College Hill, Providence, Rhode Island

College Hill is a neighborhood in Providence, Rhode Island, and one of six neighborhoods comprising the East Side of Providence and part of the College Hill Historic District. It is roughly bounded by South and North Main Street to the west, Power Street to the south, Governor Street and Arlington Avenue to the east and Olney Street to the north. College Hill is also home to Thayer Street, a shopping strip frequented by students in the Providence area.

College Hill is the most affluent neighborhood in Providence, with a median family income of nearly three times that of the city as a whole.

College Hill has been designated as one of the Great Places in America by the American Planning Association in 2011. College Hill became an example of Historic Preservation planning in 1959.

The name refers to various major educational institutions established in the neighborhood: Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design, Pembroke College and the now relocated Bryant University. Prior to their development, the area was known as Prospect Hill.

The region was familiar to the local Wampanoag people when it was suggested that a refugee group recently expelled from the Plymouth Colony should settle upon a small hill on the right bank of the Seekonk River. Led by Roger Williams, after his 3-month winter encampment with Massasoit before escaping from Boston in Dec 1635, he and a small group of families bounded together by religious faith arrived on the west side of the hill. After friendly agreement with chief sachems of the Narragansett Canonicus and Miantonomi, and with providence aforethought, Williams and his group set camp.

By 1644, Williams along with Chad Brown and the ancient settlement of Providence had taken root at College Hill.

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