The Invention of Ethnicity
Putting the Dutch in Dutch America
Lionel Martina, 10641254
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr. R.V.A. Janssens University of Amsterdam
Contents
Contents...2
Introduction...4
Chapter 1. The invention of ethnicity: How to put the Dutch in Dutch American...9
What is ethnicity?...10
Are Dutch Americans ethnic?...15
Chapter 2: Religion...20
New Netherland and the revolution era in New York...20
A Protestant schism...23
CRC and RCA: Dutch Reformed with a difference?...27
The Midwest...30
New York State...31
Religious ethnicity...33
Chapter 3: Origins and goals...35
The Dutch “Kolonies”...35
The Midwest: a homogenous plurality...37
Post-colonial New York State...40
The Achterhoek trek to the United States...42
From Zeeuws-Vlaanderen to the United States...43
Connected regions...45
E pluribus unum...47
Chapter 4: Cultural Production...50
The Field of Cultural Production...51
Cultural definition from outside...52
Tulip Festivals...60
Invented tradition and ethnicity...62
Production, invention, and tradition...66
Conclusion...67
Introduction
Peter Stuyvesant and the Dutch West India Company bought the island of Manhattan for a few beads and mirrors;1 at least, that was how I imagined the beginning of Dutch history in North
America. I probably would have remained blissfully unaware of the start of Dutch American history if not for a trip to New York. I had told my friend, an American, that I really liked to read about history and that I loved New York City, too. “Well,” he said, “if you want to combine these two things I can recommend you a book. Why don’t you read The Island at the Center of the World. The Epic Story of
Dutch Manhattan and the forgotten Colony that shaped America. As the title suggests, it is about the
Dutch history of New York. You can kill two birds with one stone.” Because this was all the
recommendation I needed, I went to Strand Bookstore on Broadway the next day and bought the book. I had finished the book before I flew back to the Netherlands two days later. Shorto’s elegantly written book did not exactly lead to an epiphany, but it did open my eyes to the long history of Dutch and North American interconnectedness. I already knew, for example, that many New York names originated from the relatively short period of Dutch colonial history. I knew about Broadway’s “Breedeweg” roots, as well as the linguistic roots of Brooklyn (Breukelen), Harlem (Haarlem),
Yonkers (jonkheer), cookie (koekje), and boss (baas). What I did not know, was that the Dutch colony of New Netherland stretched into what is now New York State, New Jersey, Connecticut, and
Delaware. All this new knowledge made me wonder if there was even more to the Dutch history in the United States.
The next step in this story is Saturday, November 11, 2012, when two worlds merged. This was the day I, a Dutchman, married Carlyn, my American wife. This merger of two worlds was not the first Dutch-American union, nor will it be the last. In a way, this was a continuation of business as usual. As we know, the Netherlands and the United States have a long history of relations. This relation stretches back to the days before there even was a United States of America, when Hendry Hudson discovered Manhattan and the river that would bear his name, in 1609. From 1609 onwards, colonists from the Dutch Republic settled the American colonies together with their English, French,
1Of course, it was Peter Minuit who bought Manhattan in 1626 for the equivalent of sixty guilders. Willem Frijhoff and Jaap Jacobs, “The Dutch, New Netherland, and Thereafter (1609-1780s),” in Four Centuries of Dutch-American
Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam, Cornelis A. van Minnen, and Giles Scott-Smith (Amsterdam: Boom,
Swedish, and Spanish counterparts. Those original colonizers were courageous men and women, braving the wilds to build up a new life for themselves and their children.2 The colonies vied for supremacy with the British, each other, and their Indian neighbors.3 In 1674, the direct involvement of the Dutch in North America ended when the British took over control over Manhattan and the colony of New Netherland. However, the British takeover did not signify the end of Dutch presence in North America, as the Dutch colonists of New Netherland remained a dominant group in parts of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. This presence was most visible in the Dutch religious institutions that were a part of every town with a population of Dutch descent. However, the sheer weight of numbers and the passage of time lessened the Dutch colonial presence and visibility.
Around 1847, this dwindling was about to be reversed. A combination of a potato blight and a bad economic outlook strengthened certain Dutch in their belief that there was a Promised Land: the United States. Again, the Dutch came to colonize the lands like their ancestors had done before them. I wonder what these two groups, the older Dutch immigrants and the newer Dutch
immigrants, share and how they differ from each other. Although no two people are the same, people often do share commonalities. What this question does raise, however, is in how far we can speak of a Dutch ethnicity in the American context. Are there Dutch Americans and if so, what constitutes a Dutch American?
When speaking of hyphenated Americans, the term “ethnicity” comes to mind. It can be defined as a duality of where a person is born, of his or her heritage, and how others see that person. It is my thesis that there is a distinct Dutch American ethnicity, and that it was originally built upon religious beliefs. These beliefs encouraged Dutch Americans to build and strengthen religious connections with other Dutch Americans. By strongly identifying with their own, Dutch Americans formed a distinct ethic group within the United States. Although religion was a very distinct marker of Dutch American ethnicity in the 19th and early 20th century, Dutch immigrants were not the only immigrants with whom religion played a major role. We only have to think about the Catholic immigrants from countries like Ireland and Italy, or the Jews from Eastern Europe that came to the United States in great numbers. The Dutch were predominantly Protestant, but Protestantism in its
2 Of course, not all inhabitants of the colonies went out of their own volition. I am aware of the fact that the African slaves and the indentured servants saw their “adventure” in a completely different light. However, it does say something that people were willing to leave everything (how little it might be) behind to start anew in a strange, wild land.
3 Some argue that the battles with the Indians continue until the present day. As an example, the current debate about the offensive and derogatory nature of the name of the Washington Redskins comes to mind.
different forms was the religion with the largest following in the United States. Therefore, you would expect that this religion was not a marker with which Dutch ethnicity can be distinguished.
Nevertheless, what set Dutch Protestants apart from other Protestants was their Calvinism. To keep true to their Calvinist beliefs, they formed their own institutions to support the one “true religion.” This “Cement of the Churches,” as Hans Krabbendam calls it, would prove a strong bond for Dutch Americans.4
One of the reasons the Dutch immigrants were able to maintain such strong bonds is that they tended to cluster together. This clustering in a relatively small geographic area set them apart from the British and French colonists, who settled in larger areas.5 Dutch clustering is not a new phenomenon, since it already started in the 17th century as evidenced by settlements in what is now New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut.6 The immigrants that made the trek from the mid 19th century continued this tendency for clustering in regions such as New York, Michigan, and
Wisconsin. For this new wave, clustering began before they even left the Netherlands. Leading up to the immigration, potential immigrants founded so-called Immigration Societies that came to colonize a distinct part of the United States. These immigration patterns led to Dutch Americans settling in the old New Netherlands colony on the Eastern Seaboard, in the new American Midwest, and in upstate New York. The latter two groups are commonly grouped and studied as one distinct group because they immigrated in the same time period. However, unlike their immigrant brethren in the Midwest, Dutch immigrants in upstate New York and in Wisconsin originated from more religiously plural regions and came to the United States for a better life with no real intentions of transplanting Dutch society. This history made these immigrants more pragmatic and less dogmatic than their contemporaries, molding their identity slightly differently than the rest of the Dutch American ethnic group.
