Old Silver Leg Takes Over

A brief biography of the Dutchman who arrived to be governor of New Amsterdam in 1647 and turned it from a muddy village into a well-organized city.

Combines creative activities with a comprehensive list of biographies written for children. Organized by age group: pre-school (ages 3-5), primary (6-8), intermediate (9-11), and young people (12-14).

It is the year 4022; all of the ancient country of Usa has been buried under many feet of detritus from a catastrophe that occurred back in 1985. Imagine, then, the excitement that Howard Carson, an amateur archeologist at best, experienced when in crossing the perimeter of an abandoned excavation site he felt the ground give way beneath him and found himself at the bottom of a shaft, which, judging from the DO NOT DISTURB sign hanging from an archaic doorknob, was clearly the entrance to a still-sealed burial chamber. Carson's incredible discoveries, including the remains of two bodies, one of then on a ceremonial bed facing an altar that appeared to be a means of communicating with the Gods and the other lying in a porcelain sarcophagus in the Inner Chamber, permitted him to piece together the whole fabric of that extraordinary civilization.

Pieter Quackenbosh was born in Holland, ca. 1614. He, his wife Maritje, and their first four children, immigrated to New Netherlands, ca. 1653; and settled in Albany, then known as Beverwyck. Three more children were born in Albany. Descendants live in New York, New Jersey, Ontario, Washington, California, and elsewhere. Descendants spell their name "Quackenbush."