TURKEYS By the Bay

I lived in Rhode Island for much of my life, along beautiful Narragansett Bay, a large coastal area that has constant offshore breezes and once hosted the famous America’s Cup sailing tournaments. The bay was named for a local Native American tribe whose name roughly translates to “people of the small point.” The bay is a relatively protected body of water surrounded by land and filled with islands that create a mild climate, with cooler summers and warmer winters compared with the rest of the state.

This region was home to early large agricultural plantations of the Colonies, which produced some of the most iconic American poultry and livestock breeds. These include the Narragansett Pacer horse (now extinct), the Narragansett turkey, the Bronze turkey, the Rhode Island White chicken, and, perhaps the most famous chicken breed of all, the Rhode Island Red. The Narragansett turkey never became as famous as the Rhode Island Red, but it nonetheless made an