David Voorhees to Speak at New Netherland Institute Annual Meeting

ALBANY, NY (01/20/2009)(readMedia)-- INTERVIEWS AND ART AVAILABLE

David Voorhees of Hudson, the editor of the publication De Halve Maen, will be the guest speaker at the quadricentennial year's annual meeting of the New Netherland Institute (NNI) January 31 at the Mansion at Cedar Hill, Selkirk. De Halve Maen is published by the Holland Society of New York.

Registration for the meeting is open to the public. The event starts with a luncheon at 12 noon, followed by a business meeting and the guest speaker's presentation. The cost of the lunch is $25. Registration and payment details for the meeting and directions to the Mansion at Cedar Hill can be found at http://www.nnp.org or by calling the institute office in the Cultural Education Center, (518) 408-1212.

The NNI is the support organization of the New Netherland Project (NNP), formerly called the Dutch Translation Project, which is located at the New York State Library in Albany. The project was established by the New York State Library and The Holland Society to translate and publish some 12,000 papers that include correspondence, court cases, legal contracts and reports from the period 1636 to 1674.

Since 1990, Voorhees has been editor of De Halve Maen, which was first published in 1922 by the Holland Society to serve as a vehicle for new research illuminating the Dutch contribution to American history. Its title is the original Dutch form of The Half Moon, the ship Henry Hudson sailed into the Hudson River in 1609, 400 years ago.

Featuring essays on various aspects of New Netherland material culture, such as agriculture, architecture, silversmithing and the decorative arts, De Halve Maen has grown to be one of the most important sources of information about the Dutch colonial period.

Voorhees is also director of The Papers of Jacob Leisler Project, which studies the life of the man who came to New Netherland as a young employee of the West India Company and became influential in the social, economic and political development of New Netherland and New York. He is best known as a leader of a 1689 New York rebellion that came to bear his name.

Voorhees, formerly the managing reference history editor at Charles Scribner's Sons and a co-editor of The Papers of William Livingston, received a Ph.D. in history from New York University in 1988. He was a New York State Council of the Humanities Speaker in 1996-1998.

His published works include "The Concise Dictionary of American History" (1983), "The Holland Society: A Centennial History 1885-1985" (1985), and "Records of the Reformed Protestant Church of Flatbush, Kings County, New York, Volume 1, 1677-1720" (1999).

An update will be given on the institute's four quadricentennial projects:

• The traveling exhibit "Light on New Netherland" opened at the NYS Museum in December and is on exhibit until February 8. It will then be shown in a number of other locations.
• An exhibit at the Museum of the City of New York (MCNY) will open April 4.
• A book of essays, "Explorers, Fortunes, and Love Letters: A Window on New Netherland," will be published in April and complement the exhibit at MCNY.
• The 30 minute documentary "Uncovering America's Forgotten Colony: The New Netherland Project" is in production and will be available for sale on the website nnp.org.

The business meeting will also include the annual report by Charles T. Gehring, director of the NNP, as well as a time for questions and answers.