Jersey Area Research Articles

The Epidemiology of Infant Mortality in the Greater Newark, New Jersey Area: A New Look at an Old Problem

This research had institutional review board approval from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and the State of New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services. IRB #0120110286 BACKGROUND: The death rate during the first year of life, or infant mortality rate (IMR), is a key indicator of a nation's health. Many factors affect IMR in the United States, including race and ethnicity. The 2020 U.S. Healthy People IMR target goal has been revised to 6.0 deaths per 1,000 births. In 2006, the IMR in New Jersey was 5.5 deaths per 1,000 births, ranging from 4.4 for Caucasians, to 11.5 for African Americans. This study is designed to determine whether IMRs vary by zip code in the greater Newark region and identify maternal/infant characteristics associated with elevated IMRs. A descriptive study was conducted using New Jersey Department of Health (NJDOH) birth certificate data and U.S. Census data by zip code in the greater Newark area. IMRs were analyzed by zip code and by characteristics of mothers and infants. IMRs vary by zip code of residence. The lowest and highest IMRs were in zip codes 07105 and 07102, respectively, both located within the city of Newark. Maternal characteristics associated with high IMR, in multivariable analysis, include: lack of prenatal care, single marital status, and non-Hispanic black race. Demographic characteristics associated with high IMRs were: low mean household income and a large percentage of the population living below poverty level. Race/ethnicity, marital status, and zip code of residence show significant impact upon infant mortality. Poverty and race/ethnicity are associated with increased IMRs and track to ZIP code.

The Art of Theodore F. Rose: Nineteenth Century Lithographer and Painter

The Art of Theodore F. Rose: Nineteenth Century Lithographer and Painter Dr. Joseph H. Hall, IV Abstract Theodore F. Rose is a late-nineteenth century lithographer and painter, who is littleknown, as an artist, among both the general public and among professional art historians in even the Philadelphia-New Jersey area. He was a competent commercial lithographer being most well-known for his black and white illustrations of the beautiful homes and street scenes of the resort towns of the New Jersey Coast in the 1870’s. However, Rose was also an accomplished painter in oils, using a very dark palette, in almost exclusively outdoor settings, with the exception being at least one charming trompe l’oeil still life. I have been unable to link him to any of the early art training centers in Philadelphia in the nineteenth century. It is much more likely that he became apprenticed, or indentured, to a lithographer, working for one of the many printers or publishers in the city, where drawing and painting skills would have been developed as well. Rose had a very rough early life, losing family to disease, and serving in the United States Civil War. It is hypothesized that his melancholy background contributed to the somber, or threatening, atmosphere of his paintings. Full Text: PDF DOI: 10.15640/ijaah.v4n2a2

Colorectal Cancer Screening Among Foreign-born South Asians in the Metropolitan New York/New Jersey Region.

The goal of this study was to examine colorectal cancer (CRC) screening practices and factors associated with CRC screening among foreign-born South Asians living in the metropolitan New York-New Jersey area. Two hundred and eight men and women recruited from community settings in the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area completed a questionnaire that included demographics, CRC screening practices, health care access and practices, attitudes about the health care system, primary care physician support for CRC screening, cultural factors, and attitudes about CRC screening and CRC worry. Almost a third of the sample had not heard of any of CRC screening tests. Approximately 62% of the sample had never had a CRC screening test and approximately 69% of the sample was not currently on schedule with regard to CRC screening. When the relative contribution of significant correlates were evaluated, participants who had lived in the US for a longer time, who endorsed more CRC screening benefits, and who endorsed fewer CRC screening barriers were significantly more likely to have had CRC screening in the past. Participants who were more likely to use English in their daily life, who endorsed more CRC screening benefits, and endorsed fewer CRC screening barriers were more likely to be on schedule with regard to CRC screening. In conclusion, awareness of CRC screening and uptake of screening was low in this population of foreign-born South Asians. Interventions to promote CRC screening may benefit from targeting this subgroup of Asian Americans.

