Lefferts Homestead (Part of the Historic House Trust)

THE LEFFERTS HOUSE AND TALES OF STEINBOKKERY POND


	"There's Senator LEFFERTS across the street in his homespun 
suit that made the statesmen at Albany jealous when he was there. 
His wife spun every thread of it."-Jokn Baxter's Diary, I790

	The old LEFFERTS house, having been occupied by eight generations of 
LEFFERTS, is still owned by the family. It stands at 563 Flatbush Avenue, 
unchanged, very different from the modern buildings in that part of Brooklyn; 
and, shaded by great trees set in emerald lawns, it might well annouunce 
to the hundreds that pass it daily, "I have occupied this site for more 
than two hundred and fifty years." 

	On the landing of the British at Bath in August of 1776, when the American 
riflemen, toward evening, saw the enemy approaching, they set fire to stacks 
of grain in Flatbush and also burned this house. Its foundations were saved, 
and in a short time was reared the dwelling that now occupies the site. 
The land on which it stands was granted to LEFFERTS Pietersen. Van HAGEWOUT, 
who came to this country in 1660 and settled in Flatbush. He received a deed 
in parchment a year later, signed by Peter STUYVESANT.

	The LEFFERTS family has been a prominent one and closely associated with the 
growth of Flatbush. John LEFFERTS, a grandson of the original settler, was 
judge of the Court of Sessions and Common Pleas, and was a county judge 
for a number of years. He was a town clerk of Flatbush and delegate to the 
Provincial Congress. His son Peter was a State senator and a judge of the 
Court of Sessions and Common Pleas, one of the first trustees of the 
Reformed Protestant Dutch Church in Flatbush, and a large contributor toward
the erection of Erasmus Hall, to which he subscribed sixty pounds and of 
which he was one of the trustees. He was a prominent Patriot.

	An interesting tradition concerning property of a later member of the family, 
Mr. John LEFFERTS, is told by Mr. Daniel M. TREADWELL. This property was 
Steinbokkery Pond, once near Bedford Avenue, which covered a surface area of 
about two acres and was owned by Mr. John LEFFERTS in 1860. About this pond 
the Indians wove tales; and the Algonkins, of whom the Flatbush Canarsies 
were a sub-tribe, believed that springs, brooks, and ponds were gifts of the 
Great Spirit, hence sacred. Probably many of these tales were heard by the 
whites, and Steinbokkery Pond came in for its share of superstition. 
One Joris VAN NYSE asserted that the Steinbokkery was a breeding-place for 
sea-serpents and ghosts, and he further declared that one night,
when he was returning home from Ben NELSON's in Flatbush, on Clove Road, 
near the bridge, he saw four or five great serpents come out of the pond, 
their heads blazing flame, and that they followed the creek toward the ocean.

	Mr. John LEFFERTS said that in the fall of the year he had seen phosphorescent 
lights rising from the swamp and marshes about the pond, but, like many of 
his neighbors, he was not disturbed by the phenomenon. The country folk 
were the ones who saw visions and wove tales of a supernatural nature about 
old Steinbokkery, interpreting what they saw as forerunners of some great 
calamity. The Indians in their turn believed that the pond was the home of 
fire dragons, and that these monsters flew from one pond to another. 

	"One of the most charming men I ever saw," continues Mr. TREADWELL, 
"was Mr. John LEFFERTS. He was a factor in all of the affairs of Flatbush 
for half a century. He was 6ft. 4in. tall and proportionatly powerful, 
and was as kind and gentle as a child,-but no trifling. At one time a 
donkey domesticated in his family for the pleasure of his children refused 
to go into an adjoining pasture. No persuasion could persuade him to move 
an inch. Mr. LEFFERTS wasted no time in expostulating with the reluctant 
beast, but seized him by the tail and nape of the neck and threw him bodily 
into the adjoining field."

	This homestead has been the inspiration from which has sprung the plans of 
a number of summer cottages. In fact, some of the most attractive modern 
suburban homes are adaptations of these old Dutch homesteads. Not a few 
of the "Queen Cottages" are almost pure Dutch. Could we trace back the 
history of the architect's plan we would find its beginnings in an 
old Dutch home.



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