souls.

What is your favorite Rhode Island right of way?

Providelphia

Post Mortem: “Body of Proof”

Episode 1 of the made-in-Rhode-Island, set-in-Philadelphia, cadaver-of-the-week drama “Body of Proof” aired last Tuesday (with a second episode squeezed into the ABC Sunday lineup last night), so here are my first impressions:

The series is Hollywood slick, but the acting is uneven, and you would expect a first show to offer a little more edge and originality in either the plot (painfully contrived) or the ensemble characters (painfully familiar and forgettable). Dana Delany plays the main character, Dr. Megan Hunt, a brilliant medical examiner with Sherlock Holmes-esque powers of observation and deduction. Before her forensic career, Hunt was an ace neurosurgeon until a horrific traffic accident left her with a condition that causes her hands to cramp and numb without warning – a handicap that ended her first profession after she killed a woman on the operating table. She has no relationship whatsoever with her 12-year-old daughter, who lives with her embittered ex-husband. And, in a point made repeatedly during the first show, she has no friends. Wow. That’s a lot of baggage to carry.

One problem is that this kind of show has been done to death, and better, ranging from the “CSI” franchise to “Crossing Jordan” (with Jill Hennessy as a crime-solving forensic pathologist in Boston) and “Bones” (with Emily Deschanel as a forensic anthropologist in Washington, D.C.). Hunt’s medical examiner follows in the tradition of these talented, emotionally-stunted women who are more comfortable spending their days among corpses than with the living. In all of these shows, there’s murder and banter in equal doses, a few red herrings to carry the hour, a story arc peppered with obvious sexual chemistry between the female protagonist and her male partner, and throwaway lines of noir humor that border on parody.

In fact, parody might’ve been a better way to go. The genre was lampooned brilliantly in the Nicholas Stoller and Jason Segel movie, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” as the eponymous character spoofed the stock female crime-solver role in “Crime Scene: Scene of the Crime” and, during the final credits, “Animal Instincts.” (Check out the spin-off movie “Get Him to the Greek” for another short Sarah Marshall parody of a TV drama cliche, “Blind Medicine,” in which Kristen Bell plays a visually impaired nurse. Hysterical.)

If only “Body of Proof” had the guts to go all the way for camp. They could’ve invited a weekly celebrity cadaver (in the manner of the old celebrity super-villains on the 1960s “Batman” show, or the celebrity murderer on the not-camp-but-certainly-witty “Columbo”) to draw interest. Pay the standard slab rate to B actors that no longer have the option of going on “Love Boat,” “Fantasy Island” or “Tales from the Crypt.”

Another problem is this whole Providence-Philly mash-up. While the various Rhodyspotting scenes are fun, it’s jolting to see Pennsylvania cops hanging out by the Hot Club or a sudden exterior shot of the Billy Penn tower in the mix. I’m sure the folks in Pennsylvania are saying the same thing we are: “Hey, that’s not Philadelphia!” (Of course, Philly’s a bigger market than La Prov, to borrow a phrase from Phillipe & Jorge – may they rest in peace – which may explain why Rhody isn’t the setting as well as the location shoot.) Also, at least in the first episode, everybody who works in Providelphia (or Phillydence) seems to have spectacular, only slightly varied, views of the same city buildings.

The R.I. Film and TV Office along with many in the Ocean State are rooting for this show for the jobs it will provide and for the exposure it will bring. That’s fine (although let’s not be yahoos about it; if the show settles in as a standard, well-made forensic drama, that’s probably the best we can hope for.) It’s a shame, though. Providence would make a great noir town on the little screen. We have the infrastructure in place for gritty crime drama. Rampant corruption. Colorful real-life characters. The University of Rhode Island even offers a popular forensics lecture series during the academic year.

At any rate, the next time someone decides to film a series in Rhody with a weekly dead body count, let’s hope the autopsy reveals that the last meal included stuffies, wieners and strip pizza, not cheesesteaks.

What do you think of “Body of Proof”?

Pogo Dave Spotting

Highway driving in Rhode Island can be dreary in March. Until the forsythia arrives, and unless the hawks are hovering, there are few highlights on the major roadways. So yesterday’s trip from Barrington to South County and back was a rare treat for me, since I passed Pogo Dave coming and going.

