Von Limburg is not Dutch

I came across a family tree on Ancestry.com that included General Lewis Cass. I was very much interested in this tree as Lewis Cass' daughter, Matilda was married to a very distant cousin of mine, Henry Ledyard. When I say very distant, he is my 6th cousin 4 times removed.

General Cass was the governor of the Michigan Territory, which at that time included the current states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and parts of North and South Dakota. While researching my family, I found family in Cass County, in most of these states. My grandparents are buried in Cass County, Minnesota. I hadn't connected why so many of these states had a Cass County until I learned about Lewis Cass.

I generally don't spend much time on the ancestors of people who marry into my family. Typically, I try to find out birth, death and marriage dates for the parents of a person who married a relative. When I searched for Lewis Cass, I was surprised how much was written about him. I was also surprised at some of the things written about him or his family that were not correct.

Then I came across another tree that sent a red flag up the pole when I saw it. Lewis Cass had another daughter, Isabella. This tree claimed that she married Baron Theodorus Marinus Roest Von Linburg who was the Dutch Foreign Minister to the United States. The words baron and von were the triggers.

The word Von is German, not Dutch. It translate to the English word of just as the Dutch word van would translate. However, the German word "Von" signifies a person of the nobility of that place whereas the Dutch word "van" simply means of or from. Baron is a title used in the regions that today comprise Germany. It is not a Dutch title.

I came across an inventory of letters and documents relating to the family Roest van Limburg from 1604 to 1978 at the Archives of the Netherlands. Theodorus Marinus Roest van Limburg is addressed in letters as Mr. not as Baron. So where did the author of the tree get this idea that Theodorus was a baron?

So I decided to search further. I found a book that was printed in 1922, "The City of Detroit, Michigan, 1701-1922 Volume II." There it was, big as life! But that same search found another book. Only this book is recent (1996). It is entitled "Lewis Cass and Politics of Moderation" by Willard Carl Klunder at Kent State University. To me it looks like Mr. Klunder lifted the text from the 1922 book.

Since it was published by Kent State University, I can hardly blame someone researching Lewis Cass and his descendants for incorporating this junk into their tree.

Tulips in Dutch New York

I am finalizing the annual newsletter for the Stoutenburgh-Teller Family Association and was asked to include a picture of the Equitable Life building at 120 Broadway in New York City. This is the site of Pieter Stoutenburg's alleged tulip garden. Pieter (1613-1698/99), according to family legend, is supposed to have brought tulip bulbs with him to New Amsterdam and was the first to plant a tulip garden.

It is not clear when Pieter arrived in New Amsterdam but he certainly was there in 1649 when his marriage banns were posted. Most of the information concerning the time of his arrival is hearsay. I have not found a document that provides a clue as to when he arrived in New Netherland. Some relatives claim that he arrived with Director-General Willem Kieft in March 1638. And, again I can find no supporting documentation.

Tulips are an Asian plant that were introduced to the Netherlands in 1571. The bulbs were very expensive as the supply of bulbs was not large. Only the very wealthy could afford the bulbs. A virus had attacked some bulbs producing a multicolored bloom. The bulbs of these flowers were highly desired by the rich. By 1634, the price of a single bulb was out of the reach of all but the very, very rich. Tulipmania swept the Netherlands between 1634 and 1638 when the bubble burst. In the succeeding years, the price continued to drop.

Many of the people who settled in New Netherland were refugees without great means. And those who were not fleeing religious persecution also came to the New World with very little means. The Dutch West Indies Company, a trading company, depended on these people to cultivate a trading resource in the New World. I really did not expect to see tulips in North America before 1638 because of the prohibitive cost but tulips appear to be in New Amsterdam by 1640.

Once the cost of tulip bulbs cratered, I naturally assumed that I would find some reference to the bulbs appearing in New Netherland. It does not seem plausible to me that Pieter Stoutenburg introduced tulips to Dutch New York when the colony was established by a huge trading company. Adriaen van der Donck settled in New Netherland in 1641 for a few years before he was sent back to the Netherlands for a period of time. While Adriaen was in Europe, he wrote about New Netherland. This account was published after 1644 and includes passages that describe the gardens of New Amsterdam. These gardens include among other plants tulips.

I don't believe that Pieter Stoutenburg was the only resident of New Amsterdam who was growing tulips. But ironicially the tulip associated with the Dutch and the Netherlands is not a native plant. However, the tulip is viewed by much of the world as Dutch. The Netherlands imports tulip bulbs throughout the world with the United States as the largest buyer. The winter of 1945 was a famine year for the Dutch. The allies had cut off supplies to the Germans occupying the Netherlands. The German military stole all of the food sources leaving nothing for the citizens. The enterprising Dutch used the tulip bulbs as a food source.

