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Archiver > Dutch-Colonies > 1998-03 > 0888968615


From: "Robert S. Van Fleet" <>
Subject: 1652 VAN VLIETs, Esopus,NY
Date: Tue, 03 Mar 1998 18:43:35 -0500


Susan, You'll get a citizenship award for copying and posting "The Town
of Esopus Story," pub. 1979.
Your first installment today sent me into a swirl of digging
because of the date (1652) in your quote that follows:

"---#6. Just north of Riverview Cemetery in Port Ewen is the old VAN
VLIET homestead, built on land acquired by a Jan VAN VLIET in 1652 on a
grant from King William of Holland.....Tryntje VAN VLIET and Baltus
TERPENING were married in this house in 1652. Probably this was the
first wedding in Klyne Esopus."

Well,now! This, to me, is like saying somebody named Columbus
("a Columbus")landed on America's shore in 1482, ten years earlier than
thought.
I had though my guys were the early VAN VLIETs when, aboard de
Trouw, on June 13, 1662, Adrian Gerritsen VAN VLIET, wife Agatha Jans
SPRUYT, and younsters Gerrit, Jan, Dirck, Giertje and Machteld sighted
New Amsterdam.

But lo! "a VAN VLIET", unbeknownst to me, is already upriver, his
parchment deed in hand, laying up fieldstone walls and knocking wooden
pegs into beams. More than that, a wedding was held (Sooo festive, I'll
bet), and darling Tryntje is now Mevrouw TERPENING.

Help me, someone? Who are these early-bid VAN VLIETs? Why didn't
my Aunt Bertha tell me?

Really, now, I'll send up multiple-gun salutes for anyone who can
set me straight.
Thanks, all.
--Bob Van Fleet
Middletown, NY

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