Fwd: Re: more on civil war harps

["Winslow Yerxa" <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

- --- In harp-l-archives@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Joe and Cass Leone 
<leone@xxxx> wrote:


Keep in mind that the DUTCH were in N.Y. in the 1600s. They were 
ALREADY cutting lenses and grinding gems (in Holland). Surely at 
least 
a few "bumblers" who couldn't make it in Holland may have come across 
to the new world. To (even) them, cutting reeds would have been no 
significant hurdle. Slots, on the other hand would have required a 
nice 
"touch"   smo-joe

===================

Actually, the Dutch came mostly between about 1630 and 1660 (the 
Yerxa - or rather Jurckxsem - family arrived during this period) 
after which the area was handed over to the British, and Dutch 
immigration pretty much stopped. The Dutch were never that numerous - 
they used to tell the Mohawk that more Dutch were coming and the 
Mohawk would laugh and say, "The Dutch always lie." Little did they 
know who else was on the way.

So the maintenance of cutting and grinding skills between 1660 and 
1860 in an underpopulated agrarian economy with the added 
interruption of a civil war in 1776 seems like a bit of a stretch.

Winslow
Winslow