The subjects interviewed for Underground Rhode Island were selected, among many possibilities, for several reasons. The eldest were likely to have been part or the "hip" scene around jazz and the Celebrity Club of the 1950s. More than a few had a connection with AS220 and its circle, at some time in the past. And the youngest members have been active in the Rhode Island arts scene, in one way or another, during the last twenty years or so. Not all are either "lost" or "unknown"; some of them have long been prominent. And yet they represent a self-consciously offbeat take on the mainstream culture of Middle America. They are "underground" even when "overground," part of a world more recognizable to Allen Ginsberg (or Bruce Springsteen) than the people in the White House or Wall Street. And they were intriguing to the students who chose to interview them.
You may expect to find a photo--not necessarily from the recent past--a short biography, a recording of the subject's own voice, a verbatim transcript of the interview, and links to related materials. Not all these are present for each interview--some are still being gathered (or recovered)--but they definitely represent a sense of a life and creative work within that life.
John Rector is perhaps most well-known as the owner of Leo's, a popular fringe bar and restaurant that ran in downtown Providence from 1974-1994. Leo's was opened to fulfill a need, mostly in the student community, because local bars were not student-friendly. Leo's soon became a hub of social activity. Rector illuminates some of the details of the counter-culture at the time: who the participants were, where they lived, where they hung out, and why many never left Providence, even after graduating from Brown or RISD. The bar and restaurant ran for twenty years and saw not only internal changes, but also external changes of the city around it.
Leo's serviced a diverse community, all closely entwined with the city of Providence. The bar/restaurant closed in 1994 for several reasons, the most prominent being that there had been little change in the clientele over twenty years. This is, perhaps, yet another example of the insular communities Rhode Island seems to foster.
© 2005