Introduction
The New Paltz Historic Documents Project, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is a collaboration between four institutions with collections of historical documents: Historic Huguenot Street, the Haviland-Heidgerd Historical Collection at Elting Memorial Library, the Reformed Church of New Paltz, and the Town of New Paltz. The project consists of conserving (as needed), digitizing, and making available online early documents from New Paltz and surrounding communities, ranging in date from the mid-1600s to 1830 with some mid and later 19th-century documents included.
The documents are made available online through the New York Heritage website and are supported by the Southeastern New York Library Resources Council. Phase 1 (2021-2024) of this project is now complete, with 3,714 documents (24,000 pages) made available online. Phase 2 (2024-2027) is underway and new documents will be uploaded starting early in 2025. When completed, Phase 2 will add about another 18,557 pages of documents dating from the 18th through the late 19th century to the project.
New Paltz is located in Ulster County, New York, part of the historically and culturally rich mid-Hudson River Valley. Containing countless overlapping references to people, places, events, and time periods in French, Dutch, and English, these four collections chronicle the development of a significant rural American community as it evolved over time and demonstrate the power of local history to illuminate and deepen understanding of broad historical trends. According to renowned historian and Yale Professor Emeritus Jon Butler, the New Paltz Historic Documents Project led by Historic Huguenot Street “illustrates the fascinating ways in which a small, astonishingly complex Hudson River town perhaps unexpectedly exemplified major features of America's story, with distinctive and captivating local features,” namely “social life, economy, race, ethnic relations, and religion.”
Image (header): Jean (Jacob) Hasbrouck House, ca. 1721. Vintage photograph. Historic Huguenot Street Archives.
The preservation and digitization of these documents has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this project do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The translation of Dutch language documents is supported as part of the Dutch Culture USA program by the Consulate General of the Netherlands in New York.