<P> They are also seen in materials from New York's two World's Fairs and the uniforms of the New York Knicks basketball club, the New York Mets baseball club, and the New York Islanders hockey club . </P> <P> The seven arrows in the lion's left claw in the Republic's coat of arms, representing the seven provinces, was a precedent for the thirteen arrows in the eagle's left claw in the Great Seal of the United States . </P> <P> Any review of the legacy of New Netherland is complicated by the enormous impact of Washington Irving's satirical A History of New York and its famous fictional author Diedrich Knickerbocker . Irving's romantic vision of an enlightened, languid Dutch yeomanry dominated the popular imagination about the colony since its publication in 1809 . To this day, many mistakenly believe that Irving's two most famous short stories, "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", are based on actual folk tales of Dutch peasants in the Hudson Valley . </P> <P> The tradition of Santa Claus is thought to have developed from a gift - giving celebration of the feast of Saint Nicholas on December 6 each year by the settlers of New Netherland . The Dutch Sinterklaas was Americanized into "Santa Claus", a name first used in the American press in 1773, when, in the early days of the revolt, Nicholas was used as a symbol of New York's non-British past . However, many of the "traditions" of Santa Claus may have simply been invented by Irving in his 1809 Knickerbocker's History of New York from The Beginning of the World To the End of The Dutch Dynasty . </P>

When the english gained control over new netherland