52 Ancestors 2022 – Page 15 – A Deck of Ancestors

52 Weeks – Week Twelve

Joined Together

Twelve weeks of genealogy, my true love gave to me: the theme “Joined Together” for the 52 Ancestors Challenge. Rather than a lot of discussion, I thought this week I’d post photos of some of the couples whose unions ultimately resulted in…me!

While I have photos of other (great) grandparents, I will only post for those of whom I have the pair. First, my maternal great great great grandparents.

William Burgess (1822 – 1904)
Charlotte Liggett (1837 – 1909)

Robert Nelson (1818 – 1902)
Elizabeth Joseph (1818 – 1902)

Valentine Schmidt (1839 – ?)
Margaretha “Regina” Boechler (? – ?)

Next, for my great great grandparents on my father’s side, I only have photos for one pair. These are my grandfather’s grandparents.

Johannes Jansz “Jan” Pater (1862 – 1935)
Ariaantje Jacobs “Adriana” Bleeker (1865 – 1929)

I have photos of all my maternal great great grandparents.

Horace Conrad Liggett Burgess (1854 – 1940)
Sarah Florilla Cook (1857 – 1894)

Ella Elizabeth Thomas (1859 – 1941)
John Alexander Nelson (1854 – 1942)

On to my great grandparents. I have photos for all of them.

^{Theresia “Teetje” Pater (1894 – 1947)
Johannis Albertus van der Fluit (1894 – 1932)}

^{Adrianus Komen (1888 – 1948)
Elizabeth Bakker (1888 – 1976)}

^{Milton Leo Burgess (1891 – 1964)
Hazel Nelson (1899 – 1967)}

^{Heronimus “Jerome” Lerner (1895 – 1954)
Emelia Anton (1903 – 1997)}

My paternal grandparents.

Adrianus Joseph “Arie”
van der Fluit (1923 – 2002)
Christina Komen (1923 – 2000)

“Trouwboekje” means “marriage booklet” in Dutch. In the Netherlands, only a civil marriage is legally valid. A church ceremony can take place afterward, but is not recognized by the state. The registry office would issue one to a couple at they time they were married. They typically include an extract of the marriage registration. While they can vary from one municipality to another, a trouwboekje usually will include space for the birth information of the couple, as well as for the children of the marriage. They can also include information about religious matters, such as information about the church wedding and baptisms of the couple and their children.

My maternal grandparents.

^{Leo Cleveland Burgess (1920- 1995)
Helen Lerner (1921 – 1984)
October 1971}

^{Helen and Leo around 1947.}

My parents. Married crazy young by current standards and still together, modelling what a great marriage should be.

And then there’s mine.

52 Weeks – Week Eleven

Flowers – Sort Of…

I have to admit, I found little inspiration this week’s theme for the 52 Ancestors Challenge. My eldest suggested that I write about my Mayflower ancestor, but it’s not really a topic that speaks to me. While I know it’s a goal for many to find Mayflower ancestors, it wasn’t mine. I was underwhelmed and, somehow, strangely disappointed when I discovered I had a Mayflower ancestor.

As for literal flowers, from a family history point of view, I will acknowledge that when I think about it, they do remind me of each of my grandfathers.

My maternal grandfather, Leo Burgess, had a garden that took up most of half his back yard. While he might have grown other things, my strongest memory is that every year he planted mostly potatoes. One year, when I was little, there was a bee shortage. My grandfather spent many hours going from flower to flower of each potato plant, dabbing them gently with a small paintbrush to pollenate them.

My maternal grandparents’ home in Lethbridge, Alberta. The potato garden was in the back, along the eastern half of the back yard. I took this in May 1995, after my grandfather passed away. You can see my mother and aunt Diana at the front door. We had gone in to sort through my grandfather’s things.

Not the house where my grandfather Vanderfluit turned the front yard into a flower garden. This was in the 1960s, when he still did farm work.

My paternal grandfather, Adrianus “Arie” van der Fluit, was an avid gardener. In his retirement, he removed all the grass from his front yard and replaced it with flower beds.

While there are photos of each of my grandfather’s gardens, I don’t happen to have any handy. However, while looking, I came across photos of my paternal grandfather showing him with something that I associate more strongly with him than flowers – dogs.

My grandfather in Lethbridge, Alberta with Sheba, in the late 1960s or early 1970s.

My grandfather in the Netherlands, a few months before he married my grandmother.

My grandfather started training dogs at a young age, when he was still in the Netherlands. It was something he continued to do after coming to Canada. In the 50s or 60s he even trained dogs for the police. As long as I can remember, my grandfather always had at least one dog, usually a German shepherd. My favourite was Sheba, the first dog of his that I’m able to remember.

