Immigration:
158
years ago today, the ship Farvlinta (Thomas Smith Captain) from
Rotterdam, docked in the port of New York. On board were a Dutch farmer
and carpenter, Pieter Janszoon Kooij, and his wife Guurtje
Gerbrandsdochter Klaverblad from Aagtdorp near Schoorl in Noord Holland,
NL. They came with three children Jan (6), Jannitje (2), and
Gerbrand (1), but Gerbrand did not make the passage and passed away (May
29) and buried at sea. They were headed for Upstate New York, but
found themselves in September living in the immigrant colony known as
Hooge Prairie (later Roseland), Illinois now a part of the city of
Chicago. Guurtje was pregnant during the passage, and while they were
taking up residence in a barn belonging to Pieter DeJonghe the
Schoolmaster from Warmenhuizen, NL, my great grandfather was born. As
was the custom they named him Gerbrand for the deceased child they lost
at sea. They came for economic betterment, as many immigrants in that time
did, because a virus effecting root and tuber crops, had caused farms
all over Europe to fail. But the Kooys (Kooijs) never give up so… they
left their relatives their friends and their land to embark on a new
adventure in the New World with these words in their heart, if not on
their lips:
Why are you cast down, O my soul?
And why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God;
For I shall yet praise Him,
The help of my countenance and my God. [Psalm 42: 11]
They had hope above all else and by the census of 1860 they were listed as “well-off”. They were not educated though they were self taught and prized learning. Their descendents, however, did become educated and among them may be counted Doctors, Lawyers, Teachers, Musicians, Physicians, Philosophers, Engineers and Clergymen and women, but most of their descendents practiced farming and the wood-working trades which run deep in their blood.
Why are you cast down, O my soul?
And why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God;
For I shall yet praise Him,
The help of my countenance and my God. [Psalm 42: 11]
They had hope above all else and by the census of 1860 they were listed as “well-off”. They were not educated though they were self taught and prized learning. Their descendents, however, did become educated and among them may be counted Doctors, Lawyers, Teachers, Musicians, Physicians, Philosophers, Engineers and Clergymen and women, but most of their descendents practiced farming and the wood-working trades which run deep in their blood.
We should all remember that all of us are immigrants or descendents thereof, and though we have been Americans for perhaps many generations, we should honor and welcome those who come to this nation seeking economic betterment. Immigrants are an added value to our nation.