Avian Bornaviruses in North American Gulls

Avian bornaviruses, recently described members of the family Bornaviridae, have been isolated from captive parrots and passerines as well as wild waterfowl in which they may cause lethal neurologic disease. We report detection of avian bornavirus RNA in the brains of apparently healthy gulls. We tested 439 gull brain samples from 18 states, primarily in the northeastern US, using a reverse-transcriptase PCR assay with primers designed to detect a conserved region of the bornavirus M gene. Nine birds yielded a PCR product of appropriate size. Sequencing of PCR products indicated that the virus was closely related to aquatic bird bornavirus 1 (ABBV-1). Viral RNA was detected in Herring Gulls (Larus argentatus), Ring-billed Gulls (Larus delawarensis), and Laughing Gulls (Leucophaeus atricilla). Eight of the nine positive birds came from the New York/New Jersey area. One positive Herring Gull came from New Hampshire. Histopathologic examination of one well-preserved brain from a Herring Gull from Union County New Jersey, showed a lymphocytic encephalitis similar to that observed in bornavirus-infected parrots and geese. Bornavirus N protein was confirmed in two Herring Gull brains by immunohistochemistry. Thus ABBV-1 can infect gulls and cause encephalitic brain lesions similar to those observed in other birds.

Multimodal Transit Connectivity for Flexibility in Extreme Events

Transportation services and their networks are vital in providing users with flexibility under both normal and extreme conditions. The availability of alternatives is essential in emergencies to provide critical support services for evacuation and supplies, yet disasters often impair transportation's ability to provide these services. In the populous and dense New York and New Jersey area, weather disasters often set records, have occurred historically, and are expected to recur. Vulnerabilities particularly affect disadvantaged populations. Multimodal connectivity for rail and bus transit is evaluated for New York City and several northeastern New Jersey cities for passenger flexibility and risk reduction in emergencies. The U.S. Department of Transportation's Intermodal Passenger Connectivity Database is evaluated as a general multimodal connectivity context. For rail transit stations, bus counts are computed for each station for buses stopping within a 0.1-mi radius; this requirement reflects the needs of less mobile users. Geographic information systems are used for database construction for statistical analysis with publicly available transit and census databases. The New York City statistical analyses of census tracts within which stations are located show variable bus connectivity for different stations and suggest availability by poverty level. A subanalysis for New York City's terminus stations shows greater bus connectivity and different transit activity characteristics. Results provide ways of operationalizing connectivity for transit resilience as critical infrastructure. Methods can be extended to other areas. Recommendations for flexibility in terms of passenger multimodality are provided.

Julie Dickerson: Creative Currents

Ashley Makar interviewed Julie Dickerson in 2010 while she was painting a mural of “dancing saints”—ranging from Moses’ sister Miriam to Martin Luther King—in the undercroft at St. James and St. Paul Episcopal Church in New Haven, Connecticut (affectionately nicknamed “St. PJ's”). Dickerson is a 2010 graduate of Princeton University. As a senior, she submitted a proposal for Princeton’s Martin A. Dale '53 fellowship and was granted the fellowship for her project “Creative Currents,” in which she proposed to paint as many murals as possible in hospitals, shelters, and other community spaces in the New York/New Jersey area.

Surviving HIV/AIDS in the Inner City: How Resourceful Latinas Beat the Odds by Sabrina Marie Chase (review)