The Dutch princess, Juliana, and her children were sent during WWII to Ottawa, Canada for safekeeping along with some tulip bulbs. Ottawa has to this day a tulip festival to commemorate Juliana's stay.

Who is Pieter Van Stoutenburgh?

I came across a USGenWeb Website for Monmouth County, New Jersey that posted information about an ancestor of mine. It appears to be a response to a query about a John Stoutenberg (sic) and his possible wife, Jane Schenck.

As I read the information that was included in the response, I was awestruck of the number of facts cited that were simply not true.

The information was taken from a book, "Monmouth Families," written by Ann P. Miles and was published in 1980. It can be found on page 203 of Volume II.

The STOUTENBERG (sic) family were early 1700 residents of Colts Neck, here is then a very small portion of the family who have long disappeared from the area.

1-PIETER VAN STOUTENBURGH (sic) b.c.1613 in HOLLAND d. 3/9/1699 @ 86 in N.Y. City (He came to U.S. in 1638. He was N.Y. City's first Treasurer. He also introduced Tulips to this country, lived at the corner of Broadway & Wall Streets) md. 7/25/1649 ALFGY (sic) VAN TIENHOVEN dau. of CORNELIUS & MARIE VANDAMIN

My Comment: The records do not indicate that Pieter Stoutenburg was the first treasurer of the New York City. He was appointed treasurer of the City of New York for a few years but long after the British took over the Dutch colony.

At this time, I have not found any indication that Pieter introduced tulips to the New World. He may have had a tulip garden, but even that fact I have not been able to confirm.

I have not seen a transcription the documents at the time of Pieter’s life in which his name is written as Van Stoutenburgh. The Dutch spelling has no “h.” I rarely saw his name written with the preposition “van.” I believe that he came from the area of Utrecht Province in which the town/village of Stoutenburg is situate.

I have never seen Aefje van Tienhoven’s name recorded as Alfgy. I have no idea where this information is found. Also, her parents were not Cornelius and Marie Van Damin. Who ever came up with this has confused several facts.

Aefje was the sister of Cornelis van Tienhoven, a very powerful man in New Amsterdam. Cornelis married Rachel Vigne whose step-father was Jan Jansen Damen. Aefje and Cornelis were children of Luycas van Tienhoven and his wife Jannetje.

ISSUE:
2-ENGELTJE bp. 8/20/1651 d.y.

3-ENGELTJE bp. 1/5/1653 md. 2/18/1671 WILLIAM WALDRON b.1647 son of BAREN RESOLVED

4-Child b. 12/13/1654

5-JANNETJE bp. 8/30/1656, md. ALBERTUS RINGO b. 1620 in Holland son of PHILLIP JANZSEN RINGO & GERTJE CORNELIS

6-WYNTJE bp. 5/8/1658 d.y.

7-LUCAS bp. 1/10/1660

8-WYNTJE bp. 10/15/1662 bur. 7/11/1734 md. 1st GERRET CORN, VAN EYEEN md. 2nd 5/25/1693 EVERT BYVANKS

9-ISAAC b. 9/23/1668 d. 9/21/1711 N.Y. md. 7/21/1690 NIELTJE BOGART

10-TOBIAS bp. 1/18/1660 N.Y. City d. 1715 N.Y. City md. 7/2/1684 ANNEKEN VAN ROLLEGOM bp. 7/15/1665 d. 1744 dau. of JAN JOOSTEN VAN ROLLEGOM from Holland

Comment: Engeltje Stoutenburg married Willem Waldron. Their banns were published On Feb. 18, 1671. I assume that the entry in the Reformed Dutch Church marriage book in New York was the date on which the 1st bann was published. If that were the case, then Engeltje and Willem were married about 3 weeks later as banns have traditionally been published for 3 Sundays.
Willem Waldron was the son of Resolved (Resolveert) Waldron and his first wife Rebecca. After her death, Resolved married Tanneke Nagel. Resolved and Tanneke had a son who was named as tradition would dictate for her father, whose given name is Barent. For some reason, Resolved and Tanneke’s son Barent Waldron has been confused with his father Resolved Waldron and grandfather Barent Nagel, both of whom I have seen in stories given the title, Baron.

I really don’t where this author has found the names of the people as I have not seen some of the names above spelled in that manner. For example, Gertje is not a spelling of her name that I have seen or would expect to have seen based on the records of the time that I have examined. Albertus Ringo’s mother was Geertje.

