Re: Knickerbocker/ VanVeghten - New York
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In reply to:
Knickerbocker/ VanVeghten - New York
12/12/00
I am a descendent of John VanVeghten and Maria Knickerbocker. John was the son of Major Dirck VanVeghten and Alida Knickerbocker. Major Dirck, a member of John Knickerbocker's militia unit, was a casualty of the Revolutionary during the Saratogo campaign. Dirck's father, Harmon, and grandfather, another Dirck VanVeghten, were killed by Indians during the French and Indian wars at their homestead near Pudding Hill, abutting the old Knickerbocker farm in old Schaghticoke, N.Y.
Harmon married Lisabet VanBuren, a distant relation to President Martin VanBuren.
The older Dirck was a son of Cornelius VanVeghten (or VanVechten in the original Dutch variation), and the grandson of Teunis Dirckse VanVechten, who came to the New Holland colony first in 1632 as a worker on "Farm Number 5" on Manhattan island, and later with his wife and first son in 1638 as a tenant farmer on Killian Van Rensselaer's patroonship in the upper Hudson valley.
As for the Knickerbockers, they were a prosperous family, with one member serving as a congressman in the first decade of the 19th century. He was friends with the writer Washington Irving, who paid visits to the farm in Schaghticoke and borrowed the name for his "Knickerbocker's History of New York" by the fictional writer Dietrich Knickerbocker, whose name also appears with the famed stories "Rip VanWinkle" and "Sleepy Hollow." Thus the name Knickerbocker became associated with everything New York, right down to their present day basketball team.
I have more info from family genealogy papers compiled and published by James Brown VanVechten, which are packed away right now.
Hope this helps.
Rudy VanVeghten