Passeonkquis Cove’s Missing Wharf
In January of 1920, the State Harbor Commission made its annual report to the General Assembly of Rhode Island, cover the year of 1919. In it, as “item number 18”, assent was given to the Ferrier Land Company to build a “to build a wharf in Providence River opposite Gaspee Plateau Shore Plat.” The Gaspee Plateau Shore Plat refers to the area north of Passeonkquis Cove, looking east and south over Gaspee Point. This area was part of the Pawtuxet Purchase and farmed, but was never significantly developed until the 19th century, when it spent a period of time as a golf course, and then was platted out by the Ferrier Land Company.
1938 Aerial Photo of Passeonkquis Cove and Gaspee Point
As far as we can tell, the wharf was never built. The USGS has a nearly hundred year long history of taking aerial photos of the US. In 1938, Passeonkquis Cove was photographed. In the photo, no what is present. It’s possible Ferrier never got around to building a permanent wharf, but it’s also possible there was a temporary wharf between 1919 and 1938 that was destroyed in the ‘38 hurricane.
Though the wharf may have never existed in reality, it did get drafted into the Ferrier Land Company’s advertising. A proposed layout for the area can be seen below and established nearly all of the roads and neighborhoods now present to the north of Passeonkquis Cove.
You can see the old camping supply house near Metropolitan Park, now Salter’s Grove on both the advertising piece and the USGS photo above. Amazingly, the supply house foundations can still be found at the edge of the trees in Salter’s Grove. The bathing beach mostly exists to this day but “Bay Shore Boulevard” has since washed into the bay (or also was never built, though it exists as a paper road at the very end of Gaspee Point Drive).
The layout of the Gaspee Plateau Plat is visible and influences these neighborhoods to this day. In the center of the image along the cover, you can see a “Goddard Ave” that similarly was never built (but also exists as a paper road). Next to it is “Parkside Drive” which currently goes south (“up” in the image) to the Passeonkquis Cove waterfront. If you’ve ever seen Parkside Drive you might have wondered how it got its name. Here we can see that there was supposed to be a long park, following the natural flow of a fresh water spring that runs from Country Club Drive to Passeonkquis Cove. This spring still exists and still runs, though the park is not yet well maintained, especially north (below, in the image) of Narragansett Parkway.
The Gaspee Plateau Plan by the Ferrier Land Company
There’s several additional historic things to note from this early 20th century plan. “Palace Garden Station” is indicated on Narragansett Parkway, which is the old trolley stop on the rail line that now no longer exists (but can be seen) near Warwick Avenue. Conimicut Point is also illustrated in the distance. The illustration is long before the 1938 hurricane and you can easily see how densely built Conimicut was at the turn of the century. Nearly all of these summer cottages were destroyed in the hurricane. And Annmary Brown Drive memorializes Mrs. Brown, who owned a large farming estate prior to the establishment of the country club, which is also memorialized in the drawing. The landscape is verdant and open, hopefully something we can continue to strive for today.
So, whatever happened to the wharf? It seems completely undocumented or mentioned after the 1920 General Assembly session. There is an unusually large amount of rubble at its location on the map, perhaps a remnant