There are variations in how Wyntje Stoutenburg’s husband’s name was recorded then, but I have not seen a record in which his named is written Gerret Corn. Van Eyeen. I have seen his name recorded as Gerrit Cornelisen Van Westeen, Van Echtsveen and Van Exveen. Corn. is an abbreviation for Cornelis but also for the patronyms Cornelisz, Cornelisen or Corneliszen.

Isaac married Neeltje Uittenbogart or Uyttenbogart.

Do not believe the family trees, old books and family lore if you want a true picture of who your ancestor's are.

Hooky and the Dutch Connection Part 2

I mentioned in Part 1 that I had found an article, "The Dutch Origin of Play Hookey" by John Ralph Sinnema printed in 1970 in the American Speech magazine. Unfortunately at the time I posted Part 1, I could only view the first page of the article. In order to view the remaining pages, I had to pay a fee.

I found that I could access the article at one of two Universities that were nearby. Since I had some other items I wanted to study at the Stanford University, I made a trip to Palo Alto. The delay in being able to post part 2 was worth it. I found the entire article to be most interesting.

Dr. Sinnema passed away in 1999. He was a professor and chairman of the German department at Baldwin-Wallace College in Ohio. Although, Dr. Sinnema seems to have been well regarded, I checked on a few of his source citations before proceeding with part 2 of my blog on the word "hooky."

He makes a reference to the Anthology of New Netherland by Henry Cruse published in 1865 regarding a complaint in 1656 by Nicasius de Sille, attorney, concerning the boys playing hoeckje in the streets. I found confirmation of this on Page 286 of Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York: One Hundred and Forty-First Session, Vol. XXIX, No. 62 (Albany, NY: J. B. Lyon Company, 1918).

Hoeckje seems to be a diminutive of Hoeck or Hoek. Hoek was a geographical term, meaning a small cape, that the Dutch used and was Anglicized to Hook. It also meant corner. The boys playing hoeckje in 17th century New Amsterdam were playing a game like hide-and -seek. The difference from hide-and-seek being an object was hidden while the players (seekers) were awaiting around the corner rather than players hiding and one or more seekers trying to find them all.

Dr. Sinnema's article goes into detail about the how a hoekje spelen evolved from a game of hide-and-seek into play hooky.

Hooky and the Dutch Connection

Yesterday, I blogged that a few days last week I played hooky from writing in my blog.

I got to thinking about the word "hooky" and what it really means. The definition at Princeton University WordNet Web site is "truancy, failure to attend (especially school)." Well, I knew that, but why is it called hooky?

Using Google Search I found several online dictionaries that referenced the etymology of the word. It seemed to me that many of the online dictionaries are copies of each other. Most claimed that the term "play hooky (or hookey)" was derived from hook it, hook or a Dutch game played in 17th century New Amsterdam.

Since each of these dictionaries provided a list with a choice of three possible origins and no information about the source(s) of this information, I continued my quest.

I looked for dictionaries that included the etymology of words. I found the following on page 345 of Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present, Volume III - Fla. to Hyps. (Compiled and edited by John S. Farmer and W. E. Henley and printed in 1893)

Hookey. To play hookey, verb. phr. (American). — To play truant; to do Charley-wag (q.v.).

1876. Clemens [Mark Twain], Tom Sawyer, p. 100. Took his flogging . . . . for playing hookey the day before.

The book did not tell me anything about the origin but it did indicate that the term was in use when Samuel Clemens wrote Tom Sawyer. I found a copy of Tom Sawyer that was published in 1875. The term used twice in Chapter 1 and twice in Chapter 10. Thus, I could confirm that playing hooky was in use by 1875.

I happened upon an article that John R. Sinnema authored entitled "The Dutch Origin of Play Hookey" (American Speech, Vol. 45, No. 3/4, Autumn-Winter 1970. Durham, NC: Duke University). He writes, "Bartlett correctly states that play hookey is a "term used among school-boys, chiefly in the State of New York," dating its appearance about 1848." [p. 205]

Mr. Sinnema indicates that Bartlett included a citation from Samuel Clemen's Mark Twain that included the phrase "playing hookey." He references John Russell Barlett's Dictionary of Americanisms, 4th ed. (1877) in a footnote on Page 205.

Luckily, I came across a copy of Dictionary of Americanisms. A Glossary of Words and Phrases, Usually Regarded as Peculiar The United States, by John Russell Bartlett. (New York: Barlett and Welford, 1848) "HOOKEY. To play hookey, is to play truant. A term used among schoolboys." appears on page 180.

