Netherlands – Page 16 – A Deck of Ancestors

52 Weeks – Week 41: Handed Down

For this week’s theme for the 52 Ancestors Challenge, “Handed Down”, I know exactly what I wanted to share.

As I wrote about in Week 10, my Tante Riet served as a missionary in Metro Lampung, Indonesia for many of years. When I was around 15 years old, she visited us during a trip she took to Canada. She gave me a hand-painted silk bookmark from Indonesia. I though I knew where I had been carefully storing it, but to my surprise it wasn’t where I thought it would be. Wat jammer, as you might say in Dutch.

However, I did find many wonderful mementos – wedding invitations, cards, letters, photos, and other souvenirs of special events. I even found a lovely thank you note a close friend of mine gave me thirty years ago. She wrote the first half in Dutch. While I could understand it at the time, with three decades of struggling to learn the language, I’m happy to say that I fully understand it now. Good thing I set it aside for so long!

However, none of those items were things that fit this week’s theme. So instead I will share an item I inherited from one of Tante Riet’s older brother, Oom Kees. I also wrote about him in Week 10 and, like his sister, he led a religious life. I never met Oom Kees, who passed away in 1987. Somehow this item made its way from him to my mother, who passed it on to me – a very nice bottle opener. I have no idea if this was of any special significance to him or if there was a story behind it. I also have no idea how or why my great uncle came into possession of this item, which is a promotional item advertising a potato wholesaler. Was his parish a big purchaser of wholesale potatoes?

The note my mother enclosed when she sent it to me -which I still have – does not explain much. It simply says that it belonged to Oom Kees, my dad’s uncle, who had passed away in January that year. However, I received it gratefully, as I had little in the way of physical mementos from my family in the Netherlands.

I haven’t taken this out of the box in decades. I only took it out to photograph it for this post.

The back side of the opener advertises “A.C. Loogman & Zonen – Groothandel in Aardappelen”. In English, “A.C. Loogman & Sons – Potato Wholesalers”. It seems odd that they’d have a bottle opener as a promotional item. You would think a more appropriate item might be a potato peeler.

I googled the company and it turns out they were in business up to November 2020, at which time it went bankrupt. Using the Wayback Machine of the Internet Archive, I found the from the last capture of their website (www.acloogman.nl), which included a short company history, which I’ve translated into English:

When you think of quality potatoes, you cannot ignore AC Loogman. Since 1953, we have ensured that customers from all over the world can enjoy the best potato varieties, collected directly from the grower and packed by us according to their wishes. Thanks to our extensive fleet and ultramodern fully automatic packaging machines, we can deliver large quantities within the country and abroad. But smaller regional customers can still count on our personal and committed service.

While a rather nondescript item, it certainly is one of the oddest heirlooms in my possession!

Addendum

I generally focus on my side of the family in this blog, so it did not occur to me to think of my wife’s veil for our wedding. It was the same veil her great grandmother wore when she got married in 1918. A costume designer my wife knows did some repair work on it and added a bit of volume to it to spruce it up and make it look as good as new.

Addendum to the Addendum (Feb. 17, 2025): I just learned from a September 1918 newspaper that my wife’s great great great grandmother wore the same veil at her wedding in 1866. So my wife was wearing a pre-Confederation item! Talk about something old to go with the something new, borrowed, and blue!

52 Weeks – Week 39: Road Trip

If I do the 52 Ancestors Challenge again next year – which I’d like to do – it might serve me well at the start of the year to look ahead to see the full list of 52 themes. As I mentioned last week, many times this year something I’ve written about in the past fits into any number of subsequent weekly themes. For this week’s theme of “Road Trip”, the genealogy road trip that comes to mind is one I did with my mother to south-west Saskatchewan, to where my grandmother was born. Unfortunately, I’ve written about that here not once, but twice. The other road trip that comes to mind I wrote about two weeks ago.

Part of the problem is that I haven’t been on a lot of genealogy road trips. It’s not easy doing one from where I live. Western Canada, where much of my immediate and extended family lives, is a big place.

