As part of the NY400 celebration, New York City strengthens its ties with Dutch counterpart cities such as Breukelen (Brooklyn), Haarlem (Harlem), and Vlissingen (Flushing). During his visit to the city of Breukelen in the Netherlands, Brooklyn borough President Marty Markowitz officially proclaimed the month on March 2009 to be ‘New York’s Quadricentennial Celebration of the Dutch in Breukelen’.
The declaration states: ‘Brooklyn, named after the Dutch town Breukelen, is the first city outside of New Amsterdam that became a city of its own, instilled with the values of freedom of religion and commerce, the right to bear arms and the rights of women to own, bequeath and inherit property, all of which helped to establish the very democracy that we enjoy today, therefore, it is only fitting that we celebrate with our Dutch brethren the Quadricentennial with the Dutch in Breukelen.’
Further, Brooklyn borough President Markowitz salutes ‘the wonderful people of the Netherlands who came to our shores 400 years ago and provided us with the foundation of our government, the tenets of religious freedom, and the establishment of inalienable rights that have sustained us for four centuries; our architecture, major streets and highways still bear the imprint of the great Dutch influence, and our borough’s oldest church is The Dutch Reformed Church in Downtown Brooklyn, I commend those intrepid Dutch families that dominated the county of Brooklyn for some two hundred years, raising families, developing land and agriculture, building businesses and establishing what we now know as the communities of Bushwick, Flatlands, Flatbush, Gravesend and New Utrecht.’
‘I join with the Dutch people as we celebrate the illustrious and unique history that we share, and pay tribute to the memory of Henry Hudson whose intrepid voyage along what is now known as the Hudson River, paved the way for Brooklyn to become one of the most enduring and diverse societies in America, and a landmark to the rich tradition of the Dutch people’, Markowitz concludes.
The proclamation also includes the official seal of Brooklyn, which holds the borough's motto ‘Eendraght Mackt Maght’. Written in the (old) Dutch language, it is inspired by the motto of the United Dutch Provinces and can be translated as ‘Unity Gives Us Strength’.
The original proclamation can be viewed here.
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