Ethnic groups, themselves, can be perceived and defined from both inside and outside of the group by looking at cultural production. There are two main flavors of cultural production, small-scale and large-small-scale. In short, small-small-scale production is culture, such as literature and art, produced for a small group, while large-scale production is culture accessible to the masses. Cultural
production of Dutch Americans from outside the ethnic group took the form of large-scale
4 “Cement of the Churches” is the title of Chapter 4 of the book. Hans Krabbendam, Freedom on the Horizon: Dutch
Immigration to America, 1840-1940 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009).
5 Of course, what also played a role is that the French and British sent more colonists to North America than the Dutch. This also led to those colonists settling in a larger area.
production. Washington Irving’s book about Dutch New York, A history of New York, from the
beginning of the world to the end of the Dutch dynasty, is the first example of outside production in
relation to Dutch Americans. This book was shortly followed by a book by Edmund B. O’Callaghan,
History of New Netherland; or, New York under the Dutch. Unlike Irving’s book that portrayed gruff
caricatures of Dutch Americans, O’Callaghan used factual information to detail Dutch colonial history in the United States.7 O’Callaghan inadvertently set the stage for “Holland Mania.” Holland Mania was a period during which everything Dutch was valued in the United States and the period led to a new appreciation of Dutch Golden Age art. Dutch masters like Rembrandt and Vermeer depicted the idealized, clean, and frugal Protestant work ethic that Americans valued. This appreciation was a response to the rising immigration from regions that were not “white” or Protestant, like Italy and Eastern Europe. During Holland Mania, this perceived “Dutchness” was used to define the American ideal against others. When the United States closed its borders with the Quota Acts of 1921 and 1924, no new, unwanted immigrants were flooding America’s shores. The Dutch were no longer necessary as a role model and were therefore discarded, and Holland Mania had come to an end.
Despite the sudden abandonment of Holland Mania, Dutch Americans continued to produce both small-scale and large-scale productions. For example, religion remained central for many Dutch immigrant communities causing the small-scale cultural production of Dutch language church services. Dutch language newspapers also continued cultural production, only shifting their focus from inside one distinct community to reporting the happenings of all Dutch areas. Large-scale production continued as well. A major example of large-scale production from inside the Dutch American community is the so-called Tulip Festivals. These festivals not only celebrated the unique immigrant view on Dutch ethnicity, but also give an indication of the strength of Dutch ethnic identity in particular regions. Indeed, as Dutch immigrants went westward or became more Americanized, Tulip Festivals followed suit. All in all, these festivals were places where invented traditions, imagined communities, and cultural production all came together.
Because of the long connection between the Dutch and the United States, many discussions could be started about the influence of the Dutch on American society. Although “influence” is difficult to measure, there have been many theories about the Dutch shaping American identity. This thesis is not out to prove or disprove these theories. What I do want to explore is how Dutch
7 “Review of History of New Netherland; Or New York under the Dutch by E. B. O’Callaghan,” The North American
immigrants left an impression in the United States. This search led me along the paths that Dutch immigrants to the United States have followed for centuries. First, after starting as localized communities Dutch Americans eventually imagined a national ethnic identity. This ethnic identity was largely shaped around the Calvinist religious heritage of the immigrants. These roots led to the establishment of ethnocentric schools, churches, and newspapers. The Dutch immigrants also tended to cluster within these established communities in an attempt to transplant Dutch society to the United States. These communities eventually evolved and celebrated a now Americanized version of Dutch ethnicity in the form of Tulip Festivals.
Perhaps due to all of these similarities in both small- and large-scale cultural production, historiography tends to focus on only two groups of Dutch immigrants. These groups are the older immigrants who settled in what had once been New Netherlands and the newer immigrants who settled in the Midwest and upstate New York. However, if one looks closer into the details of their individual ethnic roots, religion, choice of settlement, and cultural production, a small rift begins to emerge. In this thesis, I aim to explore what the definition of Dutch ethnicity is and how that
definition can shift. Because only by analyzing small cultural differences can we fully understand the true complexity of the Dutch American melting pot.
Chapter 1. The invention of ethnicity: How to put the Dutch in Dutch American
Currently, 4.3 million Americans say they are of Dutch descent.8 The literal definition of ‘descent’ is relatively straightforward, where ‘descent’ is tied to a biological lineage or an origin. However, the definition of ‘descent' when put into relation with culture is ambiguous,9 and becomes even more complicated when we use ‘descent’ to describe the construct of ‘ethnicity’. Werner Sollors explores this ambiguity in his book Beyond Ethnicity: Consent and Descent in American Culture. For Sollors, descent is a relation of substance, while consent is a relation of law. As he stated: “Descent language emphasizes our position as heirs, our hereditary qualities, liabilities, and entitlements; consent language stresses our abilities as mature free agents and ‘architects of our fates’ to choose our spouses, our destinies, our political systems.”10
This leads me to the question of what makes an American a Dutch American. Firstly, what definition does the U.S. Census Bureau use to determine a person’s descent? Interestingly, the U.S. Census Bureau assumes it is a matter of consent. Under federal guidelines, what ethnicity and descent a respondent has, is a choice. In the end, the respondent decides of what ethnicity, if any, he is a part.11 Secondly, does Dutch ancestral history or choice define a Dutch American? If you can only be a Dutch American by descent, what constitutes this descent? If being Dutch American is a choice, what is this choice?12 To find out if being Dutch American is based on descent, consent, or both, I will first define ethnicity in the context of this paper. What makes a person ethnic? Is it a choice or simply a matter of ancestry? After defining ethnicity, I will delve into the specific markers of Dutch American ethnicity. What makes a person Dutch American? Do religion, language, and culture make someone Dutch American, or is there more to it? After I have discussed these different markers, I will look into
8 U. S. Census Bureau, “Dutch Heritage in the United States,” accessed March 13, 2014, http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml? pid=ACS_12_1YR_S0201&prodType=table.
9The Oxford Dictionary describes ‘descent’ as follows: The fact of ‘descending’ or being descended from an ancestor or ancestral stock; lineage. “Descent, N.,” OED Online (Oxford University Press), accessed April 18, 2014, http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/50722.
10 Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity.p. 6.
11 The U.S. Census Bureau uses the definition from the Office of Management and Budget to determine ethnicity. Quite surprisingly, the only ethnic distinction the federal government makes is ‘Hispanic or Latino’ and ‘Not Hispanic or Latino’. “Revisions to the Standards for the Classification of Federal Data on Race and Ethnicity | The White House,” accessed June 4, 2014, http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/fedreg_1997standards/.
different groups of Dutch Americans. Are they similar or different? Is there one distinct type of Dutch American, or are there more flavors to the Dutch American stew?
What is ethnicity?
As Werner Sollors suggests in The Invention of Ethnicity, “The forces of modern life embodied by such terms as ‘ethnicity,’ ‘nationalism,’ or ‘race’ can indeed be meaningfully discussed as
‘inventions.’”13 Dutch American is the name for a specific group of people in the United States of America. This specific group distinguishes itself from other Americans by using the prefix ‘Dutch’. Therefore, one of the markers of ethnicity is how the group perceives its ethnicity. If I follow Sollor’s definition, being Dutch American is also an invention. However, like most ‘ethnics’ Dutch Americans most likely do not see themselves as inventions.14 One of the questions of this thesis is what else makes an American “Dutch American.” In other words, how do we define Dutch in the American context? Is it a matter of ethnicity, nationality, culture, religion, or a melting pot of all of the above?
