November 2, 2012, Friday, 306

User:Rwebster

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Flatlands Dutch Reformed Church GO TO THIS LINK TO SEE MY PAGE!!!!!!!!



Contents

The Dutch Reformed Church of Flatlands

New York Times


Research Project Proposal

A few blocks from my house is an old church. At least that’s all I’ve seen it as most of my life. Until recently I never really gave any thought to it and its past. The first street I chose was a public school not far from this church. Yet as I wrote my proposal and started some research I decided that I was more interested in this church than the public school. All my life I’ve never seen anyone going to this church on Sundays for services, yet I recently walked by the building and saw that there were supposedly services every week at 10:30 and several other activities during the week. I will hopefully get the chance to attend a service during my research, which will be interesting. All around this building is the modern world. Apartment buildings, cars, stores, noise, and the Brooklyn I know, drown out the story this building has to tell. Even as I walked around the building recently, taking pictures, people looked confused as to why I was doing such a thing. It is simply an old church to everyone in my neighborhood, as it has been to me.

Draft One

Rachel Webster

10 March 2009 CHC Seminar 2 Professor Wills

Research Project Proposal: The Dutch Reformed Church of Flatlands

A few blocks from my house is an old church. At least that’s all I’ve seen it as most of my life. Until recently I never really gave any thought to it and its past. The first street I chose was a public school not far from this church. Yet as I wrote my proposal and started some research I decided that I was more interested in this church than the public school. All my life I’ve never seen anyone going to this church on Sundays for services, yet I recently walked by the building and saw that there were supposedly services every week at 10:30 and several other activities during the week. I will hopefully get the chance to attend a service during my research, which will be interesting. All around this building is the modern world. Apartment buildings, cars, stores, noise, and the Brooklyn I know, drown out the story this building has to tell. Even as I walked around the building recently, taking pictures, people looked confused as to why I was doing such a thing. It is simply an old church to everyone in my neighborhood, as it has been to me. In my research so far, I’ve learned about the churches origins, which reach back to the 17th century. On www.brooklynonline.com, the author states, “This Church was one of the two Brooklyn Dutch Reform Churches Organized under orders of Peter Stuyvesant. The other is the Flatbush Dutch Reform Church. The Flatlands church was formed under the Revrand Johannes Megapolenis in 1654. By the time of the American Revolution and the Battle of Brooklyn, it was over 100 years old.” This site also discusses the fact that this area of Brooklyn during colonial times was farmland and the church was central to “pioneer life”. They also discussed the graveyard that is next to this church. “It's cemetery dates back to the beginning of European civilization in the "New World" many of the Tombstones are written in Dutch, and not until the mid 1800's does English become common on the grave markers.” This website was very interesting and seeing the building itself helps make the connection between these words and their reality. Here are some pictures of the building and its surroundings.




This first picture is a plaque I found outside the building. It reads, “1636…’The Kings Highway’ formerly the road to Flatlands neck passed this site. Over it the Indian braves and Captain John Underhill with his colonial soldiers passed Lord Cornwallis on August 26, 1776. At the head of British troops silently marched in the night to outflank the continental army at the battle of Long Island. President George Washington drove over this road, April 20, 1790, on his journey around Long Island.”

Image:View from Kings hwy.jpg


This picture is a view of the church and the cemetery from Kings Highway. This is how I see it almost everyday on my way to school and it is easy to ignore. There is little activity, at least when I walk by. Image:Sign.jpg


This sign surprised me.  Clearly there are activities going on at this church that I just didn’t know about or this sign is just really old.  Hopefully as I do further research I will possibly be able to attend a service and maybe interview some of the members.  I still have yet to see anyone there besides the occasional maintenance worker.  

Image:Graves.jpg


This is a picture of some of the tombstones in the graveyard next to the church. I eventually would like to find out some of the names and research the people buried there. But the fact that these tombstones are still here and haven’t been built over is impressive. I also found information about the area in the book Brooklyn by Name, about this area. It discusses the origins of Kings Highway as one of the original routes in Brooklyn (Bernardo & Weiss 109).

