Biography
Hans Hansen Bergen emigrated to New Netherland in 1633 in a company with the Director-General of New Netherland, Wouter Van Twiller, and Bergen was initially known in early New Amsterdam records by various names, but chiefly Hans Hansen Noorman and Hans Hansen Boer. (The word Boer is Dutch for 'farmer.')
Bergen was married to Sarah Rapelje, the first female child of European parentage born in the colony of New Netherland and whose chair is preserved in the collection of the Museum of the City of New York. Following Bergen's death in 1654, his widow remarried Teunis Gysbert Bogart.
Along with his father-in-law, Joris Jansen Rapelje, Bergen acquired and managed several pieces of property. In 1647, Bergen received a patent for 400 acres (1.6 km2) in the Wallabout Bay area of present-day Brooklyn.(Rapelje was a substantial property owner, as well as one of the Council of Twelve Men.) Following his land grant, Hans Hansen Bergen moved to the area on western Long Island now located within the borough of Brooklyn, where he made his living as a farmer. Apparently illiterate, Bergen signed his name to official documents with a simple 'H'. Following Bergen's death, in 1662 two of his sons settled at what is today's Bedford, Brooklyn, near their Rapelje grandfather.
Bergen is a place name which today appears frequently in Brooklyn, including in the neighborhood of Bergen Beach and Bergen Street, both named for the family. Descendants of Hans Hansen Bergen owned the land that became Bergen Beach, which they subsequently sold to entrepreneur Percy Williams, who developed it into a summer resort. Some also believe that Bergen County, New Jersey as well as Bergen Township take their names from this early Norwegian settler, although the evidence is inconclusive.
Read more about this topic: Hans Hansen Bergen
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“A great biography should, like the close of a great drama, leave behind it a feeling of serenity. We collect into a small bunch the flowers, the few flowers, which brought sweetness into a life, and present it as an offering to an accomplished destiny. It is the dying refrain of a completed song, the final verse of a finished poem.”
—André Maurois (1885–1967)