Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1898-05-26

ODD SPECIMENS OF HUMANITY ARE
7AMApO MOUNTAlNEERS.


Them-They Are tho Best Hunters and
Fishermen In the Land.
People who have never been up in
the Ramapo mountains can have little
idea OF how strange a race Of people
live back in those high and rocky hills,
miles from any village, and with not a
rod of road by which their huts may be
reached by wagons. In other words, it
is not generally known that within 30
miles of the heart Of New York city
there is community as curious almost
as can be found in the remote mountain
recesses Of Tennessee or North Carroll.
ma. 1t is sort of lost tribe, or, rather,
an amalgamation of two lost tribes
If one can imagine what sort of beings
would result from moro than century
intermarrying Of American Indians and
Guinea negroes, with an occasional dash
of white blood added to the mixture, he
may form notion of the people that
live back in the rugged hills that rise
about Sutfern, Ramapo, Sloatsburg,
Woodbourne, Tuxedo and other places
in tho Ramapo valley. But it would
take pretty brisk imagination to pic
ture some Of the queer specimens of hui
mainly that have resulted from this
mixture.
Albinos of the milkiest haired and
pinkest eyed variety are common, and
the dino museums recruit their curio
halls in that line from among these
mountaincers, as did tho great and only
Barnum before them.
Back in tho last century and during
the first quarter of the present century
slaves were common in that part Of
New York state and the adjacent region
of New Jersey. These slaves were treat
ed no better by their old Dutch masters
than were their fellow bondsmen in the
south. They were worked long and
hard and tho lash was not spared. Con-
sequently runaway slaves were many.
These runaways invariably sought tho
Businesses of the surrounding mountains.
1t is very difficult thing to mako
ones way up and among tho Ramapo
mountains oven at this day, and it was
almost an impossibility in the slavery
days. AS result, when negro once
succeeded in hiding there he WAS as safe
from rocapturo as il he had gone to
Canada, although he might be within
sight and sound of his master s homo.
Scores of runaways in time peopled the
inaccessible hills, and in the spots
where they threw up their first shelter
ing huts of bark or fallen trees or found
refuge il caves their descendants dwell
today.
Tho woods had their Indian jewellers
already, and tho two races mingled.
These arc the strange people who are
seen now and then III tho little villages
along the Erie railway in Rockland and
the adjoining towns of Bergen and
Orange counties, and whose homes arc
far back in tho hills. a characteristic
of these people is that tho names of tho
old Dutch families in which the orig
inal blacks were slaves have been ro-
tanned by them, generation after gener-
alton. Tho most numerous family OF
tho race goes by the name of De Groat,
but there arc Do Presses, Van Hoevons
and many other Des and Vans.
In the SIMMER time you might climb
and Chamber and stumble up the steep
sides and over tho rocky SUBMITS Of the
Ramapo mountains all day and not see
n solitary sign of habitation, although
there would be many on all sides of
you. They are SO doftly tucked in
among tho rocks and hidden by the trees
and foliage that only ono acquainted
with tho ways of tho mountaineers could
find them. In the fall when the trees
are bare, tho huts stand revealed to any
who may pass that way, and such are
few, for although there is no better
rutfed grouse shooting anywhere than
in these mountain businesses the weary
climbing necessary to get to the haunts
of these birds is more than the average
sportsman cares to undergo.
There is no ground that might grow
anything about any of these huts; not
chicken or fowl of any kind; not
even pig. But there are dogs without
limit--mongrol, woltish looking dogs,
such as might hang about Indian camps
and always from ono to half n dozen
half naked, oerie, eldsh looking chill
dren, who, at sight or sound of II strau
ger, scamper to cover i'll tho hut, in the
brush or among tho rocks, disappearing
as completely as startled brood of
young quail.
How do these people subsist? They
are tho best hunters and fishermen i'll
tho land, aud game and trout are abun.
dant all about them. They hunt and
snare grouse and rabbits and catch trout
for the market during the season. The
women and children pick berries For
the products of tho forest, streams and
berry patches these people obtain store
goods at tho villages, both the luxuries
and tho necessaries-the latter being
chiefly whisky and tobacco, the former