Happy Wednesday! I'm Dan McGowan, and I highly recommend a new book called "The Price" about the business of college football. Follow me on X (Twitter) @DanMcGowan
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Rhode Map Live:Join us on Dec. 11 for a special live event in the ballroom of the Providence G about the future of the Rhode Island Foundation. You can register here. Marquis Buchanan was walking off the field and celebrating the University of Rhode Island football team’s miracle comeback last Saturday when his brother delivered the devastating news.
Mom just got a call. There was a fire.
Buchanan, a former Classical High School star who is now the 9-2 Rams’ leading receiver, had just posted another monster stat line – six catches for 132 yards – to help the team rally from a 17-0 halftime deficit to defeat Albany 20-17. That secured URI’s first unbeaten season at home since 1985.
Now his success on the gridiron was the furthest thing from his mind. The triple-decker on Georgia Avenue in Providence's Washington Park neighborhood that he has called home since high school had caught fire, destroying the first two floors and causing severe damage to the Buchanan family’s third-floor apartment.
“I was wondering how it happened,” Buchanan said. “I told everyone we would be fine. It’s not the end of the world.”
Investigators believe a brush fire that started outside – possibly from a cigarette that wasn’t fully put out – extended to the home. No one was injured in the fire, but Buchanan said his siblings lost a lot – especially clothes heading into the winter months.
“My sister really got the worst of it,” Buchanan said.
There’s a GoFundMe already set up to help support the Buchanan family as they prepare to move into a new apartment.
As for Buchanan, he is trying to focus on the Rams’ last regular season game this week at Bryant. With another big game, the redshirt sophomore could reach 1,000 receiving yards on the season.
His long-term goal: Make it to the NFL.
“That’s always end goal,” Buchanan said. So if anything like this ever happens, my family won’t have to worry about anything.”
🤔 So you think you're a Rhode Islander...
Who is the last person elected to the US Senate from Rhode Island to not be a Democrat or Republican? (You can find the answer below.)
Mea culpa: Yesterday, I wrote that Ted Turner graduated from Brown in 1960. He was actually expelled from Brown, but he has received two honorary degrees from the university.
Do you have the perfect question for Rhode Map readers? Don't forget to send the answer, too. Shoot me an email today.
The Globe in Rhode Island
⚓ If you're confused about Providence's latest financial crisis with its school system, Steph Machado has the perfect explainer for you. Read more.
⚓ The Town Council in Burrillville has voted against renewing the entertainment license for “The Conjuring House,” the supposedly haunted 18th-century farmhouse that attracts droves of thrill seekers, ghost hunters, and paranormal skeptics to the small, rural New England town every year. Read more.
⚓ A correctional officer must now serve time in federal prison for smuggling drugs into the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls. Read more.
⚓ A record 28 million people visited Rhode Island in 2023 — a more than 2 percent increase — as tourism continued to improve since the pandemic. Read more.
⚓ In an opinion piece for Globe Rhode Island, the leaders of the Rhode Island branch of the Conservation Law Foundation write that city leaders are siding with the possibility of future jobs and profits for polluting industries over the health and well-being of South Side residents. Read more.
You can check out all of our coverage at Globe.com/RI
Also in the Globe
⚓ Massachusetts officials on Tuesday approved a report with broad suggestions to alleviate the state’s strained emergency shelter system as the annual price tag for operating the network mounts amid increased need from migrants and Massachusetts residents facing homelessness. Read more.
⚓ Brandeis has launched a new program that will cover the full cost of tuition for students from families with yearly incomes under $75,000. Read more.
⚓ Mired in a three-game losing streak, the latest lowlight in a difficult and disappointing start to the season, the Bruins Tuesday fired Jim Montgomery, just two years after he won the Jack Adams Award as the NHL’s top coach. Read more.
⚓ Rhode Map readers, if you want the birthday of a friend or family member to be recognized Friday, send me an email with their first and last name, and their age.
⚓ We're expecting to learn the more about how much Providence owes it school department from Judge Jeffrey A. Lanphear sometime today.
⚓ State Treasurer James Diossa and other leaders will be in Warwick at 11 a.m. to announce details on the RISavers Program Partnership, that state's first-ever public retirement savings program for Rhode Island private sector employees currently lacking that option at their workplace.
🏆 Pop quiz answer
John Hopkins Clarke was a member of the Whig Party and served from 1847 until 1853.
RHODE ISLAND REPORT PODCAST Ed Fitzpatrick talks to Brown University student Khadija Nazari and Anne Sliney about a new nonprofit called Support for Afghan Girls’ Education (SAGE).
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