The old Greek word “ethnikos” originally meant either “gentile” or “heathen” and signified people who were “other” and not of the own group. The Greek context also implies that ethnics do not possess citizenship rights. “Ethnics” were by definition not of the “polis” and could therefore not possess the same rights as the citizens. The first definition, of a people that were “other” than the reigning group, is also the definition we currently use when we talk about ethnicity.15 A second marker of ethnicity, therefore, is in how far a person has citizenship rights. Interestingly enough, although the root of the world goes back to ancient Greek, the use of ethnic in its current form is relatively new. According to Sollors, the first use of the word “ethnicity” in its current form was in 1941 by W. Lloyd Warner and Paul Lunt.16 For Warner and Lunt, someone “was classified as
13 Sollors, The Invention of Ethnicity., p. xi. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge etc: Cambridge University Press, 1983). Anderson, Imagined Communities. In chapter 4 I will discuss the invention of Dutch American traditions in more detail.
14 See, for example, the essays celebrating Dutch American scholar Robert P. Swierenga’s 35-year career. For the authors, Dutch and American alike, being Dutch American is a tangible fact. Hans Krabbendam and Larry J.
Wagenaar, eds., The Dutch-American Experience: Essays in Honor of Robert P. Swierenga (Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij, 2000).
15 Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity, p. 25.
16 Ibid, p. 23. The book in question is Warner, W. Lloyd, and Paul S. Lunt, The Social Life of a Modern Community, Yankee City Series, vol. 1, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1941).Warner was a member of the Second Generation of the Chicago School of Sociology, which came up under the tutelage of Robert E. Park and Ernst W. Burgess. One of Warner’s more famous contemporaries is Louis Wirth, who wrote the influential ethnic study “The Ghetto”, on communication and social maintenance. For an overview of the Chicago Schoool of Sociology and its professors, see Wayne G. Lutters and Mark S. Ackerman, “An Introduction to the Chicago School of Sociology,” vol. 1996 (presented at the UCI-ICS Social Worlds Lab #96-1, Irvine, Cal., 1996).
belonging to a specific ethnic group if (1) he considered himself or was considered by the Yankee community as a member of the group, and (2) if he participated in the activities of the group.”17 Warner and Lunt furthermore state, “The concept of ethnicity is not based simply on place of birth.”18 If we follow this definition, the simple fact that a Dutch American was born in the
Netherlands does not make his or her ethnicity Dutch.19 In addition, the simple fact that a person residing in the United States descends from Dutch ancestors does not make one Dutch American. However, the question that remains is what else makes a person “ethnic” or “other”? A Yankee is a native inhabitant of New England, which at the time was a synonym for White Anglo Saxon
Protestant (WASP). The Dutch immigrants were also white and Protestant, and apart from the language at least outwardly indistinguishable from the WASPs.20 Sollors provides a definition for ethnicity in Beyond Ethnicity; there, he writes that ethnicity is a construct. As a construct, ethnicity appears to be natural and bound to descent, but at the same time, it is also rooted in consent and acceptance.21 Ethnicity in this sense is a result of his or her heritage. As a child of Dutch parents, you are automatically Dutch. However, if you are born of Dutch parents in the United States, part of your Dutch ethnicity is defined by the acceptance of your Dutch roots. With Warner and Lunt in mind, this acceptance has to be from both the ethnic group, itself, as well as from the “others”. Without acceptance of these roots, you are just an American and not Dutch American. In short, ethnicity is a choice, while at the same time also a result of descent/ancestry.
The author Horace Kallen is inexorably connected to the debate about ethnicity. His 1915 essay Democracy versus the Melting-Pot was a critique of the theories of the American melting pot metaphor that were prevalent in his time. Kallen substituted the melting pot metaphor with his own metaphor of an orchestra. America was like an orchestra, where different instruments came
together to create “a symphony of civilization.” These instruments were also a synonym for the
17 Ibid., p. 23. Sollors also asks the question if Yankees are also ethnic, p. 24. His main conclusion, which I share, is that for the dominant group in a country all other persons who are not of that group is ethnic. This raises the question if the new immigrant Dutch were ethnic compared to the descendants of the colonial Dutch Yankees. 18 Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity, p. 23.
19 According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word "Yankee" is probably derived from the Dutch "Janke”. This would mean that by Lloyd and Lunt's definition Dutch Americans are not ethnic. However, in the United States “Yankee” usually refers to a White Anglo Saxon from New England, or WASP. “Etymology of ‘Yankee’,” Oxford English
Dictionary, March 18, 2014, http://www.oed.com.proxy.uba.uva.nl:2048/view/Entry/231174?
result=1&rskey=XxvoGc&.
20 At least according to one of the Dutch letter writers in Kathleen Anne DeHaan, “‘He Looks like a Yankee in His New Suit.’ Immigrant Rhetoric: Dutch Immigrant Letters as Forums for Shifting Immigrant Identities.” (Northwestern University, 1998).
different ethnicities in the United States. In Kallen’s synonym, outsiders also defined ethnicity like in the Greek “ethnikos,” or Warner and Lunt’s “Yankee.” Kallen further introduced new terminology to the ethnic debate by referring to this symphony as “cultural pluralism.”22 From this idea came his claim that “an Irishman is always an Irishman, a Jew always a Jew. Irishman or Jew is born, citizen or lawyer, church-member is made. Irishman and Jew are facts of nature; citizen and church-member are artifacts of civilization”. Therefore for Kallen, ethnicity was a given- a matter of descent, which could not be changed.23 In his opinion, multiple ethnic groups enrich the nation by adding their own tone to the symphony. By differentiating ethnicities, America is prevented from becoming a broken record, repeating the same stanza repeatedly. In Kallen’s definition, ethnicity is also something that is determined by the view outsiders have of a certain group. It is up to the listeners on the outside to distinguish the different sounds of the ethnicities. However, as I have shown previously, the question if ethnicity is a matter of consent or descent might not entirely fit Kallen’s music sheet. There are also proponents of the theory that ethnicity is a matter of choice and consent.
If ethnicity is a matter of consent and acceptance as well, which type of consent makes a person specifically Dutch American? Willem Frijhoff tries to answer this question in his essay
Dutchness in Fact and Fiction.24 One of his main concerns is how to define Dutch and Dutchness.25 For Frijhoff, Dutchness is primarily based on consent and secondarily on actual nationality. In order to understand this consent, he places the Dutch ethnicity and nationality in a historical perspective. For Frijhoff, the consensual definition of being “Dutch” starts with 17th century colonial New
Netherland. For the inhabitants of the Dutch Republic, citizenship was not determined by place of birth alone, but was also something that could be bought, therefore implying consent. Citizenship was tied to your place of residence and, with that, slightly reminiscent of the Greek “polis.” If you legally lived within the gates of a city or town (inside the “Poort”) you were of that city or town. If you were not of that town, you could become a legal resident by paying for the privilege. If one can
22 Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity, p. 97. Kallen himself would not have spoken of ethnicity, since the word was not in use until the 1940s. Instead, Kallen talked about races and nations when writing about what we consider ethnicities. For clarity, I have translated Kallen’s terms race and nationality to ethnicity.
23Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity, p. 183. Robert P. Swierenga was also part of the discussion in the 1970s and beyond on what constitutes ethnicity. He subscribed to Kallen’s definition of a pluralistic society, Robert P. Swierenga,
“Ethnocultural Political Analysis: A New Approach to American Ethnic Studies,” Journal of American Studies 5, no. 1 (April 1, 1971): 59–79.
24 Willem Frijhoff, “Dutchness in Fact and Fiction,” in Going Dutch: The Dutch Presence in America, 1609-2009, ed. Joyce D. Goodfriend, Benjamin Schmidt, and Annette Stott (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 327–58.
25 Ibid. For instance his statement that “Dutch” is actually not a Dutch word. Since it is an externalist term, by definition “Dutch” is about the outside perception of the people of the Netherlands.
become Dutch by paying for it, becoming Dutch is a choice.26 The colonists, many of whom were not born in the Dutch Republic but came from elsewhere, transplanted this consensual form of
Dutchness to New Netherland. When the British took over the colony in 1674, a treaty between Britain and the Dutch Republic protected the Dutch freedoms, property, and liberties. A major example of these freedoms was the municipal government of New York. The military governor of New York kept the New Amsterdam system of a chosen council of “Burgemeester” and “Schepenen” (loosely translated as mayor and aldermen) in place. Another example is the monopoly on trade with the Indians held by the town of Beverwijck, which transferred to its successor Albany.27 Those are only two examples of how the former Dutch colonists, now under British rule, had their own special status within the British colonies. Because of this special status, Dutchness became a badge with which these citizens could defend their privileges against their neighbors and their new rulers. Religion and language became markers of both “Dutchness” and Dutch identity in New York, with which these colonists could mark their special status.28 “Dutchness” was a means to establish and defend citizenship rights.
Therefore, I place the beginning of what I will call “Dutch ethnicity” in America at the colony of New Netherland. Language, culture, and religion set those colonists and their descendants apart from the “English” that surrounded them. Even when the Dutch colonists were not actually born in the Netherlands, they spoke Dutch among each other and predominantly belonged to the Dutch
26 A, unfortunately, incomplete record of the “Poorters” (citizens) of Amsterdam can be found in the Amsterdam City Archive. Stadsarchief Amsterdam, “Amsterdamse Poorters,” n.d.,
http://stadsarchief.amsterdam.nl/presentaties/amsterdamse_schatten/amsterdammers/poorters/index.html. A person born in Amsterdam was automatically an Amsterdammer, but not automatically a “Poorter”. This privilege could be bought and came with its own privileges. For a more extensive summary of “Poorters” and citizens in the 17th century Dutch Republic see Maarten Prak, “The Dutch Republic as a Bourgeois Society,” BMGN - Low Countries
Historical Review 125, no. 2–3 (January 1, 2010): 107–39.
27 For more on governance and city rights after the transfer of power, see Simon Middleton, “The Waning of Dutch New York,” in Four Centuries of Dutch-American Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam and Giles Scott-Smith, 2009; Simon Middleton, “The Idea of ‘Amsterdam’ in New Amsterdam and Early New York.,” ed. George Harinck and Hans Krabbendam (Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij, 2005), 45–54; Jaap Jacobs, “‘To Favor This New and Growing City of New Amsterdam with a Court of Justice.’ The Relations between Rulers and Ruled in New Amsterdam.” In
Amsterdam-New York: Transatlantic Relations and Urban Identities Since 1653, ed. George Harinck and Hans
Krabbendam (Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij, 2005), 17–29. These rights were all based on the Municipal Charter that the Dutch States-General implemented in 1653. In turn, this charter is the basis for New York’s City Charter. For more on the trade monopoly of Albany, see Bernard Mason, “Aspects of the New York Revolt of 1689.,” New York
History 30, no. 2 (April 1, 1949): 165–80.p. 171-172.
28 Frijhoff, “Dutchness in Fact and Fiction”, pp. 346-349. De Jong also dedicates a chapter to the integration of the Dutch colonists in Colonial America (chapter 5), pp. 67-86. Gerald Francis De Jong, The Dutch in America, 1609-1974 (Boston, Mass: Twayne Publishers, 1975). His main conclusion is that the effects of the Dutch colonial period were minimal, but that this is not be confused with the stereotypes that Washington Irving helped spread, p. 86.
Reformed Church. Culture in the discourse of 17th century New York is the public culture of the Dutch Republic and, more specifically, its rights and privileges. This definition does not necessarily mean the production of culture in literature, art, or folklore.29 The English takeover also marks the beginning of a tradition of seeing the Dutch Republic as one of the foundations of modern democracy. This shift in perception also lessened the importance of nationality in the idealized Republic.30 Instead of placing importance on the place of descent, people regarded cultural, linguistic, and religious diversity as the basis of this society. According to some theories, the Dutch community was the seed of New York and, therefore, the basis of the United States, as we now know it.31 Of course, claims about the origins of American culture are not solely for the Dutch. This theory is one in a long line of theories on how American culture came into being. Frederick Jackson Turner’s “Frontier Thesis” is one that comes to mind.32 The British, who gave the United States their language among many other things, also need to be included in this discussion.33 However, since this thesis is about Dutch Americans and their culture, I will not expand on these British theories. There is debate if a small group of Dutch colonists is responsible for the later identity of a city or a country. However, during the 17th and a large part of 18th century, there was a definite benefit for the continuance of Dutch cultural identity. In the end, maybe with the exception of smaller towns in the Hudson Valley, the eventual assimilation of the colonial Dutch into the English and later the American society went fast. The result was that by the end of the 18th century the former Dutch colonists were a part of the
29 Simon Middleton, “The Waning of Dutch New York,” in Four Centuries of Dutch-American Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam and Giles Scott-Smith, 2009. Middleton gives a very concise summary of how cultural Dutchness changed over the years after the English takeover.
30 Anderson, Imagined Communities, p. 46. Anderson places the origin of the modern nation state in the period between 1776 and 1838. I am aware of the fact that nationality as such was not used in 17th century Holland or
America, but found this the best word to describe a person coming from a specific country that is not part of the Dutch Republic.
31 Willem Frijhoff and Jaap Jacobs, “The Dutch, New Netherland, and Thereafter (1609-1780s),” in Four Centuries of
Dutch-American Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam, Cornelis A. van Minnen, and Giles Scott-Smith
(Amsterdam: Boom, 2009), 31–47, come to a similar conclusion. On maybe a less scientific basis, but definitely an enjoyable version of this story is Russell Shorto, The Island at the Center of the World: The Epic Story of Dutch
Manhattan and the Forgotten Colony That Shaped America (New York etc: Doubleday, 2004).
32 According to Turner, American’s struggle with the frontier in their own country formed American culture and traditions. He concluded that the first chapter of the United States closed when its borders stretched from ocean to ocean. Frederick Jackson Turner, The Frontier in American History (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1921), http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22994., p 38.
33 The prime example of this theory is Fischer’s “Albion’s Seed”, in which Fischer claims that American culture originates in the folkways that were exported by the immigrants coming from distinct British regions. The book was a reaction to the frontier theory and the Germ Theory. The latter claimed that Germanic liberties were the root of American culture. David Hackett Fischer, Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America (New York etc: Oxford University Press, 1989).
American fabric.34 Dutch ethnicity had lost its function of being “other”, and with that protecting the old privileges. With this loss of function, Dutch ethnicity had also lost its distinction at the beginning of the 19th century. However, with the emergence of nation states and large waves of immigration of “others,” Dutch ethnicity would not be dormant for long.
