In Old Amsterdam (1949)

James A. FitzPatrick: Self - Narrator

Quotes 

• James A. FitzPatrick : Thanks to the speed of modern air travel, we have flown about three thousand, five hundred miles in less than 18 hours.

• James A. FitzPatrick : The housewives of Amsterdam vie with one another in their collections of exquisite pieces of china and porcelain - some of which were brought to Holland by the East India merchantmen, and have since been handed down from generation to generation.

• James A. FitzPatrick : The picturesque old buildings which line the banks of the waterways reflect the patience and tenacity, and the power and richness, of a race that has spent two thousand years in a constant struggle with the forces of nature, to wrest a great and flourishing land from the sea.

• [last lines] 

  James A. FitzPatrick : Although the old Dutch Masters have contributed much to the art and culture of mankind, we cannot conclude our glimpses of Amsterdam without a word of praise for the industrious Dutch artists who built a great city on reclaimed land from the sea. And it is with this thought that we say farewell to old Amsterdam.

• James A. FitzPatrick : While the city's unique system of canals is of the utmost importance in time of peace, it is also of great strategic value in time of war, for the whole system of sluices and canals is so organized that Amsterdam could be practically inundated in a matter of hours, leaving nothing to the conquering enemy but the sea from whence the old town was originally created.

• [first lines] 

  James A. FitzPatrick : From New York, the former Amsterdam of the New World, we are travelling by airplane to the original Amsterdam of the Old World - and we are now within in sight of our destination. Below us we see the so-called polders, or islands of land, which have been reclaimed from the sea by the industrious Dutch.