For my grandparents’ 40th wedding anniversary, we drove from Terrace in northern British Columbia to Lethbridge in southern Alberta. We thought nothing of it, it was only one province away, only a 17-hour drive. Our relatives from the Netherlands were gobsmacked. They pointed out that we had driven the distance from Amsterdam to the border of the then still-extant Soviet Union. Needless to say, it’s even further to travel to the homelands of my great grandparents, even those who lived in the United States. Utah is a two-day drive from here.

Despite the massive distances, the road trip I have decided to write about was only 600 meters long. I’ve done the trip twice, the first time by bicycle and the second by car. However, I had to fly from the west coast of North America to the west coast of Europe to do it.

My father was born in Waarland, North Holland. Today it is part of Gemeente Schagen (Municipality of Schagen), but when my father was born it was part of Gemeente Harenkarspel. The Dutch seem to like reorganizing their municipalities, so a village or town can end up in various different gemeenten over time.

The first time I visited the Netherlands, we stayed with one of my grandmother’s sisters and her husband, Tante Anny and Ome Nic, who lived in the adjacent gemeente of Langedijk (which, as of January 1 of this year, is now part of Dijk en Waard). On one of my last days with them, Ome Nic and I went for a bicycle ride from Langedijk to Waarland, to meet my grandfather’s (van der Fluit) side of the family.

We started at the home of my grandfather’s oldest brother and his wife, Ome Jan and Tante Marie. They lived in the house where Jan and my grandfather were both born. Almost immediately due north of their house was the house where my father was born.

Several of Jan and Marie’s children (my dad’s cousins) and grandchildren were there for our visit. What really struck me was how different the Dutch was that they spoke. I had no idea what anyone was saying. Even my Ome Nic seemed to find their Dutch hard to follow.

At the house where my grandfather and his brother were born. It was odd meeting so many people who vaguely looked familiar. The children are all my second cousins, two of whom looked almost exactly like two of my siblings.

One of those cousins, Pieter, took me on a short bike ride up the road to the house where my dad was born. Not only that, he knew the current owner, so we were able to go inside. That was incredibly special.

The house where my father was born, the first time I visited Waarland

Five years ago, I had the opportunity to go to the Netherlands at a time my parents were also visiting. I had always wanted to go to the Netherlands with my father. It was an incredible experience. Of course, one of the days of our visit had to include a trip into Waarland.

With my father outside the house here he was born. He’s more than happy to say, yes, he was born in a barn.

We started at the house where he was born. It looked as if the place had not been well maintained by its current owners, although I had to tease my father by asking him whether he remembered the skateboard halfpipe in the back yard.

We then made our way to Ome Jan’s and Tante Marie’s house. Ome Jan had passed away in 2011 and Tante Marie died in 2013, so the house had a new owner. In fact, it was an entirely new house. The old one had been demolished, but the new one that replaced it looked almost identical.

During the recent-most trip to Waarland, I also got to go by the church where my father was baptized. Unfortunately, there wasn’t time to go inside. As well, we stopped by a 450-year-old windmill that has been a museum since 1920.

Poldermolen Waarland. Hangin’ out, more than a metre below sea level, as you do.

52 Weeks – Week 34: Timeline

In the timeline of the 52 Ancestors Challenge, we’re on Week 34, which is the theme of the week, “Timeline”!

Plotting out the timeline of an ancestor or family group can be a great analytical tool. However, I find what is just as important are timelines of history. Knowing the history of a place can provide context and clues as to our ancestors’ actions.

Timelines of history are totally bodacious and most triumphant.

One of my favourite timelines of history is the Canon of the Netherlands. In addition to my love of genealogy, I have always loved history (it was my major in undergrad) and the Canon appeals to my inner history geek. It is a timeline of fifty historical events that together show the historical and cultural development of the Netherlands as a nation. Not only that, there are separate canons for every province and the regions within each province. It is a beautiful piece of work and I enjoy reading it independent of any family history research I might be doing.

