Scarborough, Galilee & Jerusalem Hurricane Risk: The Harbor Mouth's Own Story
Scarborough, Galilee, and Jerusalem are not a separate town -- they are villages within Narragansett, Rhode Island, sitting at the outermost, ocean-facing edge of a town that this site's own Narragansett hurricane-risk page already covers in depth: the 1938 hurricane that swept away Whale Rock Light and killed its keeper, Hurricane Carol's 14.4-foot bay surge in 1954, and Hurricane Sandy's quieter 2012 pass. Those town-wide storms reached this exact stretch of coast too -- Galilee and Jerusalem are on record as having suffered severe coastal damage in 1938 -- but this page is not a rerun of that one. It goes narrower: a 100-foot wind turbine actually toppled at the Port of Galilee in March 2017, a 21-room mansion once stood exposed on the open shoreline between Scarborough Beach and Black Point, the state and federal government put $15.5 million toward storm-resilience work at Galilee and Jerusalem in November 2024, and Jerusalem itself is a village that can only be reached by land through a neighboring town. This page is not a hurricane forecast and does not state current evacuation zones or shelter locations -- for that, go directly to the Town of Narragansett's own emergency management office and the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency (RIEMA).
Three Villages at the Edge, Not a Separate Town
Scarborough, Galilee, and Jerusalem are villages within the Town of Narragansett, Rhode Island -- not an incorporated town of their own. Galilee sits at the mouth of Point Judith Harbor and is home to Rhode Island's largest commercial fishing fleet; Jerusalem sits directly across the harbor from it; Scarborough sits along Ocean Road to the north, home to Scarborough State Beach. All three face the open Atlantic or the unprotected harbor mouth more directly than most of the rest of Narragansett, which is itself already an unusually water-exposed town -- per Wikipedia, 62.56% of Narragansett's total area is water, not land.
This site's own Narragansett hurricane-risk page already lays out the town-wide storm record in detail: the September 21, 1938 Great New England Hurricane, Hurricane Carol in 1954, and Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Rather than repeat that account, this page focuses on what happened, and what has been built or lost, specifically in Scarborough, Galilee, and Jerusalem.
1938, Carol, and Sandy: The Short Version, and Why Scarborough's Public Beach Exists Because of It
Briefly, for context this page will not re-argue: the 1938 hurricane killed 312 people statewide, Galilee and Jerusalem are documented as having suffered severe coastal damage that same afternoon, and Hurricane Carol produced a bay-wide storm surge of up to 14.4 feet in 1954, worse than 1938's. Hurricane Sandy, in 2012, passed well to the west of Rhode Island but still moved enough sand in Narragansett Pier to uncover buried history. All of that is covered, sourced, and dated on this site's Narragansett hurricane-risk page.
One consequence of the 1938 storm lands directly on this village's own ground, though: in the storm's aftermath, the state claimed beachfront at Scarborough and at Galilee specifically to operate as public beaches going forward, rather than leaving that shoreline in private hands. Scarborough State Beach's own recorded history picks up the thread from there -- what is now Scarborough North was first developed with a pavilion in 1937, just a year before that storm, and the state later added two more private beaches to the south, Lido's Beach in 1981 and Olivo's Beach in 1986, to build the 59.7-acre, 0.85-mile complex that exists today. A public beach at Scarborough is, in part, a direct legacy of what a 1938 hurricane did to this coastline.
March 14, 2017: A 100-Foot Turbine Down at the Port of Galilee
On March 14, 2017, an intense winter storm brought high winds to the Port of Galilee strong enough to snap in half the supporting metal structure of a roughly 100-foot wind turbine at the port, toppling it and causing widespread local power outages. This is a dated, sourced, specific local event -- not a generic "storms happen here" claim -- and it happened at the working heart of the village: Galilee is home to Rhode Island's largest commercial fishing fleet, built up over more than a century with dredging, stone jetties, and a three-mile Army Corps of Engineers breakwater system.
No further independently confirmed detail on the exact storm's name or peak wind speed at the port was found in the research behind this page, and none is invented here. What the confirmed facts do establish is that a structure built to withstand ordinary coastal weather at Galilee's harbor mouth failed under a single winter storm's winds within the last decade -- a recent, physical data point sitting alongside the older, larger stories of 1938 and Carol.
The Windswept Mansion: An Exposed Site Whose Ending Was Fire, Not a Storm
Between Scarborough Beach and Black Point once stood Windswept, a 21-room mansion built in 1895 by the Davis family, whose wealth came from Perry Davis's Vegetable Pain Killer, a patent medicine mixing opium and alcohol. After roughly forty years in the family, the estate became an upscale restaurant, Cobb's by the Sea, before a 1952 sale left it vacant. Its actual end was not storm damage -- the vacant mansion suffered three separate arson fires before it was demolished, and the state's Department of Environmental Management acquired the land in 1974. Today only stone ruins of the outer structure remain, reachable on foot along the shoreline from Scarborough State Beach toward Black Point.
It is worth including on a storm-risk page for what its location says, not what took it down: Windswept sat on open, unprotected oceanfront ground between two exposed beach points, the same kind of siting that has produced real storm losses elsewhere on this stretch of coast, such as Whale Rock Light a few miles up the shoreline in the 1938 hurricane. Its fate was arson, not weather -- that distinction should not be blurred -- but its exposed footprint is a real, walkable reminder of how much of this shoreline's built history has stood directly in the open, whatever ultimately ended it.
November 2024: A $15.5 Million Sign That This Risk Is Current, Not Just Historical
In a November 25, 2024 press release, the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management announced that the state had been awarded $15.5 million from FEMA's Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, matched with state funds for a total $17.2 million project, specifically to strengthen climate resilience at state marine facilities. The project will elevate structures at the Port of Galilee and at the Wickford Dock, and will replace a total of eight docks across three DEM marine facilities: the Port of Galilee, the Division of Marine Fisheries' own Jerusalem facility, and the Division of Law Enforcement's Wickford Marine Base.
