New Paltz College will be changing the names of its dorms, which were named after the six founding Huguenot families of New Paltz because for 150 years, between 1680 and 1830, they were the owners of slaves. There is a history of the slave owning Huguenot families of New Paltz by Eric Roth, entitled, “Society of Negroes Unsettled.”

Roth, in detail, provides documented information about the whippings, beatings, hangings, separating slaves forever from their children, and forcing them to live year around in earthen basements below the living quarters of slave owners’ houses. I knew one piece of information that Roth did not have. New Paltz has a hanging tree, a huge white oak, near the intersection of Jansen Road and Route 32 South in New Paltz, with a limb that is eight feet around.

The slaves, to keep them in line, had to take off their shirts to take lashes from a whip on their exposed skin. The most lashes that a slave had to take was 75.

For many slave owners, the most valuable asset that the slave owner had was their slave or slaves. When a slave couple had children, they became the property of the slave owner. Some sold the children or, if they wanted, could sell the man or the woman who were the parents of a slave child.

Roth does not suggest that all of these slave owners were wonderful people. At its peak, New Paltz had about 300 slaves. By 1870 there were hardly any blacks living in New Paltz as the Huguenot families could not afford to pay them.

Ralph LeFevre’s History of New Paltz hardly mentions blacks. C.M. Woolsey’s History of Marlborough has a whole chapter devoted to local slavery, including the murder of a slave, which was done at the request of the wife of the slave owner.

The people who, around 1830, founded New Paltz Academy which later became the college, were primarily Huguenots, and came from the LeFevre, Hasbrouck, and DuBois families. Because they had ancestors who owned slaves they will now not be recognized for the years of work in giving birth to the academy, because they have the wrong last name.

Also not having his name on a dormitory is the Reverend Douw Van Olinda, the minister of the Reformed Church on Huguenot Street. In the college history, “In a Valley Fair” you learn that he was the person who led the effort to start the academy. It was he who was responsible for the greatest architectural accomplishment in the first 50 years of the 19th century in Ulster County. It was the building of the Reformed Church 1839. Though he’s been dead for over 150 years the Rev. Van Olinda still has more internet websites than almost anyone in New Paltz.

As for renaming the dorms at the college, there are reasons not to recognize slave owners, but also there are reasons to honor those Huguenot families that starting almost 200 years ago played such a huge role in getting the college to what it is today.

Apple Greens opened on March 20

On Wednesday, March 20, as expected, Highland’s Apple Greens Golf Course opened. Again. It was a March opening. Its early openings have become a way to measure Global Warming. Its earliest opening was a few years ago on March 6.

It is predicted that 2019 will be the warmest year in history. If so Apple Greens, if its owner Dave Roehrs allows, will set a record for its latest closing. Possibly as late as Christmas eve. Dave will probably say, “No way.”

My reason to believe 2019 could be record setting is that in 2018 a lot of CO2 was pumped out. Global Warming is cumulative, and that CO2 was added to the atmosphere. This summer we could break local records for 100 degree days.

This past winter, the United States set a record as being the wettest winter, and this spring the mid west is setting records for the worst floods. Next up is this summer.

Global Warming has got China to start buying liquid natural gas to replace some of its use of coal. The United States is one of the biggest suppliers of liquid natural gas in the world because of fracking. Cheniere, which sells stock under the symbol of LNG, is negotiating with China, to double its business, with a huge long term contract with China. If the two sides agree, Cheniere’s stock may be a very good stock to buy.

Global Warming creates both winners and losers, and I believe Cheniere (LNG) is a winner.

In response

This in a recent letter to the editor about a column I wrote about abortion.
Bronx County is the poorest county in the New York City Metropolitan area, which includes New Jersey, Connecticut, New York City, Long Island, and Westchester, Putnam, and Rockland Counties. The per capita income of the Bronx is $35,564, New York State, $64,450, New Jersey, $64,537, and Connecticut, $71,823. The Bronx is poor.

Eighty-three percent of the public school students in the Bronx qualify for a free or reduced price lunch and breakfast, and the food at home for these economically disadvantaged students is paid for through Food Stamps.

in 2016 there were 36,362 pregnancies in the Bronx, from which there were 20,831 births of which 16,429 were paid for by Medicaid. Of the pregnancies, 14,024 were ended by the abortion procedure. The number one reason why a woman or a couple would have an abortion is that the woman or the couple could not afford to have the child.

Of the births, 13,078 were out of wedlock, or the the birth certificates of about two/thirds of the babies born in 2016 in the Bronx, only lists a mother.

There were 2,526 teen pregnancies in 2016 in the Bronx, from which there were 1,062 births and 981 abortions.

The birth rate in the Bronx was 14.3 babies per thousand of women in the child bearing years, while New York State’s rate is 11.8, and in Ulster County, 8.4, and in Dutchess, 8.5. The poorest area is having the most children per thousand.

Children growing up poor in addition to welfare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, and school meals cause another cost. Poor children have a far higher percentage of ending up in jail or prison. Prison cost for a person in New York State is $69,355 a year. New York State is number one in this cost category.

Farmers depend on migrants

Our local farmers, and ones in upstate New York and the rest of the nation are having their livelihoods threatened by Trump’s immigration policies. Upstate, a lot of dairy farmers employ a lot of Latino migrants to milk cows three times a day, clean the barn of cow manure and other daily chores. The migrants, who came here 30 to 40 years ago, are retiring and their now adult children do not do this work. Usually migrants from Mexico and Latin America would come here with a Green Card for this year round work. No longer. They now play hide and seek with ICE. If the farmer loses them he is out of business.

Agriculture is a $37 billion business in New York State. Battling for the farmers and against Trump are Republican congressman and Governor Andrew Cuomo. Both Republicans and Democrats are united for our farmers against the President.
We need our farmers.