THE PAST

An excerpt from the New York Daily Times on August 24, 1852 mentioned an event at the church. The author wrote, “FAIR AT FLATLANDS. - The ladies of the Reformed Dutch Church at Flatlands hold a Fair on the afternoons and evenings of the 25th and 26th inst., the profits of which will be devoted to furnishing the lecture room of the Church.” This excerpt shows the kind of town Flatlands was and what the church was used for. The same article talked about how a man named William Kershaw was arrested for violating the Sunday Ordinance, which probably had to do with closing shop for the Christian Sabbath or something to that effect, but just seeing this in the paper shows what the culture was like back then and the small town feel that Brooklyn had in the middle part of the 19th century. [1]

On this note we can start to look at Flatlands history as a historical town. In The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn on page 124 reads: Flatlands remained agricultural until the 1830s, when with only 700 residents, it was the second-smallest town in Kings County. Blacks, who had farmed the land as slaves for their colonial owners, made up 20 percent of the population when New York State abolished slavery in 1827. After the Brooklyn City Railroad Company extended horsecar service to Kings Highway in 1875 and Flatbush Avenue was completed, Flatlands residents gained access to downtown Brooklyn’s stores and businesses, and the area began to grow, albeit slowly. …In 1896 the town was the last to be annexed by the City of Brooklyn. The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn 2nd edition In 1954, the church made a book to commemorate its Tercentenary Anniversary. Included in this book is some of John Baxter’s journal. It begins on page 54 where we learn that John Baxter “was born in the Kingdom of Ireland on the 20th day of December 1765.” His journal entries about the 19th century are interesting and bring us into the everyday life of Flatlands dwellers. For example, mention store openings and how John Lott’s store, “the first since Columbus Discovered America” (page 57). He talks about his agriculture and how they suffered from the “thick ice” of winter (page 58). He makes regular notes about church services which means he was an active member or so it seems. Another source brings us a little closer to the churches backyard, which is a graveyard. In the Kings County Genealogical Club Collection, there is a section on the tombstone inscriptions in the Reformed Dutch Church of Flatlands. It was written in 1882 and the way they recorded information shows us what’s important to that society. The descriptions included information like age, birth date and whether the person was colored or not. When I saw this I was reminded that slavery existed in New York, and as was mentioned before, it was only abolished in 1827. It always seems so surprising to hear of slavery in the North, yet it was far from uncommon. Yet when this was written, blacks were freed from slavery so some families in this graveyard were black and 20 percent of the neighborhood was black in the 19th century, as was stated earlier. There were also baptismal and marriage records in this book, starting on page 61. And in the back of the book there were a list of other books about Brooklyn being advertised (page 97). In the History of Kings County: The Civil, Political, Professional and Ecclesiastical History and Commercial and Industrial Record of the County of Kings and the City of Brooklyn, N.Y. From 1683 to 1884, Reverend Anson du Bois, one of the pastors from the church, wrote a history of Flatlands. He noted that in 1870 “the church now reports 80 families and 200 members” (page 75). Reverend Anson du Bois became the pastor in December of 1870. His position was clearly deemed as important since he was given the honor of writing about the town’s history in this book for the city. Clearly the church was still a big part of the everyday life of the people of Brooklyn and specifically the town of Flatlands. The book made in 1954 to celebrate the Tercentenary Anniversary is a great symbol that the churches history was still important to the people of the 20th century. The historians who helped gather the information for this book were John Remsen and John Van Siclen. There is a letter from the White House and New York’s governor at the time, Thomas Dewey. In the back, there is a section of the sponsors of the book. Among these was Berkeley Pharmacy Inc., located 1951, Flatbush Avenue, which is still on the same corner, which I actually stand in front of everyday waiting for the bus. That connection made me realize how young my neighborhood is. In 1966, the state decided this church was an important place, as had the members for decades. It became a landmark on July 19th by the Landmarks Preservation Commission.


THE PRESENT

Now we can fast forward to 1983. The neighborhood has changed, as we see in this article by Mark Sherman called, “If You’re Thinking of Living In: Flatlands.” He writes: Not until the post-World War II building boom did Flatlands become a heavily populated residential area, but when it did, the builders who erected houses took a page from the book of the settlers. They built simply and efficiently, mainly one- and two-family, attached and semidetached homes. Block after quiet, tree-lined block, those homes now house almost 100,000 people in greater Flatlands. He even quotes the senior senator of New York, Chuck Schumer. He quoted him here when he said; “It has the best aspects of urban and suburban life, said Representative Charles E. Schumer, who has lived in the Phillip Howard Apartments on Flatbush Avenue for three years. We have many different kinds of people, you don't need a car to go places and there's a true sense of neighborhood. And we also have greenery and space. These are simple facts about the current area, which is pretty much a verbal snapshot of what the area has become over the years. Another picture of the neighborhood comes from an article written in 1996 by Douglas Martin. He wrote a great piece entitled, “Trudging up the Flatbush Trail,” that describes Flatlands. He writes: …As the neighborhood of Flatlands oozes into that of Flatbush, we pass Four Aces Pawnbrokers, with a menagerie of stuffed game in the window, including a toothy beaver. At a bakery, we have reason to suspect we are overcharged when it becomes apparent we are both ignorant and from outside the neighborhood ($3.50 for two beef patties in cocoa bread, which would have been $1.30 each). "Pretty smooth," says Danny. "A good old-fashioned New York hustle."


Notes

  1. NY Times [1]