Consul General Speeches

NY400 Town Hall Meeting, Westerkerk, Amsterdam, April 4, 2009

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen.

Looking back 400 years, it is tempting to romanticize the early settlement of what would become the United States.  Hearty bands of men and women, setting off on a grand adventure across an ocean into an unknown future.  A wilderness with fertile soil, an abundance of animal life, a marvelous landscape of towering trees covering mountains and hills, and rivers and streams leading settlers onward.

Carving out a new home in a vast, wild continent was undoubtedly an adventure.  Yet, we must remember the considerable hardships facing those who explored and settled the world that was new to Europeans in Henry Hudson’s time.  Conditions aboard the Haelve Maen were harsh; transatlantic journeys dangerous.  The perils of the wilderness were real; the winters unforgiving.  Yet somehow a patchwork of families and individuals drawn from different backgrounds, different lands, speaking different languages and honoring different religions, came together to form communities.  And most notably they built the community on the southern tip of the island of Manhattan that grew inexorably into New Amsterdam and the wonder that is New York.

In our modern lives it is a little quaint for us as urban dwellers to imagine building our own houses and gathering our own food.  Most of us cannot even manage to grow more than a few window box herbs or a terrace garden of potted vegetables.The levels of disease and infant mortality that plagued early settlers are unthinkable to us today.

Each time in history has its own hardships.  Some, like poverty and deprivation, endure.  Yet in each time, we find the courage and the ingenuity and the sheer will to overcome the perils we face.  Tonight’s gathering is a celebration of the Dutch contributions to the American creed that have helped both our nations triumph over adversity and that mark the enduring relationship between the Netherlands and the United States.

Celebrations of the Dutch role in the founding of New York and the profound influence that settlement had on the United States were held twice in the last century.  In 1909 New York City hosted what was then expected to be the “largest celebration in the history of New York.”  The people that watched the massive flotilla of ships, or attended gala dinners, or enjoyed the spectacular fireworks display during two weeks of celebrations in New York City could hardly have anticipated the changes to their world that were to take place across the next century.  Polar expeditions reached – or nearly reached – both the North and South Poles in that year.  By the way, the Elf Steden Tocht was held that year for the first time.  In the years to come, a pandemic influenza swept the world (1918-1920) killing tens of millions of people.  The stock market crashed and the Depression brought ruination, but also structural political and economic changes.  We fought two world wars and subsequently built the modern security relationship between the U.S. and Europe that NATO is currently gathering to celebrate.

Today’s challenges are stark and would defy the belief of the people of the early 20th century.  Those 1909 celebrants could also hardly have imagined the development of new medicines and vaccines that would save millions of lives.  Discoveries from the smallest atomic particles and the building blocks of life, to the vastness of space revolutionized our thinking.  Mass travel by air, sea, train and auto has made the world smaller.  What would an early 20th century New Yorker or Amsterdammer make of television, computers, mobile phones, CDs, DVDs, blue ray, I-pods, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube?

This year’s celebration integrates web technologies, transatlantic video feeds, blogging, social networking sites, viral advertising, and the John Adams Institute’s innovative “digital historical project” called The Island that will engage a new generation of school kids in the U.S. and The Netherlands in an exploration of our joint history.  More traditional commemorations like this public meeting, honor our past and invite people to explore what it means for our future.

Yesterday I met with a new generation of pioneers from Amsterdam and New York who are gathered in celebration of our shared values of freedom, tolerance, and entrepreneurship to explore new frontiers in urban and civic engagement.  A program sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce brings together young professionals to strengthen the business and commercial ties between our two countries, as well as providing a welcome venue to simply learn more about each other.  And in addition to the numerous exchange programs we cherish, just three nights ago, Minister of Education Ronald Plasterk announced the creation of two new Fulbright scholarships that fund exchanges between Dutch and American scholars focusing on our bilateral relationship.

I do not presume to know what the world will be like when our successors gather to celebrate the next centennial of Henry Hudson’s voyage to the new world. 
What I do know is that it is the investment we make today that will shape the relationship between the U.S. and the Netherlands over the next century.  And that this is an investment worth making.