LOTT Homestead (Part of the Historic House Trust)

HENDRICK L. LOTT  H0MESTEAD 

AND CAPTAIN LOTT OF THE KINGS COUNTY MILITIA

	From the heart of Brooklyn one may reach in thirty 
minutes Flatlands, where still remain old Dutch manors and 
spreading meadows surrounded by an atmosphere as fair and 
peaceful as that which pervaded them two centuries ago. 
Small wonder is it that the renowned Talleyrand, when he 
came here, begged rides of Flatlands farmers, all the while 
praising their fertile fields and suggesting new vegetables 
adapted to the soil. Talleyrand may have seen the quaint 
LOTT homestead, which, combining the old and the new, now 
stands on Kimbell's Road near Flatlands Bay, and is one of 
the most interesting places thereabouts, at one time a show 
place in this part of the country, and called the finest 
house in Kings County.

	The Hendrick L. LOTT homestead was probably built about 1800.
Johannes LOTT, a descendant of the first LOTT that came to America,
bought the land in 1719 from Coert VOORHHIES and there was a time
when most of the land in this section was owned by either the 
LOTTs or the WYCKOFFS. Johannes LOTT, who lived on the farm and
eventually became one of the largest land-owners in Flatlands, was 
something of a farmer and something of a soldier. He served as 
captain. of the Kings County militia, and fought well in the 
French and Indian War. His three sons received each a farm 
after his death, and one of them was the Hendrick L. LOTT who 
built this homestead, moving the dining-room of the old house and 
its kitchen up to the new. The old part is probably more than two 
hundred years old.

	Flatlands has been the subject of many a story. Its church 
chronicles are interesting, and its civil records full of varied 
incidents, while its legends are fascinating. If the traveller 
has once heard these things, he cannot fail to recall some of them 
as he wanders in the vicinity of the LOTT homestead, viewing it 
from this point and that. He will remember the renowned Adrian 
VAN SINDEREN, who presided over the Flatlands church, now more 
than two and a half centuries old, and the Dutch sermons for 
American liberty that VAN SINDEREN preached to British soldiers.
Every Sunday he prayed that success might come to Washington, and 
the British officers, not knowing what the pious VAN SINDEREN said, 
joined heartily in the service.

	A tale is told of the days when the council of the town met in a
store that once stood on King's Highway and Flatbush Avenue, and of the 
old court being held in the cellar, to the consternation of the 
dignitary, who protested against presiding over a court held among the 
pots and kettles. There also was the heated contest in which it was 
disputed whether the owner or the town should have a strip of land 
called "Ruffle-bar." A man by the name of ELIOT and another named 
BERGEN were appointed to watch the polls when the matter came to a 
vote. BERGEN was for and ELIOT against the town. Things might have 
gone well enough had not Mr. BERGEN yielded to his unvarying propensity 
for a mid-day nap, whereupon the shrewd ELIOT, as the story goes, 
chewed up and swallowed a quarter of a hundred ballots, and carried 
the polls against the town.

	Frequently during the early Dutch days this part of Brooklyn was a 
scene of stirring times, for neighbor wrangled with neighbor and 
magistrates had much to do; but now the city here has been quiet for 
centuries; and one of the fairest of its present residences is the 
Hendrick L. LOTT homestead, still peaceful and charming as it was 
in the early part of the past century.




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