Holy Ghost Church (Providence, RI) Records (CMS 021)
July 15, 2016
CMS 021 documents activities at Holy Ghost Church, an Italian-American Roman Catholic parish in the Federal Hill area of Providence, Rhode Island, between the church’s founding, by Father Luigi Paroli, in 1889, and the parish’s ninetieth anniversary in 1979. Chronologically, the bulk of the collection dates from the tenure of Father Flaminio Parenti, 1922-1964. In terms of types of material, the bulk of the collection consists of photographs from Father Parenti’s personal collection, followed by ephemeral publications, clippings, both loose and arranged in scrapbooks, photocopies of documents about the parish on file elsewhere. Some documents cover the development of what became the Scalabrini Villa Skilled Nursing Home and Rehabilitation Center in North Kingston, Rhode Island, founded in 1955 by the same order of priests that founded Holy Ghost.
Arrangement
The items in CMS.021 are in three groups. Photographs are in Box 1. Box 2 contains news clippings, in scrapbooks and in file folders, and published ephemera from the parish and nursing home. Photocopies of church records from elsewhere and miscellaneous parish records start in Box 2 and continue into Box 3. Souvenir booklets start in Box 3 and continue into Box 3A.
In 1889, Reverend Luigi Paroli P.S.S.C. established the Holy Ghost Church to accommodate the growing number of Italian immigrants living in the Federal Hill area of the city. The church was completed in 1910. The collection sheds light on both parish life and the life and activities of its pastor Flaminio Parenti, who administered the parish from 1922-1964.