South Elmwood

The community of South Elmwood is located at the southern most tip of Providence and consists of the few, primarily residential, blocks surrounding Roger Williams Park. It is also bounded by the Cranston city line on the west and south and Interstate 95 on the north. Roger Williams Park is the centerpiece of South Elmwood and consumes the majority of the neighborhood's land area. The park, which consists of 432 acres, including 140 acres of water, was bequeathed to the city by Betsy Williams in 1871, after the area was annexed back to Providence.

When the City of Cranston was sectioned off and established in 1754, it included South Elmwood and parts of Elmwood, South Providence, and Washington Park. Throughout the second quarter of the nineteenth century the Elmwood section of Providence experienced rapid expansion. During this period, the most important industry in the area was the provisions trade. A cluster of slaughterhouses was built there in the early 1850s.

The development and urbanization in the areas of Elmwood and South Providence during this period, caused rural native-born Cranston residents to want its annexation by Providence. In an effort to make the government more workable, two voting districts were created in 1858, one in Knightsville, the other at the new town clerk's office at Elmwood and Potters Avenues. The former represented the traditional native agrarian Republican stronghold and the latter represented a growing Irish community which supported the Democratic Party.

By 1868, the Irish community in the South Providence and Elmwood area threatened the position of the Republican politicians of Cranston, who feared a Democrat might be elected as the town's only senator in the state legislature, as had already happened in Providence. With the support of the Republican-dominated state government, Cranston ceded what are now the South Providence, Elmwood, South Elmwood, and Washington Park neighborhoods back to the city of Providence. These actions both enlarged the capital city and strengthened the Republican predominance in state politics and the surrounding rural towns.

South Elmwood's transformation from a rural town to a suburban neighborhood was a gradual one. The area did not see much development until the 20th century and even then, the development during the early stages consisted of scattered residential dwellings. A Providence Journal article in 1909 reported that "there is only one small store of candy, soda and newspaper variety, and a place on the river where boats are let. There is also a kennel, at which dogs and cats are boarded, and the feature of this place is that it has a sign on which the name South Elmwood is plainly painted-the only place where the name is seen."

There was also no post office and no church, but there was a school house in the middle of South Elmwood. Today, South Elmwood is a residential neighborhood of primarily two-story dwellings. It is a small, middle-class neighborhood comprised mostly of owner-occupied, single family homes.

According to the 2000 census, 2,184 residents lived in South Elmwood, an increase of 8.3 percent from 1990. During the past decade, the nonwhite population in South Elmwood increased to represent 61% percent of all residents. In 2000, 32.9 percent of South Elmwood residents were Hispanic (more than tripling from 1990); 7.6 percent were Asian; 18.2 percent were African American; and 1.6 percent were Native Americans. Three out of four persons aged 25 or older had completed high school in 2000. Education, health, and social services (24%) and manufacturing (20%) were the leading sources of employment for South Elmwood residents in 2000. The unemployment rate in South Elmwood in 2000 was 5 percent, almost half the citywide rate of 9.2 percent, and a 57% decrease from 1990.

The median family income in South Elmwood in 1999 was $42,896, twenty-five percent higher than the citywide median family income. The incidence of poverty in South Elmwood doubled between 1990 and 2000. In 1990, 7.2 percent of persons were poor, versus 16% in 2000. In 2000, 15 percent of families were living below poverty, 22 percent of children were poor, and 12% of elderly were living in poverty, whereas in 1990 there were no elderly with incomes below the poverty level.

The number of housing units in South Elmwood increased by 15 percent between 1990 and 2000. The proportion of housing units that were owner-occupied decreased from 57 to 46.5 percent during this same period. Almost half of all housing is single unit homes (46%) and 42% are two to four family units. Three out of four housing units were built more than 40 years ago, and more than nine out of ten units were constructed more than 20 years ago. The median residential sales price in South Elmwood in 2000 was $189,250, 14 percent lower than the citywide median. The median rent in South Elmwood was 1.6 percent higher than the citywide median rent.
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Sources: South Elmwood: Neighborhood Analysis, Department of Planning and Urban Development (City of Providence, 1977) and Providence: A Citywide Survey of Historic Resources, edited by William McKenzie Woodward and Edward F. Sanderson (Rhode Island Historical Preservation Commission, 1986).