Photo of the Day: Carrie Tower, Brown University

In late October 10 years ago, I visited Brown University while vacationing in Providence, R.I. I was impressed with the architecture of the Ivy League campus, but, with so much happening in my world and my life the last decade, I had little reason to think back on it.

Until late yesterday, that is, when I saw the first awful news of yesterday’s campus shooting that left two students dead and nine others injured.

Among the photos I took 10 years ago was this one of the 95-foot-tall campanile clocktower on the Quiet Green adjacent to the Van Wickle Gates, Hope College and University Hall.

Carrie Tower was named for Carrie Mathilde Brown, granddaughter of Brown University namesake Nicholas Brown Jr., whose death in 1892 after 16 years of marriage devastated her husband, Count Paul Bajnotti of Turin, Italy. The widower left this tangible reminder of his wife in the city where they first met.

Preeminently, then, Carrie Tower stands for the enduring power of love—a force so strong, according to the monument's inscription, that "Love is Strong as Death." The truth of that statement will be tested in the days ahead, not just at Brown but in gun-maddened America. 

Photo of the Day: State House, Providence, RI

When I visited Providence in October 2015, the imposing State House of Rhode Island was just a few blocks from where I stayed. Whether or not it is the most beautiful state house in the nation, as locals claim, this white marble building is unquestionably designed to inspire awe, as one might expect from a structure created by the great American architectural firm of the late 19^th century, McKim, Mead, and White.

Completed in 1901, the building—330 feet long, 180 feet wide and 233 feet high—dominates Smith Hill, and is visible from most of downtown and many approaching highways..

There is plenty that could be discussed, from a historical and architectural viewpoint, about the State House, including the “Independent Man” statue at its top; the statues of two local military heroes, Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry and General Nathanael Greene; and an object that I discussed previously, its "Gettysburg Gun."

But the immediate, astonishing feature of the State House—one apparent in the photograph here that I took at the time—was its dome, the fourth-largest self-supporting one in the world, behind only St. Peter’s Basilica, the Minneapolis State Capitol, and the Taj Mahal. It’s so big that a number of cupolas surround this main dome.

Photo of the Day: Grace Episcopal Church, Providence, RI

I took this photo five years ago this past October, when I was on vacation in Rhode Island. This year, Grace Episcopal Church has been temporarily closed due to the coronavirus.

When the crisis clears, this institution in downtown Providence will be well worth a visit. Though the community sustaining the church dates back to 1829, its current home was built in 1846, according to specifications by Richard Upjohn.

Upjohn, an immigrant from Britain, was the go-to architect for the Episcopal Church when the denomination was in the midst of a building expansion in the U.S. (Trinity Church in New York may be his most famous project.)

Grace Episcopal has its own distinction as the first asymmetrical Gothic Revival Church in America. Its beauty was enhanced in 1912 with the addition of a chancel by architect Ralph Adams Cram.

Photo of the Day: Brown University, Providence, RI, Fall 2015

I took this picture on the campus of Brown University five years ago, while I was on vacation in Providence, RI. Obviously, the absence of masks is a giveaway that this was taken before the pandemic.

I feel sorry for the successors to these students and their counterparts around the country today who are living in fear and not enjoying the experience of college the way that those who graduated before this year did. I can only hope that today’s will help the world find its way to a better, brighter place than the one we are in now.