Are Dutch Americans ethnic?
According to the definition of Warner and Lunt, a person is ethnic if both he or she and the host society think that he or she is part of another group. Ethnicity is a way of defining the “other” by defining your own group, while at the same time being defined by others. This defining of the other is not a 20th century American invention. If the founding of New Netherland and its colonization was the first wave of Dutch immigration to the United States, the second wave starts around 1846. At that time, the combination of a potato crop failure and a bleak economic future led many people on the path of emigration. These Dutch emigrants had a few things in common. The majority of the emigrants were Protestant, they were predominantly coming from a rural environment, and they were of modest financial means. Most of the Dutch emigrants originated from the so-called “clay provinces” of Zeeland, Groningen, and Friesland, and from the sand provinces of Gelderland and Noord-Brabant.35 Since a lot of the immigrants came from rural communities, they also set out to become farmers in the United States. Next to financial hardship and a dream of a better life, many of these Dutch immigrants had another reason for immigrating to the United States. In 1834,
conservative factions had seceded from the Dutch Reformed Church, which was the official state religion in the Netherlands at the time. This secession led to an estrangement of the Dutch that were still part of the “traditional” church. Although the Seceders were not actively persecuted,
mainstream Dutch society would not fully accept them until the end of the 19th century.36 However, the opportunity to buy land in the United States and to obtain more religious freedom was hard to resist. It gave many Seceders reason to emigrate to the U.S. Furthermore, they emigrated with their entire family, which was a result of their orthodox beliefs. This family style of immigration also
34 Middleton, “The Waning of Dutch New York.”
35 Hans Krabbendam, Vrijheid in het verschiet: Nederlandse emigratie naar Amerika 1840-1940 (Hilversum: Uitgeverij Verloren, 2006), 26-27. For a very extensive breakdown of the number of immigrants, their origins, their occupation, their social situation, religion, and much more, see Robert P. Swierenga, Faith and Family : Dutch
Immigration and Settlement in the United States, 1820-1920 (New York etc: Holmes & Meier, 2000).
36Krabbendam, Vrijheid in het verschiet: Nederlandse emigratie naar Amerika 1840-1940., p. 29. Also Robert P. Swierenga, “The New Immigration,” in Four Centuries of Durch-American Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam, Cornelis A. van Minnen, and Giles Scott-Smith (Amsterdam: Boom, 2009)., 295-296.
separates the Dutch Protestants (both Reformed and Seceders) from other immigrant groups at the time.37
Another distinct trait of Dutch immigrants was that they emigrated in organized groups.38 This trait is not a specific trait of ethnicity. However, it is something that differentiated the Dutch immigrants from other groups at the time. The Netherlands’ very liberal emigration policy was a big reason for this. For the Dutch government, immigration was a way to release internal pressure. These pressures could be economic, but were also religious. To facilitate immigration the
Netherlands allowed its citizens to form so-called “immigration societies”. These societies decided where to emigrate, formed beachheads for immigrants, and informed potential immigrants of the possibilities in the new land.39 Due to these factors, a big percentage of Dutch immigrants ended up in immigrant colonies in the American Midwest. The choice for this region was logical at the time. Because it was still frontier country, the Midwest offered a positive economic environment with new farmland available in abundance.40 After the initial settlement phase, new arrivals would follow their predecessors to these locations, since there was space available with the added benefit of a
likeminded community of compatriots. It is also telling that the Dutch immigrant came to colonize an already existing nation. Reverend Scholte, who was one of the leaders of this new wave of
immigration, said on this point:
If Hollanders are scattered among a foreign population, they will be left too much to themselves, because they cannot in so short a time familiarize themselves with the language in which the Gospel is preached. Through colonization, those who will leave will be able to hear the Gospel in their native tongue during the first few years at least, and may thus receive that spiritual sustenance which will conform in them the faith, kindle them in love, warm them against the cravings of the flesh that militate against the spirit.41
37 Krabbendam, Vrijheid in het verschiet: Nederlandse emigratie naar Amerika 1840-1940. 145-147.
38 De Jong mentions the three most important emigration associations from Utrecht (Scholte), Arnhem (Van Raalte), and Zeeland (Van der Meulen). These associations would end up determining where the majority of emigrants emigrated.
39 Krabbendam, Vrijheid in het verschiet: Nederlandse emigratie naar Amerika 1840-1940. 45-47 40 Hans Krabbendam, Vrijheid in het verschiet, 48-49
41 De Jong, The Dutch in America, 1609-1974, p. 135. In his book De Jong used a part of the quote in Bertus Harry Wabeke, Dutch Emigration to North America, 1624-1860 (New York city, Netherlands information bureau, 1944), http://archive.org/details/DutchEmigrationToNorthAmerica1624-1860, p. 114. The colonization of Michigan and Iowa is discussed at length in the works of Van Hinte and Lucas. Jacob van Hinte, Netherlanders in America: A Study
of Emigration and Settlement in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries in the United States of America, ed. Robert
P. Swierenga, trans. Adriaan de Wit (Grand Rapids Mich: Baker Book House, 1985); Henry S. Lucas, Netherlanders in
America: Dutch Immigration to the United States and Canada, 1789-1950 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press;
Colonizing part of a country, staying together in tight knit communities and remaining faithful to the Gospel, is something that set Dutch immigrants apart from their European contemporaries. Dutch immigrants, especially those immigrating to the Midwest, saw themselves as colonists, which also meant that they emigrated to stay permanently. A permanent stay was not what other immigrants at the time had in mind when they moved to the United States. These other immigrant groups
consisted predominantly of labor migrants who intended to move to the United States for a short period.42 The Midwest was, of course, not the only location of Dutch immigration. The Dutch that settled in upstate New York, who are also part of my research, are a notable exception. Other Dutch immigrants also stayed on the eastern seaboard in cities like Paterson and Albany, while others moved even further west to Oregon and California. The majority of 19th century Dutch immigrants, however, did settle in the Midwest.
Especially for the Dutch immigrants that immigrated to the United States between 1847 and 1860, a sense of national identity seems to have been missing. They were first and foremost
Protestant, possibly Seceder, from a specific province, region, or municipality.43 According to the data, 75% of emigrants came from only 12% of the municipalities in the Netherlands.44 Therefore, emigration was clearly a local affair.45 Another factor that says a lot about the ideas of the early Dutch immigrants to the Midwest is how they named their new towns. Names like Overisel and Zeeland in Michigan, South Holland in Illinois, and Friesland and Overijssel in South Dakota, tell much about the roots and affiliation of their settlers.46 Furthermore, a majority of the emigrants
42 For an example of how Eastern Europeans traveled the transatlantic routes, see Adam Walaszek, “Central Eastern Europeans in the Euro-Atlantic Migration System Before the First World War,” in Tales of Transit Narrative Migrant
Spaces in Atlantic Perspective, 1850-1950, ed. Michael Boyden, Hans Krabbendam, and Liselotte Vandenbussche
(Amsterdam University Press, 2013), 29–44.
43 Swierenga, Faith and Family, p. 156. Only 18% of Dutch emigrants between 1831-1880 was Catholic and only 1% was Jewish. Since 59% of the emigrants was Dutch Reformed and 20% was Seceder, for all intents and purposes “the Dutch emigrant” was a Protestant.
