Rhode Island

Coordinates: 41deg42’N 71deg30’W / 41.7degN 71.5degW / 41.7; -71.5 (State of Rhode Island)

Rhode Island (, like road), officially the State of Rhode Island, is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but it is the second-most densely populated after New Jersey. Although most of the island’s land area is on the mainland, it takes its name from this island. Rhode Island borders Connecticut to its west, Massachusetts to its north and south, and the Atlantic Ocean in the south via Rhode Island Sound or Block Island Sound. It also shares a small maritime boundary with New York.

Native Americans lived around Narragansett Bay for thousands of years before English settlers began arriving in the early 17th century. Rhode Island was unique among the Thirteen British Colonies for being founded by a refugee, Roger Williams, who fled religious persecution from the Massachusetts Bay Colony to establish a haven for religious liberty. On land he purchased from local tribes, he founded Providence in 1636. It was the first settlement in North America to have an explicitly secular government.