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by Frans-Arne H. Stylegar (Author)
200 years before what is usually considered the arrival of the first Scandinavian immigrants in the United States, many Norwegians came to America as part of the Dutch colonization of New Netherland - today's New York State.
Today they are mostly forgotten, but the story of the Norwegian 'Dutch' in America is no less interesting for that reason, and it does not lack colorful characters and exciting episodes: the divorced sawmill owner and brawler Albert Bradt from Östfold, whom none of the heirs would take care of when he got old, or 'The flying angel', Magdalena Dircks, who was banished from the colony because of her poisonous tongue, or the soldier Andries Laurensen, who triggered one of the worst conflicts between Native Americans and settlers, or Laurens Andriessen from Drammen, who had to ride the wooden horse in New Amsterdam for having disturbed the Sunday peace, but then came out as a religious rebel and arch-Lutheran.
The Norwegian inhabitants were a minority in New Amsterdam and elsewhere in the Hudson Valley. But New Amsterdam was a city of minorities to the same extent as New York later became. Here were Scandinavians, Germans and English, Jews and Arabs. There were Native Americas, and there were Africans. In the still small but flourishing town people traded and argued in dozens of languages, and religion stood against religion. In short: New Amsterdam and New Netherland was a cultural melting pot in which Norwegians also played a role - just as in better-known periods closer to our own time. This book is about this relatively unknown part of Norwegian America.
