Bill's Brownstone
Wander through New York's Past and Present with
the author of The Mevrouw Who Saved Manhattan
New Amsterdammers
As the religious leader in Rensselaerswijck, Dominie Gideon Schaets didn't take kindly to his daughter Anna's loose ways. About 1663 the girl took up with the leading secular official of the patroonship. Arent van Curler was the grandnephew of the patroon himself, Kiliaen van Rensselaer, and so was appointed to run the place. He was also married. Thus when Anna found herself with child, no wedding was in sight.
The Dominie didn't particularly turn his displeasure on the child. At least he agreed to baptize the boy. But for the ceremony Gideon dressed him in heavy mourning clothing and snazzed up the outfit with black ribbons and bows. Anna apparently got the message of parental disdain and so did much of his congregation. Incensed at the display, half the members stayed away from the Dominie's celebration of the Lord's Supper.
Director Stuyvesant was none too pleased with the schism that persisted within the congregation or evidently with Anna's behavior. When word of "the scandal of holy sacrament of baptism" reached New Amsterdam, he wrote his representative at Fort Orange, to wit: "I readily leave to anybody's choice and approval in what kind of napkins or swaddles children are presented for baptism, [as well as] how to name them, but concerning this subject, it seems, under correction of a better judgment, that this child of whoring might better have been named Barrabas, that is frolicsome father's son, than Benoni, child of grief."
For more of the bawdy world of Dutch Manhattan, check out Sex and the City: The Early Years.
The Mevrouw Who Saved Manhattan Reviews
"[A] romp through the history of New Netherland that would surely have Petrus Stuyvesant complaining about the riot transpiring between its pages ... Readers are guaranteed a genuine adventure that will evoke the full range of human emotions. Once begun, they can expect to experience that rare difficulty in putting down a book before they have finished."
-- de Halve Maen, Journal of the Holland Society of New York, Summer 2009
"Bill Greer has deftly blended fact and fiction in his humorous tale The Mevrouw Who Saved Manhattan. ... The characters are rowdy, raunchy, loveable, and sometimes despicable, but thoroughly believable. ... This is a thoroughly delightful story that brings the Dutch colonies to life."
-- Historical Novels Review Online, August 2009
Bill's Book
The Mevrouw Who
Saved Manhattan
A Novel of New Amsterdam
like etchings by
Van Ostade and Steen."
-- Charles Wendell, Ph.D.,
President of the
New Netherland Institute
on a madcap ride through
New York history.
More about the book.
Amazon
for the Kindle
and the Nook
and see what you think
in Mevrouw
Pegleg Peter Stuyvesant
NY's First Whore Griet Reyniers
NY's First Embezzler
Cornelis van Tienhoven
Troublemaker Anthony the Turk
Indian-killer Willem Kieft
First Mother Catalina Trico
Domines Michaelius, Bogardus and Megapolensis
Van Rennselaer Nephew
Wouter van Twiller
Adultress Nanne Beech
Kosher Butcher Asser Levy
Stuyvesant Foe
Adriaen van der Donck
First Gay Herman van den Bogaert
And many more of the people who launched the tiny Manhattan settlement that
grew into the greatest city
in the world.