October 2009

Last weekend was the 2009 Rensselaerswijck Seminar in Albany, NY. This year the annual Seminar had a two-day program with an opening on Thursday evening with Russell Shorto and speakers on Friday and Saturday.

The seminar took place in New York State Museum's Carole Huxley Theatre. Your correspondent had the opportunity to attend the Saturday session with a diverse group of attendees ranging from professional historians to interested people from all walks of life. According to Charles Wendell PhD, President and Chairman of the New Netherland Institute, the complete registration for the two days of the seminar was 180, one of the best numbers in the history of the event.

The program started at 9.00 A.M. and the friendly atmosphere was set with a birthday recognition of Jippe Hiemstra, chairman of the Institute’s 2009 Committee. In the introductory words Dr. Wendell led a rousing cheer for the Van Voorhees family who organized their 5-yearly event to coincide with the Seminar, followed by recognition of the many attending societies and organizations.

No 'Holland on the Hudson'

The first speaker was Jan Folkerts MA, general manager of the municipality of Littenseradiel in Friesland and a New Netherland researcher.

Until the 1980 most researchers considered the Netherlands to be homogeneous, but in reality there are significant differences culturally, politically and economically between the various regions in the Netherlands. When thinking about the Dutch Republic in the 17th century the province of Holland is often considered to be representative of the whole Republic, since that is where the power center of the country was. However, colonists and farmers mainly came from other provinces as Mr. Folkers convincingly showed using various charts and graphs.

"Whatever New Netherland might have been, it was certainly not 'Holland on the Hudson'".

Charles Gehrling: "We're still finding stuff!"

Charles Gehring, PhD, director of the New Netherlands Project, spoke next. He talked about the origin of the sources that the NNP is translating, and some of the events that impact caused documents to disappear such as a 1674 reorganization of the WIC and a fire in 1911.

About the documents: "Some of them are still out there -- those that weren't boiled up and made into new paper. We're still finding stuff!"

Dr. Gehrling's talk was informative and very entertaining. Mr. van Slichterhorst, the main subject of the talk, had a hard time dealing with the Indians according to a related lawsuit filed in the Netherlands. Negotiating with the Indians was expensive to him personally: large amounts of gifts, food and drinks were provided. "So, this would be an early example of a protection racket". Dr. Gehrling mentioned an interesting project by the Universiteit van Leiden, http://www.brievenalsbuit.nl.

Henry Hoff, the editor of The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, spoke about researching family history in New York and New Jersey. His hand-out contains many useful links to genealogy research.

After the break Dr. Starna introduced Dr. James W. Bradley as the recipient of the annual Hendricks Award for his book Before Albany.

Len Tantillo

Len Tantillo showed many of his beautiful works and spoke about the research that went into creating these paintings. He described how archeology and the translated documents work together, for example to show that people in Fort Orange lived a wealthy live, not all that differently from their peers in patria, the Dutch Republic.

To paint canoes Mr. Tantillo did research in Canada on how to make canoes (using elm) and he worked with the Scheepsvaartmuseum in Amsterdam to learn what a Dutch bark looked like.

Martha D. Shattuck PhD, editor for the New Netherland Project, wrapped up the presentations with a talk about Rensselaerswijck.

New Netherland dinner

The evening reception and dinner was in the Hampton Inn and Suites and Indonesian food was provided by Yono's. Appetizers included krupuk with peanut sauce and Indonesian meatballs -- a nice touch for a partially Dutch crowd, since Indonesian food is not common in the United States.

A special Half Moon daalder coin was presented to everyone at the dinner; a great present by Dr. Andrew Hendricks, Chairman of the New Netherland Museum.

William (Chip) Reynolds, Director of New Netherland Museum, spoke about the work done with the Half Moon ship that he is captain of. Technical problems with the projector did not stop him from conveying what kind of preparation and guts it took Henry Hudson to cross the ocean and explore the Hudson river. Dr. C. Carl Pegels, Professor Emeritus, SUNY at Buffalo, NY. received the Alice P. Kenney Memorial Award for his excellent online collection of Dutch-Americans.

After the main event smaller groups stayed until late in the night. In the words of the Dr. Wendell: "We consider the entire event to have been a great success" -- we agree.

The audience in New York State Museum’s Carole Huxley Theatre.

Jan Folkers: "Regional Patterns in Dutch-American Culture"

Charles Gehrling: "Brant van Slichtenhorst’s Indian Grievances: Mohawks and Mahicans at Rensselaerswijck"

Henry Hoff: "Researching Dutch Families in New York and New Jersey"

Appropriate speculaas cookies during the break.

Len Tantillo. In the background a projection of one of his works.

Martha Shattuck, PhD: "From Dutch Patroonship to English Manor"

Board members selling books.

Last weekend the exhibit Dutch Utopia: American Artists in Holland, 1880-1914 opened for the public in the Telfair Museum of Art in Savannah, GA. With over 70 paintings the exhibition examines the work of forty-three American painters drawn to Holland during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries:

"Dutch Utopia includes works by artists who remain celebrated today, such as Robert Henri, William Merritt Chase, John Twachtman, and John Singer Sargent, along with painters admired in their own time but less well-known now, including accomplished women like Elizabeth Nourse and Anna Stanley, as well as George Hitchcock, Gari Melchers, and Walter MacEwen, who built international reputations with salon pictures of Dutch landscapes and costumed figures. These artists were among hundreds of Americans who traveled to the Netherlands between 1880 and 1914 to paint and to study. Some lived in Holland for decades, while others stayed only a week or two; but most passed quickly through the major cities to small rural communities, where they created picturesque idylls on canvas."

According to GPB.org the exhibit took five years of planning and research and it is the largest collection of paintings by American artists of the Netherlands that has ever been assembled.

In conjunction with Dutch Utopia there is a separate exhibition in the museum on the works of Walter MacEwen, one of the most highly decorated American artists of the late nineteenth century. He is best known for his depictions of rural Dutch life:

"Early in his career, MacEwen had also opened a studio in Hattem – a quiet medieval village in the Dutch province of Gelderland, where he spent his summers. MacEwen’s exposure to the work of seventeenth-century Dutch masters, as well as to the artists of the contemporary Hague School, exerted a considerable impact upon his developing style, and agrarian village life in Hattem inspired dozens of Dutch genre paintings that would come to define MacEwen’s mature career."

Walter MacEwen: An American Expatriate Revisited, which features additional works from Mr. Starke’s collection as well as pieces from other private and public collections and nicely complements works on display in Dutch Utopia.

The exhibition will also travel to the Taft Museum of Art in Cincinnati, the Grand Rapids Art Museum, and the Singer Laren Museum in the Netherlands.

Telfair Museums, Dutch Utopia: American Artists in Holland, 1880-1914
http://telfair.org
through January 10, 2010 in Georgia.

Senate resolution S.Res.254 we wrote about earlier was officially approved yesterday.

The Hill has an article about the Dutch American relations, specifically around Afghanistan:

"President Barack Obama is weighing a difficult decision to send more American troops to Afghanistan at a time when the Netherlands is preparing to pull its own soldiers from the war-torn country next year. "

The passage of the resolution by the Senate and the corresponding House Resolution (H.Con.Res.178) caps off the 8 month celebration of NY400 events in New York and the Netherlands to mark the shared history and shared values between the United States and the Netherlands.