The Wynkoop Family Portrait Gallery is a project that has been near and dear to my heart for some time now. Like many of you I've been overwhelmed with a desire to look the early Wynkoops in the eye and see what family resemblances there are, if any; to peer into their souls and come face to face with the men and women who helped carve a new country out of the wilderness.

    Our family wasn't alone in this struggle; thousands and thousands of others faced the same problems, many of them of Dutch descent, as are we, but the faces you'll find here are far different than all the rest, for these are our faces, albeit a bit removed from us in time and space, but our faces nonetheless. We've shared the same joys and sorrows and returned from these experiences profoundly changed, as were they. How could it be any other way; they are us and we are them. Each of us carries a small piece of Cornelius Evertsz Wynkoop and Maria Van Langedyck with us wherever we go, like a torch in the night. They left us a legacy that has endured almost 350 years and will endure as long as there are Wynkoops enough to carry on the family name.

    These family members may have passed on long ago, but if you look into their eyes, you may find that they're still with us today, that something of them survives in you. And if you listen hard enough, in the still of the night, or lost in the stacks of some dusty old library, you may hear them whisper in your ear, softly, gently, guiding your footsteps when you thought you were lost.

    This gallery has been divided into five major parts for the present, each representing branches of the family descended from the five surviving children of Cornelius Evertsz Wynkoop and Maria Van Langedyck. (Two of their children, Nicholas and Catharine, seem to have died without issue and no descendants have been traced.) Currently the focus of this gallery is Wynkoop family members from the 17th through the early 20th century. I'm looking for portraits of family members from that time frame since they will be of interest to the most number of visitors possible.

    I would like to encourage you to consider adding portraits of your own ancestors to these pages. The facts in the family genealogies and histories are interesting in and of themselves, but a photograph of the people the stories refer to speaks volumes. Our ancestors were so much more than a bunch of old dates and dry facts. Portraits bear the unmistakable stamp of their characters and the force of their personalities. You won't find that in the pages of an old book.

    While the current focus of the gallery is the descendants of Cornelius Wynkoop and Maria Van Langedyck, I would be more than pleased to add portraits from the European branches of the family as well as portraits from the African American branches. We are family and I would like to see all our ancestors represented here.

    Please feel free to contact me at [email protected] if you have family portraits you wish to contribute or know of printed material which contains copies of such portraits. This is a project I hope will grow by leaps and bounds over the coming years.

    One final word. If anyone knows of the current whereabouts of Richard Wynkoop's collection of Wynkoop portraits, as mentioned in the Preface to the 1904 edition of the Wynkoop Genealogy, (51 of them, as of December 1903), please get in touch with me. I can't tell you how much I'd like to be able to see Richard's dream brought to reality.

    Best wishes,

    Chris

The Johannes Wynkoop Branch.
    The descendants of Johannes Wynkoop.

The Maria Wynkoop Branch.
     The descendants of Maria Wynkoop and Moses Dupuis.

The Evert Wynkoop Branch.
     The descendants of Evert Wynkoop.

The Garret Wynkoop Branch.
     The descendants of Garret Wynkoop.

The Benjamin Wynkoop Branch.
     The descendants of Benjamin Wynkoop.

Unknown Wynkoop Family Members.
    Wynkoop family members whose places in the family tree have not been identified as of yet.