Reviewed by: Surviving HIV/AIDS in the Inner City: How Resourceful Latinas Beat the Odds by Sabrina Marie Chase Donaldson Conserve (bio) Surviving HIV/AIDS in the Inner City: How Resourceful Latinas Beat the Odds. Sabrina Marie Chase. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2011 In Surviving HIV/AIDS in the Inner City: How Resourceful Latinas Beat the Odds, Sabrina Marie Chase examines the experiences of 17 Puerto Rican women faced with the burden of living with HIV/AIDS. These women resided in the greater Newark, New Jersey area; half had acquired the virus from their husbands or partners, while the others had contracted it from intravenous drug use or drug-related sex work. Surviving HIV/AIDS provides an in-depth analysis of these women’s successes and the challenges they faced in attempting to obtain the health care and assistance needed for their survival. Chase attempts to answer the following four questions in her book: Given the limited resources of the participants, how did they manage an illness as serious as HIV/AIDS? Did they seek out alternatives to conventional medical treatments, and if so what kind? Did the magnitude of the challenges they faced deprive them of agency, or could they act effectively on their own behalf and on behalf of others? If so, how did their agency operate? And what can we, as a greater society, learn from this?[p.7] Chase draws on French sociologist Pierrre Bourdieu’s concepts of cultural capital, habitus, and social capital to explain why some of these women thrived while others faltered when faced with structural violence and the challenges of dealing with professionals in the health care system and government agencies. Cultural capital is defined here as a group of important resources individuals acquire from the families who raise them and socialize them into adulthood. Each group’s cultural capital is expressed as its habitus, the class and sub-culture specific worldview that prizes one set of preferences and activities over others. The author also stresses the importance of social capital, defined as benefits that emerge from relationships built on trust and reciprocity, in order to demonstrate why institutions such as hospitals and clinics are easier to navigate for people whose habitus has been shaped by middle-and upper-class privilege. Although Chase starts out by describing the poverty, prejudice, health disparities, and drug-related problems that placed these women at risk of becoming infected with HIV, the goal of the book is not simply to highlight the challenges they faced, but rather to emphasize their agency and the meanings they constructed from their experience; she also sought to show how their habitus affected their experience with the health care system. To illuminate the effects of the women’s background on their experience with the health care system, Chase created three categories: women with broad cultural and social capital, women with average cultural and social capital, and women whose cultural and social capital fell somewhere in the middle. Chase asserts that one of the [End Page 1403] main differences between women with broad cultural capital and those with average capital is that broad capital women expressed both a greater desire and ability to cross from one habitus to another, while average capital women preferred to remain in their own habitus. As a result, broad capital women were better able than average capital women to interact successfully with a variety of professional institutions which helped them to expand their social capital while receiving the necessary resources needed for their survival. Chase uses these categories throughout the book to further demonstrate the impact of cultural and social capital on the type and quality of health care women received and on their outlook on life and on the strategies they developed to deal with HIV as well as their overall health. The major strength of this volume, in my view, is the amount of time the author spent following and developing trusting relationships with the women in her study; these relationships enabled her to learn women’s stories and portray their experience in a manner easily accessible to the reader. Chase used snowball sampling to conduct extensive fieldwork from 1998 – 2000 in three...

The Pre- and Post-Migration Life Satisfaction of Korean Americans in New York, New Jersey, and Boston Areas

The Pre- and Post-Migration Life Satisfaction of Korean Americans in New York, New Jersey, and Boston Areas

Attitudes of Methadone Program Staff Toward Provision of Harm-Reduction and Other Services

The need for expansion of health services provided in drug treatment programs has been widely discussed since the beginning of the HIV epidemic among drug users. Service expansion has focused on various types of services including medical services (eg, primary care) and harm-reduction services (eg, provision of sterile syringes). A staff survey was conducted in 8 methadone maintenance clinics in the New York/New Jersey area to assess attitudes toward the provision of harm reduction and other services in methadone clinics, and the relationship of these attitudes to other variables. A total of 114 staff members in 8 methadone maintenance clinics completed the survey. The majority of staff was supportive of adding services, over 90% supported medical services, and the majority supported harm-reduction services such as syringe access and disposal services. Higher education and HIV knowledge levels were significant correlates of favorable attitudes toward service provision. Support for providing harm-reduction services in methadone maintenance clinics was found. Enhancing knowledge of staff regarding various types of health services, and engaging them in how best to institute new services, should be undertaken when new services are planned.

Hexavalent Chromium Through Lactational Exposure Delayed Follicular Development in Pre-Pubertal F1 Offspring: Mechanistic Insights into Cell Cycle Regulation of Granulosa Cells.

