HISTORY TALK WITH MUSEUM HISTORIAN STEVE SKYE “PALATINE GERMANS AND FRENCH HUGUENOTS”

NEVERSINK VALLEY MUSEUM OF HISTORY & INNOVATION PRESENTS: HISTORY TALK WITH MUSEUM HISTORIAN STEVE SKYE “PALATINE GERMANS AND FRENCH HUGUENOTS”

The Neversink Valley Museum of History and Innovation presents the fourth installment of its History Lecture Series on Wednesday, July 12, 2018 at 7:00 pm when its historian will speak about “Palatines and Huguenots” at the D&H Canal Park Visitors’ Center, 58 Hoag Road (just off Route 209 in Cuddebackville, NY). Light refreshments will be served.

Steve Skye, historian of the Neversink Valley Museum of History and Innovation, will discuss the hardy Palatine Germans who emigrated from the Rhine Valley in Germany to the British colonies of the Hudson Valley. He will also discuss their religious kinsfolk, the French Huguenots of eastern France. Both communities suffered the depredations of 17th-century warfare and the starvation of crop failures and left the Old World for the New.

The Protestants of mid-Europe occupied a 200 mile stretch of land from mid-Switzerland to Belgium with the French border running down the middle. They were a diverse group including German-speaking Swiss, Huguenots and Palatines as well as Dutch-speaking Flemings and French-speaking Walloons from Belgium. In America, the Palatines became amalgamated with other German-speaking groups to become the people we call today “Pennsylvania Dutch”. The middle-class craftsmen of the Huguenot diaspora to this day are proud of their 16th-century background.

Come to learn about how the Palatines finally found a patron in Queen Anne of Great Britain and how she enabled them to cross the ocean and settle in her New York colony. In fact, the settlement of Newburgh was established by the Palatines. Many of these colonists eventually left New York to join other Palatines in Pennsylvania and the upper Midwest. You will also get an appreciation of how the Huguenots came to found many of early America’s industries including, glass and silk making and how this literate and well-educated group played an important role in the American Revolution.

Steve Skye is a resident of Mount Hope, New York. He is an enthusiastic student of 19^th century American history with a particular interest in the North Eastern United States. He is especially interested in the evolution of an American agrarian society into an industrial giant.

This History Talk will be held July 12, 2018, at 7:00 PM at the D & H Canal Park Visitor’s Center, 58 Hoag Road, (just off Route 209) Cuddebackville, NY. Suggested donation is $5.00 for members and $7.00 for non-members. Light refreshments will be served              

The Neversink Valley Museum is open Sundays from noon until 4:00 pm through October 28 and by appointment. For more information about the museum, its mission to preserve local history or any events, call (845) 754-8870 or check the website: www.neversinkmuseum.org.  Or email at nvam@neversinkmuseum.org

The museum is at 26 Hoag Road, in Cuddebackville.

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