It was my first (and second) Pogo Dave sighting. I passed him on Route 4 sometime before noon and then on I-95 heading back to Providence around 4:30. He drives an All-American red, white and blue automobile with a bull’s head and horns on the hood, various gizmos and stationary bikes mounted on the roof. The car has a sign that reads: “This car is powered with insanity.” A North Providence native, also known as Dave Clayman, Pogo Dave has been parking his car on roadsides throughout Rhode Island performing on his contraption and spreading the gospel of nonsense for 16 years. Somehow, despite driving about 33,000 miles a year in this state for the past 11 years, I’ve never seen him before…until twice in one day.

With the international holiday of pranks, hoaxes and practical jokes set for Friday,* perhaps we should consider making Pogo Dave Rhode Island’s official April Fool. (Although Love 22 might give him a run for his money. We might have to put it to a state vote, as we did during the debate over what should be the official state drink: Del’s lemonade or coffee milk?)

The tradition of April Fool’s Day hoaxes goes back centuries, but the practice seems to have really taken off in modern times. Among the best last year: Starbucks, the coffee chain that sizes its cups as “tall,” “grande” and venti” – a language I generally refer to dismissively as Starbuckian – showed it had a sense of humor by announcing two more sizes: the 128-ounce “plenta” and the two-ounce “micra.” Google changed its name to “Topeka” for the day. And England’s Guardian newspaper announced that after 188 years of printing ink on paper, it would be switching exclusively to publishing on Twitter, after management decided that any story can be told in 140 characters.

Rhode Island hasn’t been at the forefront of a good April Fool’s Day prank in a long time, at least according to the humorologist at the University of South-Central Rhode Island who is often consulted in these matters.

This week’s question: Who is Rhode Island’s April Fool?

* A partial list of tomfoolery that may also include parodies, satires, spoofs, lampoons, follies, frolics, wisecracks, gags, japes, capers, larks, farces, send ups, takeoffs, mockeries, fakes and forgeries.

Roger and We

Following up on last week’s question on how to celebrate Rhode Island’s 375th anniversary – gift ideas under consideration: wampum or Cumberlandite – it looks like the City of Providence wants to party like it’s 1636.

On Wednesday at 5:30 p.m., the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce will conduct a Providence 375 Informational Workshop. From their press release:

HOPE FREEDOM ROOTS INGENUITY
A celebration to honor Roger Williams’ legacy and ideals
In 1636, Roger Williams and a small group of followers landed on the shores of the Seekonk River in Providence’s Fox Point. From May-October 2011, Providence will commemorate the 375th anniversary of the colonial settlement along the shores of the Great Salt Cove.

Among the events: a “My Providence” video contest; a special WaterFire in honor of the 375th; Providence’s Independence Weekend celebration and fireworks; a “Providence 375” gala honoring individuals who exemplify Williams’ legacy and ideals; a National Park Service-sponsored Shakespeare in the Park production; a “Roger Williams Paddle” led by Rhode Island Blueways; a “What does the American dream mean to you?” public art installation at Roger Williams National Memorial; an exhibit on Williams’ “A Key into the Language of America” at The Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology; The Manton Avenue Project’s “375 Roger (Over and Out): the happy-birthday-Providence-plays”; and more.

Conveniently missing from the hoopla is another Roger Williams project announced earlier this month – one that would flesh out the founder’s reputation as a slave trader. In his later years, Williams wasn’t quite the idealist he had been as a younger man. The decades after that moment when Narragansett Indian Sachem Canonicus and his people gifted Williams the land that would become the Rhode Island Colony were marred by conflict between cultures, culminating in King Philip’s War during the 1670s. According to Julianne Jennings, a Native American and former Rhode Island scholar now studying in Arizona, Williams and other colonists held a town meeting on August 1676 that resulted in an agreement to send the community’s American Indian prisoners to the Caribbean, Portugal, Spain and Africa, where they were sold as slaves. (The fact that Williams’ house had been destroyed by native factions in the burning of Providence during March of that year might have contributed to the cranky old free-thinker’s judgment.)

State officials have agreed to a request to erect a plaque somewhere in Providence that will focus on Williams’ role in selling American Indian war captives into slavery. They just haven’t figured out where or when. Given the tendency to deify our historical figures into the realm of myth and legend, there’s probably some resistance to permanently installing a monument to the Bad Roger legacy during the same year we’re celebrating the 375th anniversary of Good Roger’s landing. But there shouldn’t be.

