Why does Java's Date.getYear() return 111 instead of 2011?

Those methods have been deprecated. Instead, use the Calendar class.

import java.text.DateFormat;
import java.text.ParseException;
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Calendar;

public final class DateParseDemo {
    public static void main(String[] args){
         final DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy");
         final Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
         try {
             c.setTime(df.parse("04/12/2011"));
             System.out.println("Year = " + c.get(Calendar.YEAR));
             System.out.println("Month = " + (c.get(Calendar.MONTH)));
             System.out.println("Day = " + c.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH));
         } 
         catch (ParseException e) {
             e.printStackTrace();
         }
    }
}

Output:

Year = 2011
Month = 3
Day = 12

And as for the month field, this is 0-based. This means that January = 0 and December = 11. As stated by the javadoc,

Field number for get and set indicating the month. This is a calendar-specific value. The first month of the year in the Gregorian and Julian calendars is JANUARY which is 0; the last depends on the number of months in a year.

Javadoc to the rescue:

Deprecated. As of JDK version 1.1, replaced by Calendar.get(Calendar.YEAR) - 1900.

Returns a value that is the result of subtracting 1900 from the year that contains or begins with the instant in time represented by this Date object, as interpreted in the local time zone.

You should not use deprecated methods. Deprecated methods are methods which should not be used anymore. But whatever the method you're using, read its javadoc to know what it does.

President Evil nailed it, Date.getYear() returns a value that is the result of subtracting 1900 from the year that contains. And you you shouldn't use it.

But quick fix for the code in the question is:

Date dateFrom = null;

String gDFString = g.getDateFrom();

System.out.println(gDFString);

DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("dd/MM/yyyy");

try {
    dateFrom = df.parse("04/12/2011");

    System.out.println(dateFrom);

    // Add 1900 to dateFrom.getYear() 

    System.out.println(dateFrom.getYear()+1900);
} catch (ParseException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}

http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.4.2/docs/api/java/util/Date.html#getYear%28%29

The specification states that it returns the year minus 1900. Probably a good idea to avoid deprecated methods as well.