Wednesday, April 18, 2012 — The following item ran in our “Admiral Fowle’s Piscataqua River Tidal Guide (Not for Navigational Purposes)” for this date:
“1842 — Critics of Rhode Island’s government, which restricts voting to landowning males, hold another election and select Thomas W. Dorr as Governor, giving the state a second government.”
Our reference to a “second government” might seem casual to the point of snark, but Rhode Island’s Secretary of State officially lists Dorr as Governor simultaneously with Samuel Ward King.