Two things about this grant matter for a page about storm risk specifically in this village cluster. First, it is dated to late 2024, informing work into 2025 and 2026 -- this is not a historical anecdote but active, funded, current infrastructure work responding to storm and climate vulnerability at these exact docks. Second, it independently confirms that Jerusalem has its own named DEM Division of Marine Fisheries facility, separate from Galilee's docks across the harbor -- real, checkable infrastructure sitting in a village that, as the next section covers, has an unusual relationship with the rest of Narragansett to begin with.
Jerusalem: A Village Reachable Only Through a Different Town
Jerusalem is legally part of Narragansett, but per Wikipedia's own dedicated entry on the village, it is not attached to any other part of Narragansett by land -- its only land border is with the Matunuck section of the neighboring town of South Kingstown. As a direct consequence, fire and police service in Jerusalem is provided by South Kingstown, not by Narragansett, even though Jerusalem is Narragansett territory. For anyone thinking about storm risk and evacuation logistics here, that is a genuinely unusual fact worth knowing on its own terms: reaching or leaving Jerusalem by land runs through a different town's roads before it ever reaches the rest of Narragansett.
A separate, lower-confidence source describes Jerusalem's land isolation as tracing back to the digging of the Point Judith Breachway around 1910-1914, and describes its sole land connection as a causeway vulnerable to flooding during nor'easters and hurricanes. That source is Grokipedia, an AI-generated reference work rather than a peer-reviewed or editorially curated one, and this research could not independently confirm the specific date range or the causeway-flooding claim through a second, more authoritative source. Treat the basic land-isolation fact -- confirmed directly via Wikipedia -- as solid, and treat the specific causeway-flooding detail as reported, not independently confirmed, until verified with the Town of Narragansett or RIEMA directly.
What This Page Cannot Tell You
No town-specific, current state planning fact sheet with a projected road-mileage or bridge-clearance figure for Scarborough, Galilee, or Jerusalem under modeled storm-surge or sea-level-rise scenarios was found or independently confirmed in the research behind this page, and none is invented here. This page also does not state current hurricane evacuation zones, shelter locations, or the name and date of any current-year storm, because that information changes and belongs with the agencies responsible for it.
For current, authoritative evacuation-zone maps, shelter information, and storm-preparedness guidance specific to these villages, go directly to the Town of Narragansett's own emergency management office and the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency (RIEMA). Nothing on this page is emergency-management, insurance, or engineering advice. The 2017 turbine collapse, the Windswept Mansion's history, the November 2024 FEMA grant, and Jerusalem's land-isolation facts above are historical and current record, sourced as described below; they describe what has already happened or is already funded, not a prediction of what will happen next. Confirm current flood-zone designation, evacuation status, and insurance implications for any specific property in Scarborough, Galilee, or Jerusalem directly with the Town of Narragansett, RIEMA, and a licensed insurance professional.
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Get a Free Agent Referral →Independent research. No ads. No sponsored listings. Scarborough, Galilee, and Jerusalem are villages within the Town of Narragansett, Rhode Island, not a separate incorporated town; Narragansett's own 1938 hurricane, Hurricane Carol, and Hurricane Sandy history, including the destruction of Whale Rock Light and its keeper's death, is covered in depth on this site's Narragansett hurricane-risk page and is only briefly summarized here. Galilee and Jerusalem's severe coastal damage in the 1938 hurricane, and the state's subsequent claiming of beachfront at Scarborough and Galilee for public beach use, are per South County news reporting on the 1938 storm as referenced on this site's Narragansett pages. Scarborough State Beach's 1937 first development as what is now Scarborough North, the 1981 and 1986 acquisitions of Lido's Beach and Olivo's Beach, and the resulting 59.7-acre, 0.85-mile complex are per Rhode Island State Parks' own history page and Wikipedia's Scarborough Beach (Rhode Island) entry. The March 14, 2017 toppling of a roughly 100-foot wind turbine at the Port of Galilee, when high winds snapped its supporting metal structure and caused widespread local power outages, is per Wikipedia's Galilee, Rhode Island entry. The Windswept Mansion's 1895 construction by the Davis family (funded by Perry Davis's Vegetable Pain Killer), its conversion into the Cobb's by the Sea restaurant, its 1952 sale, its loss to three arson fires, its site's 1974 acquisition by the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, and its surviving stone ruins are per Durkin Cottage Realty's dedicated history of the Scarborough Beach ruins. The November 25, 2024 $15.5 million FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program award, the $17.2 million total project, and the plan to elevate structures and replace eight docks across the Port of Galilee, the DEM Division of Marine Fisheries' Jerusalem facility, and the Division of Law Enforcement's Wickford Marine Base are per the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management's own November 25, 2024 press release. Jerusalem's land border being solely with South Kingstown's Matunuck section, and its fire and police service being provided by South Kingstown rather than Narragansett, are per Wikipedia's Jerusalem, Rhode Island entry. Jerusalem's land isolation being linked to the circa-1910-1914 digging of the Point Judith Breachway, and its land connection being a flood-vulnerable causeway, are per Grokipedia, an AI-generated reference work; these specific details were not independently confirmed through a second, more authoritative source and are presented here explicitly as reported rather than settled fact. This page deliberately does not state current hurricane evacuation zones, shelter locations, current-year storm names or dates, or a town-specific state storm-surge/sea-level-rise mileage figure beyond what is confirmed above -- for that, go directly to the Town of Narragansett's own emergency management office and the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency (RIEMA). Nothing on this page is emergency-management, insurance, or engineering advice.