
The benches were given to the RIHS in 2008 by the Brooklyn Museum of Art, which was undergoing reorganization and deaccessioning items not relevant to their mission. Because of the label pasted to the underside of the stools, the Museum donated them to the RIHS.
With a little detective work in the RIHS Library, we were able to find two John Snows in Providence who were candidates for pew ownership, but we still didn’t know which church. And was he John Snow, or John B. Snow, lawyer with Burges and Snow?

Snow had been a member of the church since 1769; he was born on June 26 of that year, and baptized on August 7, recorded in the list of members of the Beneficent Congregational Church (MSS 291, folder 3). We still don’t know what his profession yet, but now we know he used these benches in Pew 45 on the lower floor of the Beneficent Congregational Church from 1816 on.
~Kirsten Hammerstrom, Director of Collections