One of Dr. Barry K. Douglas’ original drawings is being featured on the cover of the Northeastern Society of Plastic Surgeons regional conference journal for the fourteenth year. Dr. Douglas’ artwork in previous years have included locations such as Baltimore, Boston, Florida, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Bermuda and others.
In this artwork, he chooses to feature the Marble House mansion in Newport, Rhode Island. This national historic landmark is a Vanderbilt mansion located on Bellevue Avenue. The Marble House is a social and architectural symbol that portrays Newport’s transformation over the years.
Dr. Douglas uses acrylic paints with an ink overlay to depict the Gold Room in this grand mansion. There are many references to the history of the Marble House and Rhode Island embedded in this cover artwork, such as the architect of the mansion and the year it was built.
Can you find the facts and numbers pertaining to the mansion and Rhode Island history?
1. What is the name of the mansion depicted in this interior scene of the ‘Gold Room’?
2. When was it built?
3. Who was the architect?
4. Who was the interior designer?
5. How much did it cost to build at the time?
6. What famous architectural structure was its inspiration?
7. How many cubic feet of a metamorphic rock used in sculpture were used?
8. For whom was the mansion built?
9. Among the blue bloods of the time, what did they call their mansions?
10. Rhode Island is the smallest state. How many square miles does it occupy?
11. Rhode Island was the last of the original 13 colonies to become a state. What year?
12. Rhode Island was founded by whom? He was considered by Adams and Jefferson to have laid the foundation for principles in the First Amendment
13. The First Baptist Church in America was founded by #12 in what year?
14. The first synagogue in the United States was established in Rhode Island: name and date?
15. The highest point in Rhode Island is 812 feet above sea level. Name the peak.
16. The first circus in the US was in Rhode Island in what year?
17. Rhode Island native George Cohan’s life and music were depicted in what 1942 Academy Award winning film?
18. 450cc high profile round smooth gels.
Answer Key
1. Marble House
2. 1892
3. Richard Morris Hunt
4. Jules Allard
5. $11,000,000! (In today’s dollars, that would be $250,000,000)
6. Petit Trianon of Varsailles
7. 500,000ft^3
8. William Vanderbilt, one of the many grandchildren of the Commodore Vanderbilt who tried to ‘out-mansion’ each other. George Washington Vanderbilt won (Biltmore in Asheville, NC)
9. Cottage
10. 1214 mi^2
11. 1790
12. Roger Williams
13. 1638
14. Touro Synagogue 1763
15. Jerimoth Hill
16. 1774
17. Yankee Doodle Dandy
18. Allegorical frieze upper right
