People often ask me how I became so interested in history, and I usually respond that it's simply in my blood. Each generation in my family seems to acquire a historian. My great-grandmother, Virginia Stoothoff Horner, was an English teacher by trade and an amateur historian and genealogist. Nana copied the history of our ancestor, Captain Elbert Elbertse Stoothoff, into this notebook out of a library book in Bergen, NJ. Thanks to these notes, I first learned that Elbert Stoothoff arrived in New Netherland between 1633-1637 as a teenager to serve a six-year indenture to Kiliaen van Rensselaer. He made his way to New Amsterdam after serving his indenture at Rensselaerswyck (near Albany), and through a combination of hard work and strategic marriages, Elbert became one of the most prominent members of Dutch colonial society. He purchased land in what was known as the Flatlands/Amersfoort area of Brooklyn (now near Bergen Beach) and served in numerous high-ranking positions, including magistrate, militia captain, and a member of the Board of Nine Men.    Like my Nana, I was born within an hour’s drive from where Elbert Stoothoff first settled almost four hundred years ago. We make much of our English colonial history in this country, but we must not forget that even our earliest immigrants came from many nations and contributed to making our nation what it is today.

– Kelly Schindler

Relationship:  Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more