Inherent in every holiday named after a person is the hypocrisy of sanctifying those who were flesh and flawed. The cracks in the faces of the four presidents on Mt. Rushmore are not just weather-related, but metaphoric, a visual reminder that we put masks on our heroes, and don’t really want to see them in their stark complexity. To schoolchildren from Woonsocket to Westerly, Roger Williams is the George Washington of Rhode Island. (Although Washington, truth be told, was no great fan of Rhode Island, skipping it on his horseback journeys until we knuckled under and ratified statehood.) We have this permanent image of Preacher Williams in the long coat and the pilgrim’s hat greeting the local tribes with “What cheer,” befriending natives and colonists regardless of their cultural, political or religious beliefs, and setting the tone for the best of Rhode Island’s ideals and aspirations. As Rhode Islanders, we believe that before there was an American dream, Williams dreamed it. But the truth is far more complicated. Wherever you shine a light you'll see shadows. Which is fine. An exacting curiosity in pursuit of truth and knowledge is always healthier to a functioning society than mindless PR. Anniversaries aren’t just about celebrating the past. They are about surviving it, hopefully with a few lessons learned along the way.

Where should the “Roger Williams, slave trader” plaque be placed?

Rhody Sampler

Wienerpalooza
We had a serious wiener conversation in the office the other day. At issue was the correct spelling of one of Rhode Island’s culinary delights – the New York System Hot Wiener – which has nothing to do with New York and is traditionally spelled “weiner,” at least if you go by some of the oldest establishments in the state: the Original New York System Hot Weiner joint in Providence; Cosmic Steak, Pizza & Weiners in Warwick; Moonlight House of Weiners in Woonsocket; the Wein-O-Rama in Cranston and the Weiner Genie in Lincoln. Of course, not every wiener business spells it the same way. In some locations, the word is “weiner” on the building and “wiener” on the road sign (or vice versa). Our grammar Bible, the A.P. Stylebook, has no entry for wiener. So we are left to our own devices.

Maybe in the future, when other states eventually catch on to the culinary glory of “an arm all the way with an Arizona” – steamed buns stuffed with wieners, meat sauce, mustard, onions and celery salt running from the cook’s palm to the shoulder washed down with a coffee milk – we can do what the Scots do with whisky. Whisky made in Scotland, better known as Scotch, is spelled with no “e;” whereas it’s whiskey if distilled anywhere else. One day, perhaps, only Rhode Island wieners will be spelled officially as “weiners.” (Smells like legislation brewing.) Until that happens, however, we chose “wiener” essentially for grammatical clarity – and also because most of the modern restaurants that get into the wiener business spell it the dictionary way. It may not be as much fun as perpetuating a deliberate typo but it provides a bit of editorial sanity when we have to write about gaggers.

That said, don’t be surprised if a rogue weiner slips into our writing every once in a while.

The reason this came up is because colleague Chris Church wrote a story in the March 10 edition of The North East Independent about the North Kingstown House of Pizza winning an award from the Web site Fork in the Rhode for having the best wieners in the state. The judging was based on sampling more than 100 belly-busters from 34 wiener joints. It’s a nice honor for the Post Road eatery, given that it beat out some classic gagger locales, including the A&W Restaurant in Greenville, Olneyville New York System, Ferrucci’s Original New York System in Arctic, Lumber-Jacks-Pizza ’n Wieners in North Smithfield, Sparky’s Coney Island System in East Providence, Snoopy’s Diner in North Kingstown and (my wiener local) Rod’s Grill in Warren. But another problem with any comprehensive Rhody wiener story is keeping track of all the places that sell them. There’s no telling how many spots were left out of the survey, but Quick Rick’s Sandwich Shop just across the parking lot from our Independent offices sells them, as does Kingston Pizza down the road in Peace Dale. Bishop’s 4th Street Diner in Newport is also a contributor to Rhody’s gagger landscape.

As for the wiener wording, it’s the latest in a long line of Independent grammatical conundrums. Previous discussions – and they can get pretty heated – have established a consistent style for a variety of local terms and cultural references. They include our “two Z” spelling of Verrazzano (the explorer’s name who shares space on the Jamestown Bridge and is spelled differently on various road signs en route; even Wikipedia only gives him one “Z”); our “no H” spelling of jonnycake (even though most Rhode Island jonnycake purists insist that the flour must be made with Rhode Island stone-ground white flint corn to earn the H-less distinction); and whether to “capital the B” in Easter Bunny (A.P., once again, is silent on the matter).