In my lifetime, my grandfather always had German shepherds until I was in my mid to late 20s. Around that time he and my grandmother moved into an apartment. They were near the top floor. One day my mother told me that he had gotten a Bouvier. I had never heard of the breed before. From the sound of the name and because my grandfather had moved into an apartment, I figured it was some sort of small or toy breed.

Imagine my surprise when I first visited my grandfather after he acquired the dog and I saw how huge it was. My grandfather had turned the entire balcony – which was quite large – into a kennel. They lived next to a huge park, which was helpful. However, my grandfather quickly found more space for the dog. The building was largely unfinished at the ground level with large windows, balcony-style doors, and lots of natural light. My grandfather got permission to house the dog in there. Given the inch, he soon had a menagerie down there – along with many planters of flowers.

My grandparents later moved into a house in a small farm town. It had a huge back yard for dogs. My grandfather set up a huge obstacle course for them. He kept training dogs – even after losing his foot due to complications associated with diabetes – until he passed away at age 79. The last time I visited my grandfather before he passed away, he showed me his latest dog, putting it through its paces along the course. Doggone it, I was impressed, both with the dog’s training and with the fact my grandfather was still able to do what he loved, despite his age and health.

My grandfather in Raymond, Alberta, in September 1999, age 76, with Dekker, along with my brother Trevor.

52 Weeks – Week Ten

Worship

In what seems a bit of a change of course, this week’s 52 Ancestors Challenge is “Worship”. As the only mayor I’ve found in our family tree is my wife’s third great grandfather, this week I’ll be writing about three men and women of the cloth on my father’s side of the family. My grandmother had a brother who was a priest and a sister who was a nun, while my grandfather had a sister who became a nun.

Born in 1932, Marie Adriana “Riet” Komen was the youngest of child of my great grandparents, Adrianus Komen and Elizabeth Bakker. On my reading of the funeral card and “familieberichten” (“family message”, something akin to an obituary) my cousin sent me after she died, Tante* Riet entered religious training when she was 17. Tante Riet took her vows as a Roman Catholic nun in August 1954, when she was 22. She belonged to the order “Zusters van ‘t H. Hart”, which translates as “Sisters of the Sacred Heart”, which was a teaching order. Tante Riet served as a missionary in Metro Lampung, Indonesia for many of years. Tante Riet also spent time in Finland, where her order also served. By 1997, Tante Reit was Mother Superior of her order, in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Later, she spent several years at St. Bernadette Monastery, in Maliskamp, Noord-Brabant before retiring to Nijmegen.

When I was in grade ten, Tante Riet came to Canada to visit my grandmother in southern Alberta. My grandparents and great aunt made the drive to visit us in northern British Columbia. During that visit she gave me a hand-painted silk bookmark from her time in Indonesia. During my last visit to the Netherlands in 2017, my dad’s cousin drove me and my parents to visit her. We literally drove across the country, going from Langedijk in Noord Holland to Nijmegen on the German border in a matter of hours. Compare that to Canada, where driving across the whole country is much longer than three hours! I wrote to her several times afterwards, but she found corresponding more difficult in her last years.

Tante Riet passed away last year, in August 2021. Funeral services were restricted due to the Covid-19 pandemic. While a funeral home in Den Bosch, Noord-Brabant handled the services, while writing this it only just dawned on me that I do not know where she was interred.

Cornelis Jan “Kees” Komen was the middle child of my grandmother’s family, born in 1928. Oom* Kees was a Roman Catholic priest. I do not know what order he belonged to. In his teens, he attended Het Klein Seminarie Hageveld in Heemstede, Noord Holland, Netherlands. Hageveld was a grammar school and “minor seminary”, a secondary school that prepared boys for eventual enrollment at an actual seminary to prepare for the priesthood. Oom Kees was ordained in May 1958.

Oom Kees is buried at St. Barbara Roman Catholic Cemetery in Haarlem, Noord Holland. He shares a grave marker with two other priests. Kees’s colleagues are named as “Pastoor” on the marker, while he is identified as a “Kapelaan”, suggesting that he had been assigned to work in a secular institution such as a hospital or school.

I never met Oom Kees, who passed away in 1987, so I do not know much about him personally. Until a few years ago, the only photos I had ever seen of him were of him and the Pope.

Oom Kees certainly liked to see the Pope. On the left is Pope Paul VI. The other two photos show Pope John Paul II.

*Bidprentje* (Prayer Card) – Cornelis Jan Komen

“Grateful Memory of Chaplain Cornelis Jan Komen Born in Langedijk on April 10, 1928, ordained a priest at the Cathedral of Haarlem on May 31, 1958, he died after an active and meritorious life in Haarlem on January 8, 1987 and was buried on January 12 at St. Barbara Cemetery“

Tante Marie (Zuster Melania) in 1954, shortly after taking her solemn vows.

