Happy New Netherland Day!

In 1990, NNI member George Damiano succeeded in getting an annual commemoration of New Netherland. On 25 July 1990, Governor Mario M. Cuomo signed the bill into law designating October 11th of each year as New Netherland Day. This legislation commemorates the establishment of New Netherland on October 11, 1614. That is the date the Staten Generael of the United Netherlands chartered the New Netherland Company with “the right to resort to or cause to be frequented” the territory in America extending on the north from the present-day boundary separating New York State and the Province of Quebec (45º north latitude) southward to what is now northern New Jersey (40º north latitude). Thus, New Netherland came into existence six years before the signing of the Mayflower Compact and the establishment of the Plymouth colony and seven years after Jamestown. SPECIAL THANKS to William B. Hoyt (Buffalo) and Paul E. Harenberg (Hauppauge, Suffolk) who introduced the legislation in the Assembly. Assembly co-sponsors included: Lawrence E. Bennett (Newburgh-Orange), Elizabeth A. Connelly (Staten Island-NYC), Richard J. Conners (Albany), Thomas P. DiNapoli (Great Neck-Nassau), G. Oliver Koppell (Bronx NYC), Howard L. Lasher (Brooklyn-NYC), Roger J. Robach (Rochester), Robin Schimminger (Kenmore-Erie), Larry Seabrook (Bronx-NYC) and Paul Tonko (Amsterdam). State Senator Howard C. Nolan, Jr. (Albany) introduced the New Netherland Day legislation in the Senate. If you know any of these folks, it would be nice for them to hear from everyone interested in New Netherland thanking them for supporting this bill twenty-eight years ago. A special thank you goes to Dr. Charles Gehring and Dr. Janny Venema for their translations. To date all twenty-three Dutch-language volumes in the New York Colonial Manuscripts held by the New York State Archives are transcribed and digitized. Of this number, eighteen volumes have been translated or are in the process of being translated. Janny Venema has translated and is reviewing volume thirteen, and Charles Gehring and Steve McErleane will do a final review. It is expected to be published in the spring of 2019. Venema is in the process of translating volume fourteen. Artyon Anikin, supported by a grant from the Society of the Daughters of Holland Dames, is translating the Colve Papers, volume twenty-three. Volumes nine, ten, and fifteen are still to be translated. Of the more than 12,000 pages in this corpus, over 8,000, or 70% have been translated. Another big thank you goes out to so many of you, who, over the years have written about, given talks on, painted, exhibited, and supported in many ways, the telling of the story of New Netherland.