Chapter 6: Africans in New Amsterdam

When Ryan studied the history of New Amsterdam in second grade, he and his classmates learned about the Dutch settlers in the area that used to be Manahatta (now part of New York City). They visited local museums and a house built by European settlers. They could describe what the streets and buildings looked like after studying the Castello Plan, a 1660 map of the settlement. Ryan wrote an in-depth diary account from the point of view of Pieter, a fictional Dutch blacksmith’s apprentice. Ryan did not, however, learn about any of the Africans—free or enslaved—living in New Amsterdam. How is it that a unit that lasted weeks and included multiple field trips could ignore such important people? And how could Ryan’s class ignore the fact that the Dutch introduced African slavery to New Amsterdam?