So it seems that the term was in use at least by 1848 when Mr. Bartlett published his dictionary. Still there is no mention of the origin of the word. However, on page 179, Mr. Bartlett includes the following:

HOOK. (Dutch, hoek, a corner.) This name is given in New York to several angular points in the North and East rivers; as Corlear's Hook, Sandy Hook, Powle's Hook.

The definition of hook and of hookey in Bartlett's 3rd & 4th editions (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1860 & 1877) is changed a little from that in the 1848 edition.

Hook. (Dutch, hoek, a corner, a cape.) This name is given, in New York, to several angular points in the North and East Rivers; as, Corlear's Hook, Powle's Hook, Sandy Hook. [p, 201; p. 293]

Hookey. To "play hookey" is to play truant. A term used amount school-boys, chiefly in the State of New York. [p. 201; p. 294]

I wasn't getting anywhere in finding the Dutch connection to playing hooky except that I found another book that seemed to be based on Bartlett's dictionaries. In 1902, Sylva Clapin published A New Dictionary of Americanisms Being a Glossary of Words supposed to Be Peculiar to the United States and the Dominion of Canada.

He published a dictionary of Canadian French in 1894. Between 1873 and 1899, Mr. Clapin lived in the US, Quebec, Paris, Montreal, and Boston. So it seems that Mr. Clapin was interested in the differences between American English and British English as well as American French and the French as spoken in France. Unfortunately as you will see in the definitions below taken from his dictionary that I was no closer to finding a connection to a colonial Dutch children's game and playing hooky.

Hook (Dutch hoek, a corner, a cape). An old word designation certain corners and angular points in the Hudson and East Rivers, as Sandy Hook, Kinderhook, etc. [p. 231]

Hookey (to play). To play truant, chiefly current in State of New York, among school-boys. In England, "playing the wag." In New England, the form to hook Jack is used in preference. [p. 232]

To be continued...

PS - My husband thinks that I made up "Charley-wag" to tease him. Not so...I found Charley-wag was used 1876 in C. Hindley's Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack, p. 57.

"The Island at the Center of the World"

Each summer my husband and I make an annual trip to Lake Arrowhead, California to spend a week at Bruin Woods, UCLA Alumni Association Family Camp. Over the years, we have met a number of interesting people who are Alumni of UCLA. A few summers ago I met Simon Van Dijk. He is a professor of chemistry at Alamo Colleges in Texas and an immigrant from the Netherlands. (His wife is the UCLA alumna.)

Simon and I had a mutual interest (not chemistry). He is a Dutch immigrant to the United States; I am an American with a family history extending to the 17th century Netherlands. That first summer, we talked about Dutch history around the 16th and 17th century. Simon was then acutely aware of my family's history in Dutch New York.

The following summer, when we met again at Bruin Woods, Simon asked me if I had read a book entitled "The Island at the Center of the World." I had not, but Simon's discussion of the book intrigued me in part because of what he said about what he'd learned from reading the book. It fit with what I had learned from my research about the Dutch ethics of the time.

I returned home and bought the book to read. That which Mr. Shorto said in his book matched with the things I had found and added information to my knowledge base.

As I researched my family residing in North American in the 17th century, I realized that the Dutch colony in North America was the most ethnically diverse community in North America at that time. The other settlements in eastern North America were homogeneous and fairly exclusionary.

US history as taught in high school focuses on the arrival of the Puritans and purports that our country was shaped by the English. Even the AP American History class that it took in high school only briefly mentioned the Dutch settlement in what is now New York and New Jersey. Even as a student at the University of California at Berkeley, my US history course barely mentioned the Dutch Colony. Yet what I was learning about the Dutch colony and the Netherlands in the late 16th and early 17th centuries seemed to me had a greater impact on forming our country than did the British.

As I researched my family and realized that some of my roots stemmed from the Dutch, I began to study the Dutch colonization of New York. I found the 16th Century Dutch to generally be tolerant and fair to people of various religions and beliefs.

The English settlers, on the other hand, were less accepting of other ideas and beliefs. In fact, they persecuted the non-believers, driving them to the colonies of Connecticut and Rhode Island.

Mr. Shorto concurs and also points out that the Dutch did not have royalty like the British. The Netherlands was a republic where individuals could rise to power and status.

It is ironic that our government was founded on many of the same principles that the Dutch professed when they settled the colony in North America. If you want to have a clear idea of what it was like for people living in the Dutch colony, you must read this book.

Russell Shorto has worked extensively on the New Netherland Project, which is currently translating old documents from 1600-1664.