Wolphert Gerretse

An original patentee, director of bouweries, and a founder of the New Netherlands colony, Wolphert Gerretse played an important role in the foundation of the communities of Manhattan, Albany, Rensselaer, and Brooklyn. He was the founder of the first European settlement on Long Island, New Amersfoort, and a "Schepen" of New Amsterdam in 1654.

Before he was assigned by the Dutch West India Company as one of the first settlers to cultivate farms in the New Netherlands colony, Gerretse ran a baking and clothes bleaching business. Temporarily, from 1630 until 1632, he worked as director for Kiliaen Van Rensselaer’s farms in Rensselaerwyck and Fort Orange.

Upon completion of that employment Gerretse have decided to pursue his own business affairs. First he leased and managed a bouwerie in New Amsterdam. However, in 1636 he was granted a patent of several hundred acres on Long Island which he named the plantation "Achervelt", and that would later evolve into the town New Amersfoort, named after Gerretse's original home.

He died in 1637.