The United States is one of the world’s leading producers of chromium compounds. In California, 30% of drinking water sources are contaminated with significant levels of CrVI. More than two million tons of CrVI processing wastes contaminate 150 sites in Northern New Jersey alone, as it is the chromate capital of the world. According to the National Tap Water quality data base and Environmental Working Group (EWG) report (2008), 1.7 million people from 42 communities living in the New Jersey area drink chromium contaminated water. Moreover, in California, ~74 million people in nearly 7,000 communities drink tap water polluted with hexavalent and other forms of Cr (3), and these people are predisposed to various health problems, including increased menstrual bleeding, ovulatory dysfunctions and infertility. Recently we have reported that lactational exposure to CrVI induced a delay/arrest in follicular development at the secondary follicular stage, delayed puberty, prolonged inter-estrous intervals, and increased FSH, decreased estradiol. CrVI also down-regulated steroidogenic/and steroid signaling machineries such as FSHR, LHR, StAR, SF1, ERα, ERβ, 17bHSD-1, and -2. In order to investigate the underlying mechanism the following studies were undertaken: In Vivo studies: Pregnant rats were divided into the following groups and given the following treatments from postpartum day 1-21: (i) Control (n=5); (iia-d) CrVI (potassium dichromate, 5, 25, 50 and 100 ppm); and (iii) CrVI plus Vitamin C supplementation (CrVI through drinking water with vitamin C supplementation, 20 mg/kg b.wt; through gavage). During this period the F1 female offspring (4 pups/mother) received CrVI and/or vitamin C through the mother's milk from postnatal days (PND) 1-21. At the end of the treatment, F1 offspring were euthanized, ovaries collected, and follicle numbers were counted. Results: CrVI decreased primordial, primary, secondary and antral follicle numbers in F1 rats in a dose-dependent manner. In vitro studies: Primary cultures of rat granulosa cells (GC) from normal PND 21 F1 female rats, and spontaneously-immortalized rat granulosa cells (SIGC) were treated with 10 µM potassium dichromate (CrVI) for 12 and 24 h, with or without vitamin C pre-treatment for 24 h. The effects of CrVI on cell proliferation, cell cycle, and expression and regulation of cell cycle regulatory proteins were investigated in GC and SIGC. Our data indicated that CrVI: (i) decreased cell proliferation, (ii) arrested cell cycle at the G1-S, and G2-M phase check-points, (iii) down regulated G1-S phase-specific cyclins D2 and D3, and cyclin E; and cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs)-4, -6, and -2; (iv) down regulated G2-S phase-specific cyclins B1, A; and CDK-1; (v) CrVI up regulated CDK-inhibitors p15, p16, and p27 in GC and SIGC; (vi) CrVI also decreased cyclin D2-associated transcriptional factors c-myc, c-fos and c-jun; (vii) down regulated P13K/Akt. (viii) Vitamin C pre-treatment mitigated CrVI effects on the deregulation of cell cycle, decrease in cell proliferation, expression/regulation of cyclins, CDKs and CDKIs, and associated mitogenic pathways. Our study, for the first time provides a clear mechanistic insight into the effect of CrVI on granulosa cells which could be mitigated by vitamin C. (poster)

Perceived Risk of Amputation, Emotions, and Foot Self-care Among Adults With Type 2 Diabetes

The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of having a family member who experienced an amputation on one's own perceived risk and fear of experiencing a diabetes-related amputation. This was a descriptive cross-sectional study using paper-and-pencil surveys by mail. Adults with type 2 diabetes and a family history of diabetes attending a self-management education program in the Metropolitan New York/New Jersey area were recruited. Measures were completed about risk perception and fear of amputation, emotional representations of diabetes from the Illness Perception Questionnaire, and the foot self-care behavior component of the Summary of Diabetes Self-care Activities Survey. The authors estimated the variability in foot self-care that was accounted for by risk perception and fearful memories. In those who remembered a family member needing an amputation, high perceived risk and fear was associated with less routine foot self-care. For those without family history of amputation, fear was positively associated with foot self-care. Motivation for foot self-care behavior may be driven by risk perception and emotional responses. The ways in which risk perception and fear influence motivation for preventive foot self-care behavior are influenced by whether one's family member was affected by an amputation. Probing about the influence of the patient's legacy of diabetes may be helpful when customizing education plans.

