National Register of Historic Places

West Side Diner in Providence, Rhode Island

West Side Diner, at 1380 Westminster Street in Providence, Rhode Island, is a classic art deco, stainless steel 1947 Kullman model diner. Walter Scott began the first lunch cart/wagon service in Providence, Rhode Island in 1872, the precursor to modern diners and fast food establishments. Joseph and Mary Poirier opened this diner in 1947 on Atwells Avenue and operated it until 1955.

Like many diners, it had many owners and many names over the years, including Top Hat, Krystal’s, and El Faro. It closed in 1999, but a man named Jon Özbek saved it from the wrecking ball. It was restored and moved to its current location in 2011. It reopened two years later with new owners and a new name, the West Side Diner. It was added National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

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Diner Resources

Al Mac’s Diner-Restaurant in Fall River, Massachusetts

Al Mac’s Diner-Restaurant, at 135 President Avenue in Fall River, Massachusetts, is a 1953 DeRaffele model. The diner’s namesake, Al McDermott, began selling food in 1910 to mill workers from a horse cart. He opened this location, alongside a host of other restaurants, in the 1950s. Al Mac’s in Fall River was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. It is currently owned by the Dunse family, who acquired it in 2013.

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Diner Resources

Forest Hills Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts

Designed by landscape architect Henry A. S. Dearborn and opened in 1848, Forest Hills Cemetery, at 95 Forest Hills Avenue in Boston, Massachusetts, is a historic rural cemetery. The area was originally owned by the town of Roxbury, until Boston annexed Roxbury in 1868. Its forested paths wind their way through 275 acres, in which approximately 16,000 people are laid to rest. Like many rural cemeteries, Forest Hills doubles as a garden and arboretum.

Brookline architect Charles W. Panter designed Forest Hills Cemetery’s Gothic-Revival main gate, which was erected in 1865. It is made from Roxbury puddingstone and buff sandstone, which gives it a distinct appearance. An inscription from Psalm 121 over the entrance reads, “He that keepeth thee will not slumber.”

Memorial to Louis Ernest Mieusset (1881-1886), son of Louise Helluin Mieusset, who designed fashionable hats for Boston’s elites. She paid for this hauntingly lifelike white marble statue of her son sitting in a boat with all his favorite toys with money she saved for his schooling, leaving her grief stricken and penniless in her old age. According to popular lore, Louis drowned in Jamaica Pond, but some researchers maintain he actually died of scarlet fever.

Monmouth Battlefield State Park

In 1778, two armies slugged it out in sweltering heat in these east-central New Jersey fields. Though technically a draw, the Continental Army showed it could finally stand toe-to-toe with the best soldiers in the British Army.

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The Battle of Monmouth Court House was fought on June 28, 1778 between American forces commanded by General George Washington and Major Generals Nathanael Greene, William Lord Stirling Alexander, Charles Lee, and Marquis de Lafayette and British forces commanded by Lt. Gen. Charles Cornwallis and Lt. Gen. Baron Wilhelm von Knyphausen near Freehold, New Jersey during the American Revolutionary War. The battle was a tactical draw, with both sides exhausted after fighting the longest battle of the war in brutal heat.

After France’s entry into the war on the American side, British Lt. Gen. Sir Henry Clinton withdrew his army from Philadelphia and retreated toward New York City, which was under British control. He sent several thousand Tory volunteers and most of his supplies down the Delaware River, while his remaining 10,000-man army marched overland. General Washington’s 12,000-man army caught up with them at Monmouth Court House.

Washington sent Maj. Gen. Charles Lee and Marquis de Lafayette forward with 5,000 men to attack Clinton’s 1,500-man rearguard. When Clinton turned Maj. Gen. Cornwallis’ forces around to strike Lee’s left flank, the Americans broke and withdrew in confusion. Just then, General Washington arrived ahead of the rest of his army and sharply rebuked Lee. He cobbled together a defensive line, but that also broke under relentless British attacks. Washington’s third line held.

Ralph’s Rock Diner in Worcester, Massachusetts

Ralph’s Rock Diner, at 148 Grove Street in Worcester, Massachusetts, is a 1930 Worcester model, #660. The Worcester Lunch Car Company operated in this city from 1906 to 1957 and manufactured hundreds of lunch carts and classic diners. Robert and Mamie Gilhooly originally opened this diner on Grove Street in Worchester’s Chadwick Square (hence the name, Chadwick Square Diner).

After Gilhooly’s death in 1955, James and Mary Clingen purchased the diner. In 1979, ownership passed to Ralph Moberly, who moved the diner to its current location, next to a brick fire station. This unique establishment is a bar and music venue. it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

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Diner Resources

Hubbardton Battlefield State Historic Site

This small park and museum commemorates the only Revolutionary War battle fought in what would become the State of Vermont.

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The Battle of Hubbardton was fought on July 7, 1777 between British and German forces commanded by Brigadier General Simon Fraser and Baron Friedrich Adolf Riedesel and American forces commanded by colonels Ebenezer Francis, Nathan Hale, and Seth Warner near Hubbardton, Vermont during the Revolutionary War. The British won the battle but failed to follow up their victory.

In June 1777, British Lt. Gen. John Burgoyne headed south along Lake Champlain in one prong of a multi-pronged attack designed to split New England from the rest of the American Colonies. On July 5, the British recaptured Fort Ticonderoga after hauling artillery up to the summit of Mount Defiance. The roughly 4,000-strong American garrison fled without a fight. Major General Arthur St. Clair left Colonel Seth Warner of the Green Mountain Boys Regiment near Hubbardton with a 1,200-man rearguard while the main body continued its southern retreat.

Brig. Gen. Simon Fraser, commanding some 1,030 of Burgoyne’s most experienced troops, including German Brunswick jägers and grenadiers, was in hot pursuit. They initially surprised Warner’s rearguard in the early morning hours, but the Americans regrouped on a hill and put up stubborn resistance. Though wounded, Colonel Francis of the 11th Massachusetts Regiment directed his men to attack a vulnerable point on the British left flank.