Albany, NY

Albany is the capital city of the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Albany County, and the central city of New York’s Capital District. Roughly 135 miles (217 km) north of the City of New York, Albany sits on the west bank of the Hudson River, about 10 miles (16 km) south of its confluence with the Mohawk River. The population of the city was 97,856 at the time of the 2010 census.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albany,_New_York

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What is Pinkster? – Historic Hudson Valley

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What is Pinkster? – Historic Hudson Valley

Pinkster is a holiday that was celebrated over several days by African and Dutch New Yorkers throughout the 1700s.

The holiday was brought to the New World by Dutch settlers in the 1620s and flourished in the areas of heaviest Dutch settlement: the Hudson Valley, northern New Jersey, and western Long Island. These same areas also had significant populations of enslaved Africans from the 1600s until emancipation in New York in 1827. For enslaved people, the year offered few holidays or breaks from tedious and often grueling work. For rural captives in particular, who were often isolated from larger African communities, Pinkster became the most important break in the year.

Albany’s Dutch-African Spring Festival – New York Almanack

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Pinksterfest: Albany’s Dutch-African Spring Festival – New York Almanack

About Pinksterfeest, Harper’s explained:

“The Pinkster festivities commenced on the Monday after Whitesunday, and now began the fun for the Negroes, for Pinkster was the carnival of the African race. The venerable “King of the Blacks” was “Charley of Pinkster Hill,” so called because he was the principal actor in the festivities. Charles originally came from Africa, having in his infancy been brought from Angolo, in the Guinea Gulf; and when but a boy, he became the purchased slave of one of the most ancient and respectable merchant princes of the olden times, Volkert P. Douw of Wolvenhoeck.”