Impacts of Gasoline Prices on New Jersey Transit Ridership

This study analyzes the impacts of changes in gasoline prices on New Jersey Transit facility ridership on the basis of observed ridership data between 1980 and 2008. Two separate gasoline price increases are considered: (a) summer 2005 because of Hurricane Katrina and (b) spring 2008 because of oil price increases. New Jersey has been among the nation's leaders in transit investment, with ridership growth that exceeds the national average. Thus, investigating transit ridership trends in the New Jersey area is crucial. To understand the ridership behavior in New Jersey, after controlling for seasonal fluctuation and economic growth factors, cross-elasticity values with respect to gasoline prices are calculated with time-series regression models. Estimation results show that several months elapse before travelers respond to gasoline price changes. Moreover, correlations between transit ridership and employment rate, transit fare, and service rate are statistically significant. Cross-elasticity values with respect to gasoline prices are quite low and range from 0.12 to 0.22 in the short term and from 0.028 to 0.176 in the medium term. The findings of this study are important from an empirical point of view because they are based on real data that contain rarely found significant fluctuations in gas prices along with employment rate and give an opportunity to test the effect of these two factors on transit ridership. These results are also important from an application perspective because transit agencies can use them to make better decisions about transportation system investments, pricing, and deployment of new transit services.

Demographic Characteristics of 38 Patients Injured in Motor Vehicle Accidents Referred by Chiropractors to Physiatrists

Objective The purpose of this study is to describe the demographic profile of patients in the New Jersey area who are involved in motor vehicle personal injury lawsuits and who are referred from chiropractors to physiatrists. Methods The study design was a prospective chart review of patients (N = 38) referred to a private physiatric practice from 5 chiropractic practices. Patient data collected at initial consultation included age, employment status, emergency department consultation, time since accident, visual analog score, neck pain and back pain, review of systems, and functional limitations. Results The average patient was 37.1 years old, with male-to-female ratio nearly 1:1, and presenting 4.5 months after the accident; 81.6% were employed before the accident, 25.8% of which stopped working. The average pain score was 6.6 on a visual analog scale. Neck and back pain were common at 84.2% and 89.5%, respectively. Other complaints included headaches, sleeping difficulties, dizziness, depression, and anxiety. Limitations in function was reported in most patients. Conclusions In this study, patients referred to a physiatrist from doctors of chiropractic had neck and low back pain not requiring hospital admission. Patients referred tended to have complicated cases with a variety of medical, legal, and psychological factors that are associated with delayed recovery. Physiatrists may be uniquely suited to assist chiropractors in management of complicated patients who have been involved in motor vehicle personal injury lawsuits and who have multidisciplinary needs.

Economic Incentive, Embeddedness, and Social Support: A Study of Korean-Owned Nail Salon Workers' Rotating Credit Associations

Much of the past research on rotating credit associations (RCAs) in the U.S. Korean community has been conducted in the context of Korean entrepreneurs' success in small businesses. By contrast, little has been known about the significance of RCAs in the lives of Korean immigrant workers. Based on a sample of Korean female workers at Korean-owned nail salons in the New York–New Jersey area, the first aim of this study is to address whether Korean immigrant workers, like Korean immigrant merchants, take into account RCAs as a way to save money or raise capital. Second, this study also speculates about the importance of embeddedness (Granovetter) and social capital (Portes and Sensenbrenner) views for both economic behavior and a likelihood of malfeasance by RCA participants. Lastly, this study regards RCA membership as a mechanism of social support for its participating members. Overall, the analyses provide evidence that RCA membership at nail salons leads to both economic benefit and social support for some of its participants, and that embedded networks and an accompanying sense of trust have some connection to the suppression of its members' latent malfeasance.

Modeling the Effect of Chlorine Emissions on Ozone Levels over the Eastern United States

Abstract This paper presents model estimates of the effect of chlorine emissions on atmospheric ozone concentrations in the eastern United States. The model included anthropogenic molecular chlorine emissions, anthropogenic hypochlorous acid emissions from cooling towers and swimming pools, and chlorine released from sea-salt aerosols. The release of chlorine emissions from sea-salt aerosols was modeled using heterogeneous reactions involving chloride ions in aerosols and three gas-phase species. The gas-phase chlorine chemistry was combined with the Carbon Bond Mechanism and incorporated into the Community Multiscale Air Quality modeling system. Air quality model simulations were performed for July 2001 and the results obtained with and without chlorine emissions were analyzed. When chlorine emissions were included in the model, ozone concentrations increased in the Houston, Texas, and New York–New Jersey areas. The daily maximum 1-h ozone concentrations increased by up to 12 parts per billion by volume (ppbv) in the Houston area and 6 ppbv in the New York–New Jersey area. The daily maximum 8-h ozone concentrations increased by up to 8 ppbv in the Houston area and 4 ppbv in the New York–New Jersey area. The monthly average daily maximum 1-h ozone concentration increased by up to 3 ppbv in the Houston area, but the increases in the monthly average daily maximum 1-h ozone concentration in the New York–New Jersey area were small. Chlorine emissions and chemistry enhanced the volatile organic compound oxidation rates and, thereby, increased the ozone production rate.

