Willem Verhulst was the second director of the Dutch West India Company

Dutch West India Company

Dutch West India Company was a chartered company of Dutch merchants. Among its founding fathers was Willem Usselincx...

. In 1625, Verhulst oversaw the decision to locate the company's main fortress and town on the tip of Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

 Island in the colony of New Netherland

New Netherland

New Netherland, or Nieuw-Nederland in Dutch, was the 17th-century colonial province of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands on the East Coast of North America. The claimed territories were the lands from the Delmarva Peninsula to extreme southwestern Cape Cod...

. The settlement, which was given the name New Amsterdam

New Amsterdam

New Amsterdam was a 17th-century Dutch colonial settlement that served as the capital of New Netherland. It later became New York City....

, was the first permanent European settlement in what was to later New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. Verhulst was not popular with the Dutch colonists and was quickly replaced by Peter Minuit

See also

Fort Wilhelmus

Fort Wilhelmus

Fort Wilhelmus was a factorij in the 17th century colonial province of New Netherland, located on what had been named Verhulsten Island on the Zuyd Rivier, today's Delaware River....