You're listening to an airwave media podcast.

Ben Franklin's world is a production of the

Omaha Institute and is sponsored by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Hello and welcome to episode 324 of Ben Franklin's world. The podcast dedicated to helping you learn

more about how the people and events of our early American past have shaped

the present-day world we live in. And I'm your host, Liz Kovart. In 1609, the Dutch East India Company

employed an English adventurer by the name of Henry Hudson, and they employed Hudson to find them a sea route to East Asia by going around the northern

reaches of Scandinavia. Now Hudson did his best. He sailed up to Scandinavia and found that

the sea was just too frozen for him to make any progress.

But rather than go back to the Netherlands empty-handed,

Hudson sailed his 85-foot long vessel,

the Dachalvamom, across the Atlantic Ocean,

and during his explorations for a passage to the Atlantic Ocean, and during his explorations

for a passage to the Pacific Ocean through North America,

Hudson entered what is now New York Harbor

and sailed north along the river

that has come to bear his name. Hudson kept a journal of his voyage up and

down what is now the Hudson River. He noted that many indigenous peoples lived along the

river, that the river was tidal. He even noted that the river seemed to have an infinite number of fish.

And when Hudson arrived around the area that is now present day Albany, New York,

he commented about how the area seemed to just team with peltry and furs.

So after Henry Hudson returned to the Netherlands and circulated his journal,

Dutch traders started making a point to venturing across the Atlantic Ocean to the area that the Dutch were now

...