Eddie Forbes, age 11, of Scottsbluff, Neb., for his question:
HOW DID RHODE ISLAND GET ITS NAME?
Historians disagree on how the smallest state in the United States received its name. Some believe Giovanni da Verrazano, an Italian navigator working for France, named it Rhode Island in 1524 because he believed it resembled the Island of Rhodes in the Mediterranean Sea.
Other historians believe that a Dutch navigator named Adriaen Block named the region in 1614. He called an island in Narragansett Bay "Roodt Eylandt," which means Red Island. Block used this name because of the red cliffs on the island's shore.
The territory was firmly established with the Rhode Island name in 1636 when a first white settlement was established at Providence by a minister named Roger Williams who had been driven out of Massachusetts. Williams bought land for the new colony from the Narragansett Indians.
Three other Rhode Island colonies were founded in 1638, 1639 and 1643. Williams suggested that the four settlements unite for protection and a charter from the English Parliamentary Commission was issued in 1644. In 1663, King Charles II of England granted Rhode Island a second charter called the Charter of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
In 1774, the residents of Rhode island prohibited the importation of slaves. And two years later, on May 4, in 1776, it declared its independence from England. Rhode Island thus became the first colony to so declare its independence.
Rhode Island became the 13th state when it ratified the United States Constitution on May 29, 1790.
During the late 1700s, textile manufacturing became the state's most important industry. The first hand operated cotton spinning jenny in the United States was built in Providence in 1789. The first water powered machines for spinning cotton were built in Pawtucket in 1790.
At the turn of the century, Rhode Island became the nation's leading whaling center.
More than 24,000 Rhode Island residents joined the Union Army and Navy during the Civil War. After the war, the state's population doubled between 1870 and 1900 as prosperity flourished.
During the late 1800s and early 19008, the textile industry developed worldwide markets and other industries started and expanded.
Newport became the home of the Naval War College and the Newport Naval Station and the town became the summer home of many wealthy railroad and banking families.
The University of Rhode Island's complex at Saunderstown is today one of the nation's finest centers for oceanographic research