44 Robert P. Swierenga, “Exodus Netherlands, Promised Land America,” in A Bilateral Bicentennial: A History of
Dutch-American Relations, 1782-1982, ed. J.W. Schulte Nordholt and Robert P. Swierenga (Amsterdam: Octagon
Books, 1982), p. 133. This leads Swierenga to the conclusion that the Dutch immigrants in the Midwest were part of transplanted communities, a conclusion John Bodnar would repeat 3 years later.
45 The Dutch did not have a monopoly of localized emigration. Among many examples are the immigrants from 19th
century Central and Eastern Europe. Nominally part of empires like the Austro-Hungarian, Russian, or German empires, immigrants from these areas also identified more with region than country. Walaszek, “Central Eastern Europeans in the Euro-Atlantic Migration System Before the First World War.” However, as Swierenga has also noticed, the Dutch tendency to group together can be traced back to New Netherland colonial times, Swierenga, “Exodus Netherlands, Promised Land America.”, p. 133.
46 Robert Swierenga also mentions this apparent lack of a Dutch national identity with the emigrants. Swierenga, “Exodus Netherlands, Promised Land America.”
came from small rural villages and municipalities. A shift in places of origin to more urban centers, such as Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, and Utrecht would only take place after the 1880s.47 The fact that the Dutch were emigrating from smaller communities is not something that sets them apart when compared to other immigrant groups at the time. What does set the Dutch apart, though, is their intent. Dutch immigrants did not go to the United States to earn money or make a better future for themselves or their children. The Dutch moved to the United States to found colonies of
transplanted communities. These colonies were predominantly in the Midwest, but there were also settlements in upstate New York, to which I will come back in later chapters. The majority of
immigrants did not move to the big urban centers where quick assimilation was the norm, but instead clung together in those rural colonies. There, Dutch dialects prevailed and assimilation was slower than in the big cities.48 The combination of moving to preplanned American colonies
originating in localized emigration is a defining trait of Dutch immigrants.
The religious organization of the Dutch was another factor that distinguished Dutch immigration in the 19th century from the immigration of East and South Europeans. I call this organization another ethnic marker, since it was a way to distinguish the Dutch from “others.” Church services were in Dutch, as it was felt that the language was more suited to keep a proper distance between the young and their elders. Dutch can be more formal than English can, and with that construct a natural hierarchy between young and old. Where Dutch Catholic and Jewish immigrants mostly joined existing American churches and temples, the Protestant Dutch of the 19th century founded their own churches in the United States. Because religion played a central part in their lives, founding a new church was one of the first things immigrants did upon arrival. This church and its community then became the focal point of the surrounding country.49 It was via these churches that the Dutch immigrants also stayed abreast of religious developments in the
Netherlands. Due to these relatively closed communities, the assimilation of Midwestern Dutch immigrants was relatively slow and arduous when compared to their predecessors on the East coast. In part, this delay was natural since they arrived at a different time. No longer were immigrants pioneers on sparsely populated land, but instead they were moving into a nation that was already formed. Furthermore, the fact that these immigrants clustered in likeminded communities, most
47 Robert P. Swierenga, “The Delayed Transition from Folk to Labor Migration: The Netherlands, 1880- 1920,”
International Migration Review 27, no. 2 (July 1, 1993): 406–24, doi:10.2307/2547131.
48 Robert Swierenga also emphasizes this tendency of Dutch immigrants to cluster and behave “clannish.” Swierenga, Faith and Family, pp. 78-79.
likely, did not help their assimilation. Since religion plays such an important role in the perception people have about Dutch immigrants, I will research immigrant religion in more detail in chapter two.
None of these characteristics by themselves constitutes an ethnic identity. Combined, they are a strong indication of the “othering” that many 19th century Dutch immigrants felt necessary to keep their identity and culture. At the time of the first wave of immigration from 1847, nationality did not play a large part in defining Dutchness. The Dutch nation state, in which citizens exchanged their local citizenship for a national one, had only just begun with the introduction of the
Constitution of the Bataafse Republiek in 1798.50 Therefore, immigrants were from Zeeland or Gelderland, not per se from the Netherlands. In that way, Dutch Americans confirmed to Kallen’s definition of being ethnic: they are their own instruments and, with that, the Dutch Americans add their distinct sound to America’s symphony. However, at the same time, Dutch Americans do not exactly fit Kallen’s ethnic definition. The simple fact that you are born Dutch makes you Dutch. At the same time, consent and civilization are what make a church-member. Since religion is a big part of the Dutch American makeup, this implies that a Dutch American is made as well. When we bring Kallen’s definition to its logical conclusion, Dutch ethnicity is a result of both descent and consent.
50 Before this constitution, the Netherlands were more or less a collection of loosely allied provinces and “Generaliteitsgebieden” (the predominantly Catholic provinces of the South that were ‘governed’ by the Holland provinces). Hans Knippenberg and B. C. de Pater, De eenwording van Nederland: schaalvergroting en integratie
sinds 1800 (Nijmegen: SUN, 1988). pp. 18-19. Their thesis is that a Dutch national identity did not exist until the
second half of the 19th century. It finally came to fruition in the second half of the 20th century. The mere fact that
Chapter 2: Religion
One of the distinct markers of Dutch ethnicity in the United States is religion.51 When we look at the dominant religion in the United States in the 19th century, this is somewhat surprising. After all, the majority of Dutch emigrants were Protestant and they were immigrating to a Protestant nation. So was Dutch religion as distinct from American Protestantism as we assume? If so, what was it that set Dutch religion apart from ‘mainstream’ Protestantism in the United States? I furthermore want to answer the question about the importance of religion for Dutch ethnicity in the United States. Were the Protestant Dutch the same in the Hudson Valley, Upstate New York, and the Midwest, or did these groups differ? In order to answer these questions, I will start with a brief overview of Dutch religious history in the United States.52 Next, I will look into the role of religion in the three different areas of Dutch settlement on which this thesis is focused. I have selected these areas because I think their Dutch immigrants each have a distinctive Dutch flavor that merits further research. Because I cannot cover the entirety of these areas within the scope of this thesis, I have made a selection of a few communities within these areas. What these communities have in common, is that they share immigrant groups that make comparison possible. The majority of the immigrants in these
communities originate from the Netherlands regions of the Achterhoek and Zeeuws-Vlaanderen. For the Midwest, these communities are Sheboygan and Alto in Wisconsin; for the Hudson Valley, Albany, New York; and for Upstate New York, I have selected Clymer and East Williamson.53 The common origins of their immigrants are also the reason for me to research these origins in chapter three. Finally, I will compare these three regions to see if I can distil a distinct Dutch aspect of religion.
51 One example is Swierenga, Faith and Family., in which Swierenga gives a breakdown of the religion of the emigrants between 1831-1880, pp. 157-166. Also in earlier works, religion is an important part of Dutch ethnicity. Hinte, Netherlanders in America; Lucas, Netherlanders in America.
52 Swierenga, Faith and Family. p. 156. Since the non-Protestant immigrants are ‘only’ 19% of the total were less visible as a separate ethnic group, I will focus solely on Dutch Protestant immigrants.
53 What I call East Williamson in this paper consists of 3 townships: East Williamson, Pultneyville, and Sodus. These towns lie within a few miles of each other.
