Woonsocket

Woonsocket stands among the falls and mill streams of the Blackstone valley. Its name recalls the Indigenous people of the surrounding country; Roger Williams used the form Niswosakit when he acquired land from local inhabitants in 1661. The falls later attracted manufacturers seeking water power, and several separate mill villages grew along the river and its tributaries.

In 1810 local partners established the Social Manufacturing Company to spin cotton thread in a small wooden mill on the Mill River. Other enterprises followed around Woonsocket Falls in the 1820s. In 1832 Providence investors bought the Russell mill and established the Woonsocket Mill Company at a village they called Bernon. By the 1830s, textile production was transforming this stretch of the Blackstone into an industrial community.