An Investigation of Habitual and Incidental Physical Activity Among Costa Rican and Costa Rican American Teenage Girls

A comparative survey design was used to examine habitual and incidental physical activity among native Costa Rican (CR) and Costa Rican American (CRA) adolescent girls. The purposive sample included 17 girls (ages 12-19 years) living in Limon, Costa Rica (n = 11), and the metropolitan New York/New Jersey area (n = 6). Participants in the CR group had significantly higher levels of habitual (p = .04), incidental (p = .02), and combined (p = .03) physical activity as compared with those on the CRA group. Dance was a preferred form of activity for both groups. The relationship between habitual and incidental physical activity was not significant, underscoring the need to address both variables in assessment of total physical activity. The findings suggest a need to prioritize the promotion of physical activity among immigrant teenage girls using culturally valued methods.

The Context of a Legacy of Diabetes

The purpose of this study is to develop a means to assess recollections of a family member's diabetes self-care behavior and to assess the relationships to a participant's own self-care behavior. Assessing recollections of a family member's self-care behavior may provide insight into what patients learn from family members with diabetes. Volunteers with diabetes were recruited from 2 centers in the metropolitan New York/New Jersey area (N = 104) to complete a new pencil-and-paper survey called the Family Summary of Diabetes Self-care Activities Survey, adapted from the widely used, valid and reliable Summary of Diabetes Self-care Activities Survey to assess their recollections about a family member's diabetes self-care behavior. The measure was used to examine the relationships between recollections of a family member's self-care behavior and the participant's own self-care behavior. There was a significant positive association between recollections about family members' dietary behavior with participants' own dietary behavior, indicating that more dietary adherence of the family member is associated with more dietary adherence by the individual. No significant associations were found between the other self-care behaviors (physical activity, glucose monitoring, pill and insulin adherence). The relationship of recollections about the self-care of family members to individuals' own self-care provides some empirical support for the concept of multigenerational legacies of diabetes.

Knowledge, Attitudes, and Behaviors of Hepatitis B Screening and Vaccination and Liver Cancer Risks Among Vietnamese Americans

Hepatitis B Virus (HBV) infection is a serious health problem among Asian Americans. Vietnamese Americans are disproportionately affected by liver cancer compared with other racial and ethnic groups. Vietnamese males have the highest incidence of liver cancer of any racial group; incidence of liver cancer among Vietnamese males is 11 times higher than among White males. Nearly 80% of liver cancer is attributed to HBV. This study measured knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to HBV screening and vaccination. The study was conducted among 256 Vietnamese Americans in the greater Philadelphia and New Jersey area, with a large number of underserved, recent immigrants with low socioeconomic status and limited English proficiency. Participants were recruited from Vietnamese community-based organizations. Overall, 46.3% of the sample had heard of HBV or knew about the availability of screening (32.6%) or vaccination (35.5%) while 7.5% were ever screened and 6.3% had been vaccinated. Community-based, culturally appropriate interventions for Vietnamese Americans and health care providers should increase screening and vaccination rates.