New Netherland and the revolution era in New York
Ever since the Dutch started their colonization of the New World, religion was an important factor in Dutch culture. As early as the 17th century, the Dutch Republic was a haven for religious toleration and by extension so was the Dutch colony of New Netherland. At least, this was the perception of the time.54 In part out of necessity, the Dutch West India Company relied on foreigners to help colonize New Netherland. Among these foreigners were Protestant Walloons and Germans, but also Flemish Catholics and Portuguese Jews.55 At the time, the Dutch Reformed Church was the official church of the Dutch Republic and of its colonies. However, this did not mean that other religions were not permitted. As was the case in the Dutch Republic, New Netherland also had religious freedom of sorts. Peter Stuyvesant tried to reassert the dominance of the Dutch Reformed Church, but this did not take hold.56
The English takeover of the colony of New Netherland in 1674 marked another beginning. In the 19th century, some viewed the Dutch Republic as one of the foundations of the modern United States. Religious diversity, next to cultural and linguistic diversity, was the basis of this society. As I have discussed in chapter one, there are many competing theories about the seed of American civilization and culture. One of these theories is that the community of New Amsterdam was the seed of New York and the basis of the United States, as we know it now.57 A foundation of this theory is that the English takeover did not signify the end of the Dutch Reformed Church in the colonies. The Dutch Reformed Church was the second officially recognized church in the Colonies, next to the
54 Thomas E. Carney, “A Tradition to Live By: New York Religious History, 1624–1740,” New York History 85, no. 4 (October 1, 2004): 301–330. In this article gives a very thorough description of religious practices and traditions in colonial New Amsterdam and New York. Joyce Goodfriend also touches on this subject, Joyce D. Goodfriend, “Foreigners in a Dutch Colonial City,” New York History 90, no. 4 (October 1, 2009): 241–69. The question then, as it is now, is if it was actual tolerance or just indifference: As long as you do not bother me, I will not bother you. However, since this is outside of the scope of this thesis, I will not dwell on the meaning of tolerance in the Dutch or American context.
55 Goodfriend, “Foreigners in a Dutch Colonial City.” Naturally, not everybody agrees with this version of events. In 1918 Frederick Zwierlein was one of the first who tried to debunk this myth, Frederick J. Zwierlein, “New
Netherland Intolerance,” The Catholic Historical Review 4, no. 2 (July 1, 1918): 186–216.
56 Carney, “A Tradition to Live By.” Naturally, not everybody agrees with this version of events. In 1918 Frederick Zwierlein was one of the first who tried to debunk this myth of Dutch religious tolerance, Zwierlein, “New Netherland Intolerance.”
57 Willem Frijhoff and Jaap Jacobs, “The Dutch, New Netherland, and Thereafter (1609-1780s),” in Four Centuries of
Dutch-American Relations 1609-2009, ed. Hans Krabbendam, Cornelis A. van Minnen, and Giles Scott-Smith
(Amsterdam: Boom, 2009), 31–47, come to a similar conclusion. On maybe a less scientific basis, but definitely an enjoyable version of this story is Shorto, The Island at the Center of the World.
Church of England, under the treaty that governed the takeover.58 This was in marked contrast to the influence of the French colonists in the northern colonies. The French were predominantly Catholic, and with that, their religion was not compatible with the Protestant Church of England. Besides that, the French and British would be vying for supremacy until the end of the French-Indian War in 1760.59 The Dutch colonists and now loyal British subjects had, therefore, a special place in the hierarchy of the British colonies. Furthermore, Dutch mores continued to dominate many parts of the Hudson Valley, New Jersey, and Delaware in 1809.60 The persistence of Dutch mores was aided, in a large part, by the survival of the Dutch Reformed Church in New York and New Jersey. New churches were still founded, sermons were still given in Dutch, and Reformed ministers were still ordained in the Netherlands. All this happened in a period when no new Dutch colonists were arriving.61
Washington Irving, who did such a good job satirizing the Dutch presence in the Hudson Valley, did not write much about the Dutch Reformed Church. Even though Irving mentions the actual church building of the Dutch Reformed Church in his Legends of Sleepy Hollow, he does not go into much detail about religion itself.62 Irving’s stories about the Dutch of the Hudson Valley provide further evidence of the lasting Dutch influence in New York outside of religion. Later authors would reemphasize Dutch religion. Only 40 years after Irving’s Knickerbocker stories were first published, scholars had Dutch ethnicity veering back towards its colonial and Protestant origins. The books of John Lothrop Motley and Edmund B. O’Callaghan went back to a more positive view of the Dutch
58 This status was an official sanction of the Dutch Reformed Church by the Church of England. Edwin S. Gaustad,
Historical Atlas of Religion in America, [1st ed.] (New York etc: Harper & Row, 1962), p. 27.
59 You could even say that they would battle each other for supremacy in North America until the end of the American Revolution, when the French aided the struggling young Republic. Because this was almost a century after the British took over control of the Dutch colonies, it is not relevant to this thesis.
60 Charles H. Anderson, White Protestant Americans: From National Origins to Religious Group (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1970). p. 91. Also, Arnold Mulder, Americans from Holland (Philadelphia, PA etc: Lippincott, 1947), p. 68.
61 Gerald Francis De Jong, The Dutch in America, 1609-1974 (Boston, Mass: Twayne Publishers, 1975), pp. 52-54. Until 1772, the Dutch Reformed Church in America still fell under the Classis Amsterdam. Only then did it become its own classis. Hans Krabbendam, Freedom on the Horizon: Dutch Immigration to America, 1840-1940 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009), p. 100.
62 The Headless Horseman plays a key role in “Sleepy Hollow”, but the church and its graveyard feature only to bury his victims. According to some, this was a conscious effort by the descendants of English colonists in the United States to erase Dutch history from American memory. Judith Richardson, “The Ghosting of the Hudson Valley Dutch,” in Going Dutch: The Dutch Presence in America, 1609-2009, ed. Joyce D Goodfriend, Benjamin Schmidt, and Annette Stott (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 59–86. Interestingly, De Jong also has the stories of Irving, together with the stories of James Fennimore Cooper, as one of the pull factors for Dutch immigration to the United States after 1847, De Jong, The Dutch in America, 1609-1974, p. 134. This is even more surprising, since the sketch of Dutch Americans by Irving does not appear to be to flattering.
colonists and their American offspring.63 Especially Lothrop’s 3 part series The Rise of the Dutch
Republic: a History, originally published in 1856 was well read. These books focused on the heroic
struggle of the new (Protestant) Dutch Republic against the mighty (and Catholic) Spanish empire. Combined with the growth of the number of Reformed Churches in the United States in 1850 to 330 from 79 in 1750, Dutch Reformed Protestantism was part of the American mainstream.64
A Protestant schism
Up to 1850, almost all Reformed Churches were in either New York or New Jersey. There, the number of Reformed churches had grown to almost 300 by 1850 out of 330. The balance, of where the most Dutch Reformed churches were, would shift after 1847. As I have mentioned earlier, the combination of a potato crop failure in 1845 and a bleak economic future, led many on a path to immigration. Most of these immigrants did not stay in the old colonial possessions, but rather moved to what was then America’s western frontier. In part, this decision was due to the availability of cheap farmland. The other factor that guided these new immigrants was religion. Many of the new colonists followed their church leaders to the United States. The most prominent church leaders were the reverends Scholte, Van Raalte, and Van der Meulen. Their decision to move to Iowa
(Scholte) and Michigan (Van Raalte and Van der Meulen) not only influenced their followers, but also later immigrants.