Turning to my grandfather’s side of the family, my Tante Marie van der Fluit was an Ursuline nun. Born in 1925, she likely entered the convent sometime around 1951. Tante Marie took her vows in 1954 and went by the name “Sister Melania”. As far as I have been able to learn, she spent most of her years of service in Bergen, Noord Holland. I met her once, when I was a kid, when she came to Canada to visit my grandparents. I remember being excited to meet her, because she was the first of my van der Fluit relatives living in the Netherlands who I ever met. Tante Marie passed away in October 2016 – three days before her youngest sister who lived in Canada, Anna “Anny” van der Fluit.

My father with Tante Marie (Zr. Melania) in 2009

“Tante” means “aunt” in Dutch. German and French as well.
“Oom” means “uncle” in Dutch.

52 Weeks – Week Nine

Women

A new month brings a new theme for the 52 Ancestors Challenge, “Women”. The first week of the month shares that theme. It took a fraction of a second for me to think of who I wanted to write about this week.

I often see questions posed in genealogy forums about the preservation of records. Every time I see one, it reminds me of my Aunt Diana. The world knew her as Helen Burgess, a scientist and a leading expert on paper preservation, but with family she went by her middle name because she shared her first name with my grandmother. While Aunt Diana passed away more over 20 years ago – not yet even 50 years old – I can still find her work is cited in modern papers.

Helen Diana Burgess, B.Sc., M.Sc., M.A.C.
(1951 – 1999)

Me with my Aunt Diana. My grandparents’ house is in the background. I have no idea why we were in the neighbour’s yard.

I idolized my Aunt Diana when I was a kid. At the time, she was an undergraduate student at the University of Lethbridge. She was the only person I knew in university at the time. However, to me, her academic pursuits and later career were only part of her identity. I modeled a lot of my behaviour after her, from sharing her interests to developing a love of some of her favourite foods.

Aunt Diana excelled at nurturing children’s intellect without any us even realizing it. Many of my favourite gifts as a kid came from her, including many books. I still have a lot of them. While Aunt Diana read all kinds of books, her favourite genre was mystery novels. She had walls of bookshelves filled with them, and a few of the books she gave me were in that vein. These included the Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators series, about three boy detectives, which were everything boring old Hardy Boys books were not. I’ve passed those on to my sons. She also gave me a copy of L.R. Wright’s award-winning novel, The Suspect. That book kind of blew my mind, because it was a murder mystery set in Sechelt, Canada not far from where I lived, and not Sometown USA.

Aunt Diana also instilled in me her love of art. She loved to draw and paint. When I turned ten, she gave me a set of oil paints, complete with canvases, brushes, turpentine, and linseed oil. I often received postcards from her from around the world, as her work took her to some of the greatest museums of the world. I still have every one of those postcards. I was lucky enough to visit a few museums with her. It was something to have her as my own personal tour guide and art expert.

Diana graduating from the University of Lethbridge, 1973

Aunt Diana obtained a Bachelor of Science (Honours) in chemistry in 1973. Diana followed this with a Masters of Science in bio-organic chemistry from U.B.C. in 1977 and a Master of Conservation from Queen’s in 1979. Her thesis at Queen’s was about the “degradation of cellulose during conservation bleaching treatments”. To mark its 40th anniversary, the Queen’s Art Conservation Program conducted an interview series regarding leaders in conservation with a link to the school. One of the sets of interviews was about my aunt, conducted with her friends and colleagues.

Some of my Aunt Diana’s books, including her two masters theses, which now sit on my mother’s bookshelf. After getting an “A” in Grade 12 chemistry, I could almost understand the title of her U.B.C. thesis.

In 1978, Aunt Diana started her career with the Canadian Conservation Institute in Ottawa. By the time she took early retirement in 1998 due to her health, Aunt Diana was a Senior Conservation Scientist. She specialized in the conservation of paper artifacts, but she also worked with other materials. Diana was an expert in conservation bleaching, the use of enzymes, deacidification, and cellulose degradation analysis.

It was a big deal to me and my family when Aunt Diana was one of the scientists featured on an episode of The Nature of Things. The episode, “Turning to Dust“, was about the deteriorating paper in old books and their preservation.

On a more practical level, Aunt Diana would often give my mother tips about what household products – particularly bleach-based products – were worth it and which were rubbish. She also taught me decades ago about the perils of adhesive photo albums and the wonders of acid-free and archival paper products.

Of course, because Aunt Diana was a scientist who was at the top of her field, it always seemed normal to me that women could be scientists. Every time I see a query about preservation of genealogical records, it makes me wish I could ask her and reminds me how much I miss her.

Joined Together

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Flowers – Sort Of…

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Worship

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Women

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