Fantastic Find: New Netherland Institute

Ever since the Working on Wednesday post that focused on my maternal ninth great grandfather Dirick Areson, I've realized how little I know about the Dutch in North America.

[Novi Belgii Novaeque Angliae, Map by N.J. Visscher 1650/51 based on a manuscript map compiled by Adriaen van der Donck in 1648. This is the second state (1652) which added Fort Kasimier. New Netherland Institute]

That's why I was delighted to find the New Netherland Institute. Here's what they have to say about themselves:

"For a quarter of a century, the New Netherland Institute (NNI) has helped cast light on America’s long-neglected Dutch roots. Created in 1986 as the Friends of the New Netherland Project, it has supported the transcription, translation, and publication of the 17th-century Dutch colonial records held by the New York State Library and State Archives. These records constitute the world’s largest collection of original documentation of the Dutch West India Company and its New World Colonies. They represent an irreplaceable resource for researchers exploring this important chapter in American history, its legacy of cultural traditions, and its qualities of tolerance, diversity and entrepreneurship."

Now I'm off to check out their online publications which includes The Guide to Dutch Manuscripts Relating to New Netherland, a catalog of primary source material located in repositories throughout the United States.

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: Dirick Areson (About 1635? - 1678/9), Horses

When my maternal ninth great grandfather made his will on October 1, 1678, in Flushing, New York, he described himself as "finding my selfe very dangerously weak and not knowing how soone I may be taken away hence..."

["New York, Probate Records, 1629-1971," images, FamilySearch ( https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1961-28663-32305-24?cc=1920234&wc=9V3X-7M9:213306101,226244501 : accessed 20 January 2015), New York - Wills 1665-1683 vol 1 - image 230 of 323; county courthouses, New York.]

Dirick left all his property to his well-beloved wife Ann for her widowhood and directed that, if she did remarry, one half of the property should be shared between his children.* Almost as an afterthought reference is made to "The Estate of the above Dirick that (is) in Holland if it bee recovered is equally to be divided among his seavon children."

The will, signed with his mark, appears in New York probate records the following February (1768/9) along with an account of what he owes and is owed in turn. His four debts "taken from his owne mouth in his greatest extremity" are expressed as various quantities of tobacco with the sterling equivalent added. Only a small amount of tobacco is owed him but he has already paid "Meny ye shoonmaker" for three pairs of shoes, and is waiting for a firkin of soap, three deerskins, and "one mare" and "one three yeare old horse."

According to an entry for his family** in The Genealogical and Memorial History of the State of New Jersey** Dirick died as a result of a kick from a horse he was shoeing. I haven't been able to discover where this information originally comes from, and even if it's true, I don't know if he considered himself a blacksmith. But horses definitely belong in his story!

*Dirick comes into my direct line through his daughter Sarah.
**Spelled Aaronson there.
***Francis Bazley Lee, Lewis historical Publishing Company, 1910 - New Jersey.

© 2014 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.