Scholte, Van Raalte, and Van der Meulen were so-called Seceders. The Seceders were an offshoot of the Dutch Reformed Church and had formed a separate church after the Secession of 1834. This Secession was a reaction to the organization by King William I of the Netherlands of a new Reformed “Synode” in 1816. With this action, many of the more orthodox Protestants felt that the Dutch Reformed Church succumbed to state interference. Furthermore, the centrality of human agency in the new preaching forms, instead of the divine word of God, was something that did not sit well with orthodox Protestant pietists. In 1834, reverend Hendrik de Cock of Ulrum in Groningen was the first minister to secede with his congregation. A few young, freshly ordained ministers from Leiden University soon followed his example, among who were the aforementioned reverend Scholte and Anthony Brummelkamp. Other ministers, like Simon van Velzen, Albertus van Raalte,
63 John Lothrop Motley, The Rise of the Dutch Republic (New York: Harper & brothers, 1898); E. B. (Edmund Bailey) O’Callaghan, History of New Netherland; Or, New York under the Dutch (New York: D. Appleton & co., 1848). 64 Of those 330 churches, 300 churches were in New York and New Jersey. Gaustad, Historical Atlas of Religion in
and Cornelius van der Meulen, later joined these early secessionists.65 In essence, the goal of the Seceders was to have a pure church, untainted by humanist doctrine and modern influences. According to them, the liberal winds that were blowing through Europe at the time, could only lead to worse things to come. In this vision, the United States was less corrupted and therefore a logical destination for this pure church.
Although Scholte, Van Raalte, and Van der Meulen all were Seceders, not all Seceders were the same. Scholte was a proponent of a quick integration of the immigrants into American society, whilst Van Raalte was proposing a transplantation of the Seceder church to the United States. Van Raalte was also an enthusiastic supporter of the Dutch Reformed Church in the United States. This also implied support to Sunday schools, since these had become important in religious education in the Dutch Reformed Church. Van Raalte stayed loyal to the Dutch Reformed Church and, in turn, they helped him establish Hope College.66 What Scholte, Van Raalte, and Van der Meulen had in common was the wish to establish Christian schools. They believed that this wish could come true in the United States because the United States offered religious freedom and did not have a state church.67 During those first years of settlement, the Seceder’s dreams of Christian education were partially realized. Teachers from the community were responsible for public education in frontier settlements, which meant that the children were schooled in both the language and the pure Christian doctrine of their parents. At the same time, English was starting to make headway in education, especially at the public schools. For reverend Van Raalte, this was more than sufficient. For him and his followers, the public school system combined with the Sunday school system was in line with their wishes. In the opinion of some of the more orthodox immigrants, however, this shift to English was the first encroachment on the “True Church.”68
65 One of many authors on the subject of the Secession is Henry Beets, himself an immigrant in the United States. Henry Beets, De Chr. geref. kerk in N. A.; zestig jaren van strijd en zegen (Grand Rapids, Mich., Grand Rapids printing company, 1918), http://archive.org/details/dechrgerefkerkin00beet. On the Secession, see pp. 17-36. Also,
Krabbendam, Freedom on the Horizon, pp. 10-16.
66 Krabbendam, Freedom on the Horizon. Hope College, originally called Holland College, was established in 1866. The language in which was taught was English. I will delve more in education later in the chapter.
67 Ibid., p. 104. After all, the interference of the state in the church led to the original Secession in 1834.
68 Ibid., p. 233-236. James Bratt also includes the perceived doctrinal and liturgical impurity of the Eastern branch of the Dutch Reformed Church. According to Bratt, this also led to some people in the colonies to doubt Van Raalte’s reliability. This is in line with the Seceders original claims that the new Dutch Reformed Church, with its emphasis on human agency in its teachings, was becoming too liberal. By sticking to Dutch, the purity of the teachings could be safeguarded. James D. Bratt, Dutch Calvinism in Modern America: A History of a Conservative Subculture (Grand Rapids, Mich: WBEerdmans PubCo, 1984). p. 39.
As stated before, the first wave of immigrants started new churches after arrival. Those communities joined the already existing Dutch Reformed Church in America. However, a new rift was already in the making. Some of the causes of the Secession in the Netherlands also led to a new schism in the Reformed Church. The encroachment of English on the true church was one example of the pressure points. Furthermore, since there were no special Dutch Reformed or Christian schools in the United States, Reformed children went to public schools out of necessity. These children got their theological education in special Sunday schools, which also taught in English. The Americanization of the Dutch Reformed churches in the East was another point of contention by the time the second wave of Dutch immigrants arrived. In the East, sermons were in English.69 For some of the new immigrants, all these factors would only lead to a loss of Dutch identity and, with that, a loss of the sacredness of their religion and the “True Church.”70 The loss of Dutch identity led to another secession in 1857 and the formation of the Christian Reformed Church (CRC). Between 1857 and 1880, many of the Dutch immigrants in the Midwest that had originally joined the Dutch
Reformed Church in America, switched to the new CRC. Apart from a few congregations in Michigan, many of the new immigrant churches in the Midwest had made this switch by 1890. Not only the settled Midwestern immigrants, but also the immigrants that followed them also switched allegiance.
For many Dutch Reformed immigrants, the main reason for switching denominations was a controversy that had embroiled the Dutch Reformed Church in America since the early 1880s. In the
69 Thomas J. Wertenbaker, The Founding of American Civilization: The Middle Colonies (New York etc: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1938). In chapter III Wertenbaker gives an extensive description on the changes that took place in the Dutch Reformed Church after the British takeover of New Netherland. The 1857 schism is not the first (or last) schism in the Dutch Reformed Church in America. As Wertenbaker describes in chapter III and De Jon g in chapter VI, a struggle between those who wanted to keep the ties with Classis Amsterdam (the Conferentie) and those who wanted an “independent” American classis (the Coetus) took place in the late 18th century. De Jong, The Dutch in
America, 1609-1974, pp. 87-108. In the end, the “Coetus” faction won the argument, since New York became an
independent Classis in 1772. Also, in 1822, some ministries had seceded from the Dutch Reformed Church in America to become the True Dutch Reformed Church. This latter denomination would join the CRC in 1890. George Harinck and Hans Krabbendam, eds., Morsels in the Melting Pot: The Persistence of Dutch Immigrant Communities
in North America (Amsterdam: VU University Press, 2006), p. 19.
70 Krabbendam, Freedom on the Horizon, p. 103. Swierenga, Faith and Family; Donald A. Luidens and Roger J. Nemeth, “Dutch Immigration and Membership Growth in the Reformed Church in America: 1830-1920,” in The
Dutch-American Experience: Essays in Honor of Robert P. Swierenga, ed. Hans Krabbendam and Larry J. Wagenaar
(Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij, 2000), 169–88. Swierenga, Luidens, and Nemeth also point to the fact that their Dutch Reformed brethren in the East had helped the early immigrants of 1847 extensively. They therefore were more likely to stay within the Dutch Reformed Church in America. Lucas has devoted a passage on Van Raalte’s reception in the United States and the help he received from the reverend Wyckoff. Lucas furthermore comments very briefly on the Zeeland immigrants in Rochester, on whom I will have more later. Lucas, Netherlanders in America, pp. 70-74.
