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Here and There in New Netherland Studies
THE NEW NETHERLAND Institute suffered a tremendous loss with the death of its president R. J. Jippe Hiemstra on April 12, 2020. Mr. Hiemstra passed away peacefully of pneumonia and congestive heart failure at his home in Buskirk, New York, with his loving wife, former Holland Society of New York executive director Annette van Rooy, by his side. Mr. Hiemstra played a prominent role in Dutch-related activities in the United States for decades. He served as president of the Manhattan-based The Netherlands Club from 1996–2002. For his role in helping to promote Dutch culture in the United States and abroad, Queen Beatrix bestowed upon him the honor of Membership of the Order of Orange-Nassau on April 30, 2005, at the Netherlands Club’s centennial ball. Mr. Hiemstra was also a Friend of the Holland Society of New York as well as an active supporter of the Jacob Leisler Institute in Hudson, New York.
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Mr. Hiemstra’s particular interest in the Dutch role in shaping American history caused him to join the New Netherland Institute’s board of trustees in 2007, serving as its president from 2012 until his death. He helped guide the Institute during a period of considerable growth. “Working with Jippe for seven years” said Marilyn Douglas, current president of the New Netherland Institute, “I can attest to his deep commitment to increasing NNI’s resources by acquiring grants and other financial contributions. Working closely with the board, he secured funding from corporations and garnered donations from private individuals that increased NNI’s endowment significantly.”
In memory of their late president, the New Netherland Institute has established the R. J. Jippe Hiemstra Annual Conference Travel Fund to support the travel of a select group of students to our annual conference each fall. Mr. Hiemstra believed strongly in Spring 2020
The late R. J. Jippe Hiemstra, president of the New Netherland Institute from 2012 to 2020, inspires travel fund for scholars in New Netherland studies.
the importance of NNI’s engagement with the next generation of New Netherland scholars. Donations to the fund established in his name will help those scholars engage with the latest scholarship on New Netherland and make lasting connections with others in the field of New Netherland studies. Should you wish to donate to the R. J. Jippe Hiemstra Annual Conference Travel Fund, go to https://crm.newnetherlandinstitute.org/ civicrm/?page=CiviCRM&q=civicrm%2Fc ontribute%2Ftransact&reset=1&id=14.
JANNY VENEMA, associate director of the New Netherland Research Center, has retired from the Research Center at the end of April 2020. Dr. Venema arrived in Albany, New York, from The Netherlands thirty-five years ago with a teaching degree
Dr. Janny Venema at the New Netherland Research Center. Photo credit Albany Times Union.
from Ubbo Emmius, then part of Groningen University. Learning that there was a translation project looking for Dutch speakers, she began assisting Dr. Charles Gehring, director of the New Netherland Project, in the translation of the colonial Dutch manuscripts held in the New York State Archives. She became formally associated with the New Netherland Project, now the New Netherland Research Center, in 1985.
In addition to translating and transcribing thousands of pages of Dutchlanguage documents, she has published numerous books on Albany during the Dutch colonial period. With a background in education, she produced two sets of seventh-grade curricula with Mary Yencha, a school teacher: a 76- page curriculum packet on daily life in seventeenth-century Albany, From the Old World to the New: Using Primary Sources in the 7th grade Classroom (Albany: New Netherland Publishing, 1993) and The People of New Netherland: Using Primary Sources in the Classroom, a 130-page curriculum packet on multiculturalism in New Amsterdam and New Netherland (Albany: New Netherland Publishing, 1994). At the same time she published a translation of her 1990 master’s thesis about poor relief in the Netherlands, Kinderen van weelde en armoede. Armoede en liefdadigheid in Beverwijck/Albany, c. 1650–1700 (Hilversum: Uitgeverij Verloren, 1993). (Dr. Venema is currently working on an English revision-translation for a larger publication on charity). In 1998, her translation of the Beverwijck church records including her research on charity appeared as Deacons’ Accounts 1652–1674 Beverwijck/Albany (Grand Rapids: Eerdman’s Publishing, 1998).
Dr. Venema is particularly known for two groundbreaking studies, Beverwijck: A Dutch Village on the American Frontier, 1652–1664 (Albany: SUNY Press, 2003), and a biography, Kiliaen van Rensselaer (1586–1643): Designing a New World (Hilversum: Verloren, 2010). Beverwijck: A Dutch Village on the American Frontier received the 2004 Annual Archives Award for Excellence in Research Using the Holdings of the New York State Archives presented by the Board of Regents and the New York State Archives, and Kiliaen van Rensselaer (1586–1643): Designing a New World won the New Netherland Institute’s Annual Hendricks Award in 2011. In addition, she is the author of numerous articles relating to Beverwijck/Albany during the seventeenth century.
Dr. Venema received a master’s degree in history from SUNY Albany in 1990 and a doctorate from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in 2003. In September 2017 Dolph Hogewoning, consul-general of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, presented Venema on behalf of the Dutch government the Knight in the Order of Orange-Nassau, a civil Dutch order of chivalry, for her efforts to raise awareness about the shared cultural heritage between the Netherlands and the United States. Venema, a Dutch native, is returning to the Netherlands.
New Netherland Historic Sites Temporarily Closed
On March 7, 2020, New York State Governor Andrew M. Cuomo issued an executive order declaring a state of emergency in response to the rapid spread of the pandemic COVID19, and on March 20 directed that New York State museums and historic sites as “nonessential” be closed indefinitely to slow the virus’s spread. Despite official onsite public closures, most of these Dutch colonial historic sites are developing innovative ways to engage the pubic via digital media and the internet during this difficult period. A list of some of these historic sites is available on the New Netherland Institute website https:// www.newnetherlandinstitute.org and I Love New York’s Path Through History at https://paththroughhistory.iloveny. com/themes/colonial-history/.
For further information on the current activities and future reopenings of New Netherland historic sites, go to the New York State Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation website https://parks. ny.gov/historic-sites or go to the historic sites’ individual webpages.
New Amsterdam History Center October Event
THE NEW AMSTERDAM History Center is planning an online event for October 2020. Join hundreds of others around the world on Tuesday, October 6, 2020, at 6 P.M. for an internet discussion “New York Is a Dutch City.” Journalist Russell Shorto, award-winning author of The Island at the Center of the World, and architectural historian Barry Lewis, noted for his walking tours of Manhattan, will come together for the first time for a lively discussion on the lasting legacy of the forty-year Dutch administration of New Amsterdam in 1624–1664. In this discussion they will posit that the Dutch influence is still evident in the twenty-first century metropolis of New York City. The program will be moderated by Robert Snyder, Manhattan Borough Historian.
For additional information, please email events@newamsterdamhistorycenter.org or check their website, www.newamsterdamhistorycenter.org.
Crailo State Historic Site (also known as Fort Crailo) in Rensselaer, New York, is one of the numerous histoic sites temporarily closed to the public due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
