Jacob Steendam was a poet and successful merchant.   He was born in the year 1616, perhaps at Enkhuizen, Holland.  He was employed by the DWIC and from 1641-1649 lived in Guinea.   Steendam became the first poet in New Amsterdam.  He wrote "spurring verses" in 1659 and 1661 to encourage settlement on the South River of New Netherland.   When the English took the colony he went out to Java in 1666.  By his wife, Sara de Rosschou (or Abrahams), he had a daughter, Vredegund.  He must have passed away in 1672.  Paraphrased from Anthology of New Netherland by Henry C. Murphy, 1865 in The Founders by Charles Knowles Bolton.

Paraphrased from Anthology of New Netherland by Henry C. Murphy, 1865 in The Founders by Charles Knowles Bolton.