COMPARISON OF FETAL DEMISE CASE SERIES DRAWN FROM SOCIOECONOMICALLY DISTINCT COUNTIES IN NEW JERSEY

The causes of stillbirth were investigated in two case series drawn from distinct communities within the same geographic region in New Jersey, one characterized by affluence (Hackensack Medical Center, Bergen County) and one by poverty (University Hospital, Essex County). The data was obtained over 4 years (1998–2001) from a stillbirth autopsy service available to all obstetrics-gynecology clinicians in the northern New Jersey area. A total of 52 stillbirths from University Hospital in Newark (Essex County) and 55 from Hackensack Medical Center (Bergen County) were examined by this same autopsy service. Cause(s) were identified for 70% of stillbirth cases. Whereas population-based data revealed that the rate of stillbirths was higher in Essex and mothers of stillbirths in Essex were of younger age, greater parity, and gravidity and had higher rates of smoking, single marital status, and very low birth weight infants, the only significant difference between the two case series was infection, detected in 35% of stillbirths from University Hospital versus 14% from Hackensack. Also no difference in the incidence of stillbirth due to unknown cause was found between the case series.

The First Dutch Settlement in Alberta: Letters from the Pioneer Years, 1903–1914 (review)

Reviewed by: The First Dutch Settlement in Alberta: Letters from the Pioneer Years, 1903–1914 Mary Bletz Donald Sinnema, ed. and trans. The First Dutch Settlement in Alberta: Letters from the Pioneer Years, 1903–1914. Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 2005. Introduction. Notes. Index. 392 pp. $34.95 sc. This book tells the story of a small Dutch settlement in southern Alberta, slightly north and west of Lethbridge, from 1903 to the First World War Throughout the nineteenth century a number of Dutch nationals settled in Canada, often entering the country through the backdoor along with other migrants from the United States. When choice arable land became scarce there, they opted for better opportunities in Canada. The Dutch settlement in southern Alberta was part of the land rush of the early 1900s, when thousands of homesteaders were attracted by offers of free land in the hope of securing independence, social status, and economic prosperity. The story is told through letters, the majority of which were written by the settlers and published in Dutch-language newspapers; several are from private family collections. The letters are full of the wonder of settling in a new land, and picture the pioneer experience in great detail, from the lonely homestead on the bald prairie to a well-developed rural community. The Dutch were relatively few and came late to the Canadian land rush. The first group of settlers hailed largely from a Dutch farming settlement in Manhattan, Montana, and there seems to have been little organized colonization effort. The second group, which came in 1904, was slightly more organized and comprised forty-one persons from the small industrial town of Nijverdal in the northeastern part of the Netherlands. It was here that the industrial revolution had taken root in the [End Page 240] Netherlands, and textile production was the focus of industrial activity in Nijverdal, as it was for the rest of the Twente region. The Nijverdal immigrants in this book were not farmers, but had been employed in miserable conditions in the cotton mills, the Koninklijke Stoomweverij. The Reverend Sybrandus Schilstra, from the province of Friesland, was a strong advocate for settling in the Canadian West. From1902 to 1905 he wrote twenty-three letters to the newspaper Niewsblad van het Noorden, and, although he himself never traveled farther west than Pennsylvania, he wrote glowing reports exalting the opportunities in Canadian rural life: “There is no doubt there is a future here. Already in a few years many have become well off, if not rich.... It may not be easy to separate from parents, family and acquaintances, and to say farewell to friendly surroundings...but one ought to think about the future” (45–46). Schilstra was highly critical of industrialization both in the Netherlands and in the New York/New Jersey area, where many Dutch immigrants were employed in manufacturing jobs. He cautions against urban life: Although [a factory worker] earns relatively much money, he can have no joy of life...A farmer cherishes the land, views his cattle with joy and high spirits, sees the waving corn with gladness.... If this is not the case now in the Netherlands, there is no doubt that this can be the case after a few years in Canada (47). Everhardus Aldus, the most educated person in the group, had been a physics teacher at the local school in Nijverdal, and often appears critical and homesick in his letters. He is astonished that the potatoes served during the voyage were not peeled (94) and stations and railway cars are dirty and unsightly, with no first or second class (99). Although he admires the beautiful rivers, he is disgusted by the climate — the very annoying and strong wind, much more annoying than rain (109). He does observe the lack of class awareness and the fact that everyone, the Negro who washes windows in the town and the black worker who digs coal in the mine, as much as the doctor, lawyer, the land office official, are all addressed as “Mister” (115). Donald Sinnema provides a thirty-seven-page introduction and, given his background in church history, he emphasizes religious developments within the communities. The church was an important...