The events which led to the granting of the Charter began in July 1763 when James Manning presented a plan for a college to a group of gentlemen in Newport.Charter
This was done at the session of August 1763, at which time a copy was given by Capt.Charter
Accordingly, James Manning, a graduate of New Jersey College (Princeton) in 1762, visited Newport in July 1763, where he met with "about 15 gentlemen of the same denomination" at the home of Deputy Governor John Gardner.Founding
The plan for a college was immediately accepted and a Charter was presented to the August 1763 General Assembly in Newport.Founding
James Manning, who had been sent to Newport in 1763 with the proposal for a Baptist college in the Colony, had settled in Warren and was soon appointed the first pastor of the new Baptist Church there, an offshoot of the church in Swansea, organized in November 1764.Location
James Manning was licensed to preach by the Scotch Plains Baptist Church, February 6, 1763, and ordained April 19, 1763.Manning, James
After his graduation Hezekiah Smith traveled in the South for his health and was ordained in Charleston in September 1763.Smith, Hezekiah
West was also well known for his almanacs, the first of which, "An Almanack, for the year of our Lord Christ, 1763...," was published by William Goddard on Providence’s first printing press.West, Benjamin