Sybrant G. Van Schaick
by
Stefan Bielinski


Sybrant G. Van Schaick was born in December 1708. He was the only surviving son of Albany trader and landholder Gosen Van Schaick and his wife, Albany native Catharina Staats Van Schaick.

signature of Sybrant G. Van SchaickLosing his father in 1725, young Sybrant was saddled with early responsibility while most Albany boys were able to come of age under a family umbrella. Surviving the stigma of his father's illegal trading with Canada, he was elected assistant alderman for the first ward in 1731. But this Sybrant spent most of his early adulthood following the Indian trade and managing family property north and south of Albany.

At age twenty-seven, he married Alida Roseboom in 1735. Over the next fifteen years, their seven children were baptized at the Albany Dutch church. By the mid-1740s, these Van Schaicks were established in the family home on Market Street. In 1744, Sybrant was elected first ward alderman. In the years that followed, a focus on city-based business identified him as an Albany mainstay. In 1742 and 1763, his name was included on a list of Albany freeholders.

The provincial governor commissioned him recorder of the city in 1750. After five years in that office, in 1756 he was appointed mayor of Albany. He served during the difficult period of the last French and Indian War. He retired from the mayoralty in 1761.

In the years that followed, this Albany merchant showed renewed interest in managing family real estate and acquired several new parcels beyond Albany as well. In 1758, he was appointed to the county court perhaps signifying that he had relocated to his farm south of Albany.

Calling himself a resident of Coxsackie, Sybrant G. Van Schaick filed a will in June 1772. His wife was dead and he left an extensive estate to his four surviving children. Within two years, he had passed also!

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notes

the people of colonial Albany The life of Sybrant G. Van Schaick is CAP biography number 3987. This profile is derived chiefly from family and community-based resources. To prevent confusion with three other Sybrant Van Schaicks then living in the region, he was called "Sybrant G. or Gozen."

Signature of Sybrant G. Van Schaick as printed in JP 5:xiv.

For more on his father's troubles, see NYCD 5:773.



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first posted: 3/25/02; last revised 1/05/05