The year closes with an appreciation of the words of Adriaen van der Donck as he endeavored to entice Dutch citizens to emigrate from the then center of the world to an outpost in the middle of nowhere. Historians, translators, current NYC residents with Dutch ancestry and others will read from van der Donck’s writings and from the newly translated Prize Letters, seized as war booty by the English during the Dutch-English wars. The correspondence reveals the hopes and dreams of those who chose to immigrate here and struggled to achieve agency and success.

more information to come