Foster Center, RI

Foster Center is the civic village of Foster, Rhode Island, near the state's western border along Route 94. Its historic district was added to the National Register in 1974 and holds colonial and Greek Revival houses, the late-18th-century town building, and a collection of buildings that grew around the old crossroads. Foster's first town meeting met at Thomas Hammond's tavern in 1781; the center's town pound dates to 1732, giving the village a public role older than the state road.

That civic role continues in the Foster Town Hall and the Foster Center Baptist Church, while the Foster Center Public Library occupies the former Hemlock School. The old town jail and meetinghouse are part of the same historic cluster, and town government still operates from Foster Center. Route 94 leads north toward Glocester and south toward Clayville, linking the village to the rest of Foster's wooded, spread-out town. Foster Center is a compact New England center where town meetings, old houses, local institutions, and the highway still share one crossroads.