Almost 240 years ago William Read donated a small triangular plot of land at Thames and Farewell streets to William Ellery and other Sons of Liberty, shortly after the successful struggle to force the British Parliament to repeal the Stamp Act. The donation was welcomed not for the land, but for the tall buttonwood tree, known as "The Liberty Tree," that stood on the property. The Newport Historical Society put the famous tree's history in the spotlight Friday as a way to celebrate Arbor Day. Edward Andrews, a historian now completing his doctoral dissertation at the University of New Hampshire,...