Although the smallest state, Rhode Island is full of interesting tidbits that puts it right up there with the biggest.

Scholastic Journalism & Programming
1. The Harrington School of Communication and Media at the University of Rhode Island
2. Rhode Island PBS Education Services
3. Rhode Island PBS Scholarships for journalists
4. Helen Smith, founder and president of the New England Scholastic Press Association, who has supported high school journalism all over New England, and countries around the world
5. The New England Scholastic Press Association’s annual spring convention in May
6. Twelve Journalism, Graphics, Broadcasting and Media Communications CTEs in RI public schools
7. Rhode Island’s Free Spirit Award winners
8. Rhode Island’s Journalism Education Association Journalist of the Year nominees
9. PBS Student Reporting Labs yearlong programs for high school students
10. PBS Student Reporting Lab summer and winter camp programs and scholarships
11. John Pantalone, writer, editor, reporter and Professor Emeritus of Journalism, University of Rhode Island, and former head of the journalism department
12. Rhode Island Press Association Editorial Awards Competition
13. The Taricani Lecture Series on First Amendment Rights, URI
14. Certified JEA advisers and mentors

Organizations
15. Rhode Island Press Association
16. RI Press Association’s HIgh School Journalism Day
17. The RI Historical Society’s collection of RI periodicals over the course of the state’s history
18. Southern Interscholastic Press Association member
19. PBS NewsHour Reporting Labs
20. The RI Journalism Hall of Fame
21. The Public’s Radio (NPR) in Rhode Island
22. The Rhode Island Supreme Court’s Media Guide for Reporters

Print and Online Media
23. The Rhode Island Digital Newspaper Project
24. Rhode Island’s first newspaper, The Rhode Island Gazette, published in Newport RI between 1732 and 1733
25. Ann Smith Franklin who inherited a printing business from her husband, James Franklin, brother of Benjamin Franklin. In 1758, she started publishing the Newport Mercury, the nation’s oldest newspaper which is owned and published today by the Newport Daily News.
26. The Providence Gazette was founded in 1762
27. The Providence Journal, founded in 1829, winner of four Pulitzers
28. ProJo Deputy Executive Editor Carol Young who served the 45 years, starting as a reporter
29. John Henry Ballou’s Eastern Review (1879–1880), Rhode Island’s first African American newspaper
30. Mark Patinkin, Providence Journal columnist and author for over four decades
31. Eric Rueb, high school sports columnist for the Providence Journal
32. The Block Island Times
33. The Pawtucket Times
34. The Woonsocket Call
35. The Valley Breeze
36. The Newport Daily News
37. The RI Echo
38. The Jamestown Press
39. Newport This Week
40. East Providence Post
41. Barrington Times
42. Bristol Phoenix
43. Motif Magazine
44. RI Latino News (online)
45. Providence Business News
46. The Providence American
47. Publisher John Howell and the Warwick Beacon
48. Cranston Herald
49. Johnston Sunrise
50. Dan McGowan, RI columnist for the Boston Globe
51. Jack White (1942 – October 12, 2005) was an American journalist. He won the 1974 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for his coverage of President Richard Nixon’s underpayment of income taxes
52. Political reporter Ian Donnis of The Public’s Radio, one of RI’s best political reporters; NPR’s Political Round Table host
53. RI Monthly’s “Best Of” issue
54. Brown Daily Herald, owned independently and covering Brown University
55. The Good 5 Cent Cigar, University of Rhode Island
56. The Westerly Sun
57. Rhode Island Monthly and its president/publisher John Palumbo
58. Providence Monthly
59. The Anchor, RI College student newspaper
60. The Cowl, Providence College, student newspaper
61. 12-informa
62. GoLocal Providence
63. The Independent
64. Sakonnet Times
65. Warren Times Gazette
66. The Rhode Island Bureau of the Boston Globe
67. Former ProJ Editorial Page Editor Robert Whitcomb, editor of newenglanddiary.com, a weekly columnist for GoLocal24.com and chairman of The Boston Guardian, that city’s largest weekly.

Broadcasting
68. The call letters, WLNE for our local news affiliate, ABC 6, commonly interpreted as an acronym for “We Love New England”
69. Meredith Vieira, born in Providence and started in local television news
70. Christiane Amanpour, URI graduate and Chief International Anchor for CNN
71. Emmy Award Winner Frank Carpano, NBC10 Sports Director, a 2x Olympic torch carrier and 12x National Association of Sportscasters and Sportswriters “Sportscaster of the Year” winner.
72. Cheryl Hatch, former war correspondent and NPR reporter
73. Bekah Berger, 92ProFM on air personality plus!
74. Cheryl Hatch, journalist and national/international documentary photographer, and local TPR reporter
75. Tim White, son of aforementioned Jack White, investigative journalist and host for WPRI TV
76. Mike Montecalvo, Emmy Award winning WPRI Anchor and Bryant University instructor and broadcast advisor and winner of two national and three regional Edward R Murrow Awards
77. The sweet memory of Salty Brine (Walter Leslie Brine), radio broadcaster and television host of children’s programming
78. The Rhode Show, WPRI
79. WJAR founded in July 1949 with an AM And FM radio station, owned by the Outlet, a RI department store
80. NBC10 (WJAR) and its 2022 New England Emmy for most outstanding newscast-evening (smaller markets)
81. The late Jim Taricani, WJAR investigative reporter and champion of First Amendment Rights
82. Providence born John Joseph McLaughlin, American television personality and political commentator, host of the McLaughlin Group
83. In the earliest years of television in Rhode Island (1950s), all four existing networks shared one primary channel – the NBC affiliate station, where they shared the time.

Just because
84. Rhode Island becomes 13th state to pass “New Voices” legislation (Student Journalists’ Freedom of Expression Act) in 2017
85. Doreen Picozzi, MJE and 2011 Dow Jones Special Recognition Adviser
86. The JEA Advisers Institute coming to Providence, July 2024
87. https://www.writebynight.net/rhode-island/
88. Only 181 miles from the state capital to New York City, and 58.8 miles to Boston, Massachusetts
89. H.P. Lovecraft lived here
90. Pauly D is not from the Jersey Shore – he’s from Rhode Island
91. Since 1785, Bristol, RI has hosted the longest running, unbroken series of 4th of July Independence Day observances in the U.S.

Always a gold mine for news
92. On May 4, 1776 RI became the first state to declare its independence from Great Britain, and was the last of the original 13 colonies to become a state
93. Also was the last to ratify the new American Constitution more than 14 years later on May 29, 1790
94. Polo was played for the first time in the United States in 1876 on Aquidneck Island, near Newport
95. The state was the site of the first open golf tournament in 1985
96. The country’s first circus took place in Newport in 1774.
97. George M Cohan was born in RI
98. Rhode Islanders were the first to strike against the British by sinking an English ship called the Gaspee in Narragansett Bay in 1772.
99. First woman elected Rhode Island Governor, Gina Raimondo, is now Commerce Secretary
100. A great location for film and television: Meet Joe Black, The Great Gatsby (1974), Providence (television series), There’s Something About Mary, True Lies, Hocus Pocus 2, 27 Dresses, Amistad, The Age of Innocence, Good Burger 2, Dumb & Dumber, High Society, Mr. North, The Conjuring, The Gilded Age television series, and many more.