Rhody Universe: Sendai
Odd note from The Weather Channel this weekend, reporting on the earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan, especially the city of Sendai. According to TWC, Sendai’s closet climatological comparison to an American city is Providence. The two municipalities, both located on the northeast corners of their countries, share an uncanny similarity in average high and average low temperatures, average rainfall and average snowfall.

Happy Anniversary, Rhody
In the spring of 1636, Roger Williams crossed the Seekonk River to what would become the Rhode Island side of the New England colonies and dropped anchor in a place he called Providence. That means this spring marks the 375th anniversary of Rhode Island’s founding.

So what would be an appropriate 375th anniversary gift for Rhode Island?

Most anniversary gift lists only go up to 75 or 80 years. According to Wikipedia, the oldest traditional anniversary gift given in the United States (appropriate for age 75) is something with diamonds or gold, although modern lists (up to age 80) have been revised to diamonds or pearls. Traditionally in the United Kingdom it’s oak. Imagine after 80 years of marriage, getting a handful of acorns....

The Knowaguy State

Long before the age of texting, tweeting and posting, Rhode Islanders had their own brand of social media called Knowaguy. Knowaguy was where we went whenever we needed something. Need a job? A plumber? Someone to take hazardous waste off your hands? Don’t worry. I knowaguy. You knowaguy? I knowaguy. Of course you knowaguy. This is Rhode Island. We all knowaguy. Often it’s the same guy, but that’s a post for another day.

Our longstanding culture of “knowaguy” may help explain a factoid buried in Time magazine’s “Person of the Year” cover story on Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (the piece came out on Jan. 3, but we’re a little behind in our magazine reading). Time reports that the world’s most popular social platform is used more in Rhode Island than in any of the Other 49. As of the New Year, 65 percent of the Ocean State used Facebook. (The lowest rate, at 30 percent, was recorded by New Mexico.)

In one respect, it seems odd that the nation’s second-most densely populated state (behind New Jersey) would be the most avid users of Facebook, a site that allows people to stay in touch over long distances. But the convenience of remote communication, it turns out, may not be Facebook’s most vital function. The greater lure is the sense of being part of a community.

Rhode Island’s pre-existing social culture as a place of jostling elbows – whether at the big tables of shore dining halls or the cramped counters and bars of diners and pubs – lends itself ideally to the Facebook format. Relationships matter here in a way that they don’t everywhere. And everything is personal.

My friend Tom and I were talking about this subject yesterday, after a round of golf and during a couple of pints in Warren. Although Facebook is a global phenomenon, Tom believes that it still works best in closed or tight-knit communities, like college campuses, from which it originated. Rhode Island is its own campus, its own neighborhood. Historically we have a low migration rate. Most people are born here and die here. Even those who leave usually come back. [Consider the unofficial University of Rhode Island fight song: I’m Rhode Island born and Rhode Island bred and when I die I’ll be Rhode Island dead…] Which is why in this fragmented time, when a nation that used to gather around the TV to watch Cronkite now chooses between 700 channels and multiple types of media, it’s still possible in Rhode Island to have a conversation that the whole state can engage in. It’s like that old “Coffee Chat” segment on “Saturday Night Live:”

Rocky Point Park. The Blizzard of ’78. The Station Fire.

Discuss.

[Side note: Rhode Island itself was once a topic of discussion on “Coffee Chat.” It went something like: “Rhode Island…Neither a road, nor an island. Discuss.”]

There may be other factors for Rhody’s high Facebook use. The Ocean State is first in the nation for access to broadband coverage, which certainly helps. Its unemployment rate (over 11 percent at last count with the national average hovering around 9 percent) is still one of the highest in the country, so it’s possible that more people in Rhode Island have more time to log on. But it’s also just as likely that Facebook is the high school yearbook that you never put away in the closet, and the whole state of Rhode Island is the high school class that never graduated. Part of our identity as Rhode Islanders is knowing (and being interested in) what other Rhode Islanders are up to at any given moment, whether friends, neighbors, strangers or Buddy.

Your turn: Why does Rhode Island use Facebook more than any other state?