Introduction

2009 is a special year.The year of celebrating 400 years since Henry Hudson sailed up the Hudson river, which Hudson himself named the Mauritius River, after Maurits van Nassau the Prince of Orange who ruled Holland at that time.

Now we know how great the influence has been of Henry Hudson’s journey in 1609. It has changed the world for ever with the start of the epicentre of global commerce, politics, arts and ideas, which New York, as a state and a city, has become, and still is. There is 400 year history of American – Dutch business roots and relations.

And it is the year of Barack Obama becoming the new president of the USA. Recent research shows that the ancestors of Barack Obama, the family Blossom, fled out of Britain in 1609 for religious freedom to Leiden in The Netherlands. The route for freedom goes through The Netherlands. We all will watch and be part of the history Obama is going to write as the first black president. President Obama is than the eighth president with an ancestor in Leiden. Also the presidents Grant, Coolidge, Taylor, Roosevelt and both Bush have a ‘Leidse Pilgrim’ as ancestor.

In those 400 years there exists a strong relationship between the United States of America, the Netherlands and Europe. During the second world war thousands of young American boys gave their lives to liberate The Netherlands and Europe from the occupation of the Nazi’s.

Nowadays there are about 8 million Americans of Dutch descent in the United States of America.

These 400 years of relationship makes, that we write, organize and support four Hudson 400 events..

Surplus value of those events
A - Events both Americans and Dutch like to be part of
B - To promote biking as a sustainable green way of transportation
C - To make the 400 year existing U.S. and Netherlands relationship more aware
D – To create an administrative and business network to exchange and strengthen the relationship to find and exchange solutions in a new economy for the future here and there.