{"id":60166,"date":"2012-06-14T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-06-14T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/50th-anniversary-of-uri-alton-jones-campus-finds-assistant-director-extending-warm-welcome\/"},"modified":"2012-06-14T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-06-14T00:00:00","slug":"50th-anniversary-of-uri-alton-jones-campus-finds-assistant-director-extending-warm-welcome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2012\/06\/50th-anniversary-of-uri-alton-jones-campus-finds-assistant-director-extending-warm-welcome\/","title":{"rendered":"50th anniversary of 溏心vlog免费B站 Alton Jones campus finds assistant director extending warm welcome"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tGreenville native, Providence resident enjoys sharing \u2018hospitable culture\u2019<\/p>\n

WEST GREENWICH, R.I. \u2013 June 14, 2012 \u2013 George Lewis caught the travel bug more than 30 years ago when he spent a year studying in Austria. Since then, he has taught school in Venezuela and visited such uncommon destinations as Croatia, Nepal and Turkey, among many others.<\/p>\n


\n\tBut he can\u2019t stay away long from his job of 26 years sharing the uniqueness of one of Rhode Island\u2019s best-kept secrets \u2013 the 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s W. Alton Jones campus. As the campus celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, Lewis, its assistant director in charge of conferences and weddings, is especially proud to have helped create an environment for events unlike any in New England.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWe aren\u2019t trying to impress our guests with glitz and glamour,\u201d he said, \u201cbut instead we take them back to memories of their grandmother\u2019s country home or a camp they attended. We give them the familiarity that they recognize as home.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tIt has taken a great deal of effort to create that environment. What was originally built as a summer estate in the 1930s and used as a hunting lodge in the 1950s by oil executive W. Alton Jones has been transformed into a conference and events center where visitors can attend to business without the distractions of busy urban facilities. Lewis even retrieved artifacts from earlier eras that had been stored in the attic, and he displayed them throughout the buildings.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cMy culture is to be very hospitable, and I set that tone here so it has become the norm,\u201d Lewis said. \u201cWe take that very seriously. I\u2019m proud that we give visitors something they can\u2019t find anywhere else \u2013 the ability to take a walk and talk business, or sit on the beach and talk business.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tLewis is responsible for all the details for 350 conferences and 50 weddings each year. <\/p>\n


\n\u201cWe\u2019re getting more and more groups from around the world coming to visit,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got a group from Japan coming for a week this year, and several international corporations. These groups can go anywhere they want in the world, and they choose us because they\u2019re looking for a place to bond and spend time with each other in a way that they can\u2019t do at other facilities.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nWhen asked about the feedback he receives from these groups, Lewis said that the first comment is always about the food.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI don\u2019t go anywhere where I don\u2019t hear people raving about the food here,\u201d he said proudly, since Lewis not only plans events but also finds and tests new recipes. \u201cThe food is an important part of the experience. Wedding guests always tell us that we provided the best wedding food they\u2019ve ever had.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s a big responsibility to ensure these events happen without a hitch,\u201d added Lewis, \u201cso I\u2019m often a nervous wreck. I\u2019m confident in what we do, but I don\u2019t take anything for granted. I treat every event like it\u2019s my first, so everything is reviewed and choreographed down to the last detail.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tA native of Greenville who has lived in Providence for the last five years, Lewis was elected to the Democratic Ward Committee in his Elmhurst neighborhood, where he loves being involved in the community.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI think it\u2019s important to be a part of the community and contribute to its well-being,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI love Rhode Island. I don\u2019t have the negative feelings about the state that so many people do. I focus on what\u2019s special about it. Having traveled a lot, I\u2019m always happy to come home.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications & Marketing photo by Joe Giblin<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Greenville native, Providence resident enjoys sharing \u2018hospitable culture\u2019 WEST GREENWICH, R.I. \u2013 June 14, 2012 \u2013 George Lewis caught the travel bug more than 30 years ago when he spent a year studying in Austria. Since then, he has taught school in Venezuela and visited such uncommon destinations as Croatia, Nepal and Turkey, among many […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60168,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}