Slater Mill in Pawtucket is part of the John H. Chafee Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor.

AP / STEW MILNE

Southern New England has no national parks, but the region has plenty of rangers representing the National Park Service ( www.nps.gov). They are here to welcome visitors to public places that are important to the nation’s cultural and natural history.

Massachusetts and Connecticut have dozens of such sites.

Rhode Island has three: the Roger Williams National Memorial in Providence, Touro Synagogue in Newport, and the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor which stretches from Worcester, Mass., to Narragansett Bay. Admittance to the sites and their programs is free and open to everyone. The Roger Williams Memorial ( www.nps.gov/rowi), at 282 North Main St. in Providence, welcomes about 120,000 visitors each year, said John McNiff, a ranger and historian at the site.“We also reach an extensive number of children through ‘Travels with Roger,’ a hands-on, get-involved program in schools,” McNiff said. And the Park Service works with Smith’s Castle in North Kingstown to welcome hundreds more visitors for “A Bridge Into The Past,” an observance of 17th-century life, said Ranger Sparkle Bryant.

The memorial, a 4.5-acre urban park, includes a freshwater spring that was the center of the settlement of Providence Plantations, founded by Williams in 1636. The park was established by Congress in 1965 to commemorate Williams’ “outstanding contributions to the development of the principles of freedom in this country.”

Outside the visitors’ center, McNiff maintains a garden in the manner that the Narragansett and Wampanoag peoples planted. The “three sisters” mounds include cornstalks on which beans can climb, and they are surrounded by squash vines on the ground to retain moisture in the soil and prevent weeds.

The visitors’ center –– open daily from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. except on Jan. 1, Thanksgiving, and Christmas –– contains displays of historical artifacts, a small book-and-gift area, and a place to watch a narrated film about the extraordinary life of the man who founded Rhode Island as a “shelter for persons distressed of conscience.”

Among the people attracted were Sephardic Jews, fleeing persecution in Spain and Portugal. They established a congregation in Newport, and nearly 100 years later would build a Georgian style house of worship, designed by architect Peter Harrison. It would be named Touro Synagogue ( www.tourosynagogue.org) after Isaac Touro, its first officiating rabbi.

The synagogue, at 85 Touro St. in Newport, is the oldest in America. It welcomes 25,000 to 30,000 visitors a year, said Barbara Marom-Pollack, a guide.

An animated storyteller, she held a group of mid-week tourists riveted to her oral history of 17th- and 18th-century Newport and its trade in slaves and rum.

Touro Synagogue, dedicated in 1763 during Chanukah, continues to serve Congregation Jeshuat Israel, an orthodox congregation first organized in 1658.

The National Park Service has designated the synagogue a National Historic Site. It was renovated in 2005 by the National Historic Trust and the Park Service. Colonial Jewish Burying Ground, two blocks away on Touro Street, is the old burial ground for the congregation of the Touro Synagogue. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem “The Jewish Cemetery at Newport” reflects upon its headstones with such family names as Alvares and Rivera, Sephardic Jews.

Near the synagogue stands its brand new Ambassador John L. Loeb Jr. Visitors Center, filled with interactive displays about the history of the Jews in Newport. It opened officially in August, but was closed during a visit last week.

Between the visitors’ center and the synagogue, Patriot’s Park commemorates the significant roles Jews played in the development of the United States. It was created in the 1970s outside of the Touro wall. Jews from each of the original 13 colonies, who played a significant role in American history, are honored.

The synagogue is open Sunday through Friday from noon to 2 p.m., and tours begin every half hour. Admittance is free and open to everyone, but donations are welcome.

Rhode Island’s third National Park Service site, officially named the John H. Chafee Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor ( www.nps.gov/blac), stretches through 24 cities and towns on 500 square miles of land in the watershed of the Blackstone River. The watershed area extends from north of Worcester to Providence on the south. The 46-mile long Blackstone was named an American Heritage River in 1998.

The national heritage corridor is like a national park, but the federal government does not own the land. The National Park Service works in partnership with public and private groups to promote and protect the river valley’s natural and cultural resources.

Tuesday, the national corridor will launch “Footsteps In History,” celebrating 500 years of cultural history in the river valley. More than 100 events have been planned, including farm and museum tours, concerts and plays. “It will end with a masquerade ball Oct. 23,” said Park Ranger Barbara Dixon.

The Museum of Work and Culture ( www.rihs.org/Museums.html), at 42 South Main St. in Woonsocket, serves as the heritage corridor’s visitors’ center, Dixon said. The museum welcomes about 10,000 visitors a year, and serves another 4,000 people seeking information about the heritage corridor, said Anne Conway, co-director. The museum is open weekdays from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sundays from 1 to 4 p.m. Tickets are $7 for adults and $5 for students and elders. Admittance to the visitors’ center is free.