My kids are not real familiar with New York history. They are California kids, I guess they don't teach much about it here. My daughter didn't even know that New York had once been New Amsterdam, and why the name changed. So I told her a little of what I remembered, and then I googled to see what I'd forgot.

Like Peter Stuyvesant. His name is well remembered. He was sent to the new world by his father because he seduced the daughter of someone important back home. As years went by his career flourished, and we know him best as Governor of New Amsterdam. He had a wooden leg as a result of a war injury. And he didn't like Lutherans, Catholics, Quakers, or Jews. Especially Jews. He tried to keep the city free of them, but the tolerant government in the Netherlands overruled him.

It was fascinating to read about the early history. What we got in grade school was the tip of the iceberg.