by Katherine Imbrie - Journal Staff Writer, July 10, 2003, Providence Journal article
Here in Rhode Island, we tend to take our history for granted, but for people from other parts of the country - or, for that matter, the world - history is a big reason to travel here. And millions of them do so each year. Many head for Newport, where the combination of opulent mansions, seacoast, shopping, restaurants and 350 years of richly varied history exert a powerful pull. Once they get here, these tourists want to get their history in an easy-to-digest form, and many choose to go on one of a handful of historical walking tours of Newport that are offered by individual entrepreneurs as well as by the city's Historical Society, which uses several different guides to lead its tours.
Pausing near the White Horse Tavern, Rafael tells her flock how in the 1960s, the 17th-century building was days away from being torn down to make way for a gas station when benefactors stepped in to buy and save it. But problems remained: By law, an establishment serving alcohol could not be situated close to churches - of which there were two near the White Horse. In the end, explains Rafael, a special law was passed to permit the tavern to open under an exception applying only to establishments built prior to 1700.
Pointing out the plaques attached to several houses in the Point area, Rafael explains how, some 40 years ago, a group of Newport housewives - alarmed at plans to demolish the area's historic buildings - formed Operation Clapboard to buy, restore, and sell them to people who would keep them intact.
Rafael's historical patter in the Visitor Center and decided it was just the kind of thing she wanted to hear for the next 90 minutes. She wasn't disappointed. At the end of the tour, she said of Rafael, "She made lots of pieces of history that I hadn't quite understood come together for me quite clearly." It is clear to anyone who goes on one of her tours that Rafael loves her city with a passion. Having first visited Newport as a child, she was smitten and moved here almost as soon as she was old enough to, in 1977. She volunteered as a guide for the Historical Society before starting her own company. There is almost no question about Newport, past or present, for which Rafael does not have the answer. Aware, as the best guides are, that the street is her "stage," she takes care to place herself with her back to the site she is talking about and in a spot where the background noise will be minimal. If it's hot, she looks for shade. If it's raining, she comes prepared with umbrellas. And like the best stage actors, she loses herself in her character - in this case, the character of Newport, for which she makes herself a conduit. She has just 90 minutes to get her audience to appreciate the city - with all its flaws, eccentricities and glory - as she does.
It might sound easy, but it's difficult to do well. A tour guide has at least a double challenge: Like an actor, he or she needs to hold the attention of an audience that might be two people or 10, that might be jet-lagged or hot, and that might already know a lot about history or nothing at all. Like a teacher, the tour guide needs to be instructive without being boring, and also to focus on delivering the facts while being prepared to answer the un-expected question - if need be, with the truthful answer, "I don't know."
Along the way, Newport being a busy city in summer, the tour guide has to contend with a background cacophony of roaring motorcycles, backfiring trucks, whining lawnmowers and bellowing teenagers. It's a tough job, so tough that the only Newport guide to have survived it for more than a year or two is Anita Rafael, who started her walking-tour company Newport On Foot 13 years ago.Ironically, as Rafael points out, these gravestones - "the only art we have from these people who lived here in the 1600s and early 1700s" - are legally "protected" from hobbyists who would like to use paper and soft crayons to make grave-rubbings, only to be regularly assaulted by modern grass-cutting machinery to the point that some stones have developed waists. "Look, here's a chip that's just come off," says Rafael crisply, bending to pick up a fingernail-sized flake of slate from the grass. "Before the weed-whackers, this stone had lasted here for more than 300 years.
"Then there is the story of Doris Duke, whose Newport Restoration Foundation in the 1960s and '70s bought dozens of houses in what is now the historic district and restored them, keeping ownership and renting them out. "Today, those houses rent for between $1,800 and $2,000 a month, and some people have lived in them for decades," explains Rafael. Her audience is impressed. Val Nogas, a Canadian on her first visit to Newport, says that the only other place she's been to in New England - Cape Cod - had "the odd old house, but nothing like this."The count At stop after stop, Rafael emphasizes Newport's significance as one of the country's oldest cities. "We have 200 buildings here that are more than 200 years old - more than any other city. We get people from time to time who argue that point, but we've counted them, so we know."
Using props such as historical maps and photos to help place the present-day Newport in context, Rafael moves briskly through her routine and employs liberal doses of humor to make her points. A pet peeve is the damage that city workers wielding weed-whackers do to the fragile 17th-century slate gravestones in Governors Burial Ground.“Back to the days” Setting off briskly from the Visitor Center on a recent Tuesday morning, Rafael leads her flock of eight tourist ducks a couple of blocks away, to a spot where she can discuss Newport's history in terms of its architecture: “That carved pineapple over the front door is a symbol of welcome," she says. "It goes back to the days when a sea captain would stick a pineapple outside his door to announce that he was back from the Indies with a load of the latest goods for sale.
Although Rafael hires and trains other guides as back-ups during periods when she is especially busy, she generally leads her own tours four mornings a week during the summer. Newport On Foot tours start at 9:30 a.m. from the Gateway Visitor Center, where tourists who are milling around in search of advice on where to go and what to do often decide on the spur of the moment to go on a guided tour with the tall, smiling brunette wearing a Newport On Foot tour-guide badge.
All tours follow a similar format: 1 ½ to 2 hours of strolling and stopping while the tour guide discusses about a dozen key sites, most of them within a several-block area of Newport's historic district, including Washington Square, the Friends Meeting House, the Artillery Company and Trinity Church. In most cases, the guides talk about the sites from the outside only, leaving tourists to come back and visit the interiors on their own. "Before you leave Newport, you should go in there after 4 o'clock and before the dinner crowd comes in, and ask for a tour," says Rafael. "Do you realize that most Americans have never been inside a building that's more than three centuries old?"
From the White Horse, it's on to the Washington Square Green, with the Colony House, a former Rhode Island capitol building, at its head.Then to Touro Synagogue ("If you have time, you should go inside. It's one of the most beautiful interiors in the city."), the Newport Artillery Company ("You know how soldiers always come back home with a lot of stuff? Well, they have a lot of stuff in there, and you can visit on Saturday mornings."), and a private early-1700s house on Clarke Street ("On one of my tours, I asked a group of children how do you tell when a house is very old. And this kid pipes up, 'It would have a plaque on it' ").By 11 a.m., Rafael's eight tourists have gotten a crash course in Newport, Rhode Island and United States history, with a little Architecture 101 and modern culture (Steven Spielberg's Amistad movie, which was shot in Newport) thrown in. There's no final exam, but the visitors from Canada and Wisconsin - and even some from Rhode Island - know they've learned a lot. Rafael gets a ripple of applause as she concludes the tour at Trinity Church.
Rafael continues: "Well, the way you can really tell is that the really old houses tend to have very large chimneys and very steep roofs. And the door is usually to the side rather than in the middle. You can't tell by looking at the foundations, because in many cases in cities, these houses have been moved around.""Rhode Island was the last colony to sign up to be a state. It wanted to be independent, not part of a union," says Rafael. "Until they did sign, George Washington refused to set foot in Rhode Island. Later, he did come, and he really enjoyed himself."
But the questions aren't over just yet. Heads full of history, now it's time to fill bellies. These folks are on vacation, after all. "Where can we go for good seafood?" one person asks, and others hang back to hear the answer. Rafael considers for a second or two, gauging her audience. "If you want to be right on the water, the Mooring or the Marina Grill. If not, Scales and Shells on Thames Street."
Smiles all around. It's just about time for lunch.