The Canon was developed at the behest of the Dutch ministry of education and provides a summary of what is taught in Dutch primary schools. The website is available in English for the timeline itself and for each of the historical and cultural events listed on the timeline, although other information (such as the “About” pages, FAQs, and regional Canons) is only available in Dutch. That’s where the translate functions of browsers like Chrome can come in handy, although I like to try to read them in the original Dutch as part of my decades-long struggle to learn the language.

The Canon for Noord Holland (North Holland), the province where my father was born.

Knowing when the Netherlands was under French dominion helps in understanding the timeline of some of my ancestors. Napoleon originally structured the Netherlands as a separate “Kingdom of Holland”, with his brother Louis as the King. Over time, Louis ran the kingdom more with Dutch interests in mind, so in 1810 Napoleon abolished the kingdom and incorporated the Netherlands as part of France itself. Records from the time of French rule might be in Dutch, French, or a combination of both. Records I’ve found from after the Netherlands was incorporated into the Empire are more likely to be in French.

My Great x 4 grandparents, Jan de Waard and Cornelia Pieters Kooij, married on October 10, 1813. The record of their marriage is written in Dutch, but bears the seal of Imperial France. Less than a month after their marriage, a popular uprising resulted in the ouster of the French. On November 30, 1813, the son of the former stadholder of the country returned from exile and was named William I, Sovereign Prince of the United Netherlands. Jan and Gurr marriage was one of the last in Texel to be registered under the French regime.

Knowing the timelines of history have also been helpful in understanding my maternal grandfather’s family history. He was Mormon (Latter Day Saints) and several of his direct ancestors were amongst the earliest converts to the new religion, joining in the 1830s in New York State. Knowing the history of Mormon migration helps me understand my maternal ancestors’ movements and why they did certain things at certain times.

The group’s founder, Joseph Smith, sought to create a “New Jerusalem”. He and his followers moved to Ohio and soon began building a settlement in Missouri. In 1833, church members were run out of Missouri and a failed banking venture crippled the Ohio settlement. The Mormons attempted a settlement elsewhere in Missouri, but were driven out upon an executive order of the governor, calling for them to be exterminated or expelled from the state. In 1939, the church regrouped in a new community, Nauvoo, Illinois, and began to build their Zion there. Two years after Joseph Smith’s death in 1844, tensions with non-Mormons increased, such that the Mormons were driven out once again. They upped stakes and began the migration to Utah. During the westward migration, over the winter of 1846-1847, about 2,500 church members encamped at Winter Quarters, which was just north of where Omaha, Nebraska came to be. The first settlers arrived in what is now Salt Lake City in July 1847, in what was still Mexican territory.

Knowing this timeline, I can test the accuracy or reliability of information I have found about my Mormon ancestors. For example, some of the information I’ve found about my great x4 grandfather, Conrad Liggett, suggests that he died in Nauvoo before 1839. However, as Mormon settlement in Nauvoo did not begin until 1839, I doubt the veracity of that information.

If you were buried in Ohio in 1838, odds are you did not die in a town that was settled by the Mormons in 1839.

As well, if I have a Mormon ancestor who passed away in late 1846 or early 1947, chances are good that it occurred during the migration to Utah. For example, Conrad’s widow, Louisa Thomas, my 4x great grandmother, died on November 16, 1846. Sure enough, an entry in the Winter Quarters sexton’s records shows that Louisa died 19 miles up the river from Winters Quarters.

The entry for Louisa Thomas in the Winter Quarters sexton’s records, 1846-1848: “Loisa Cook. 36 years, 0 months, 0 days. Wife of Aaron W. Cook [*her third husband*]. Died 19 miles up the River from Winter quarters Bur[i]ed at the same place. [*Died*] Nov 16 1846. [*Disease*] chills fever. [*Born*] State of Mareland May 1811.”

Timelines of history can take you on some most excellent adventures!

52 Weeks – Week 33: Service

I’ve written about military service and religious service, so the twist I’ve taken for this week’s 52 Ancestors Challenge, “Service”, is to look at domestic service. Most of my ancestry consists of labourers and agricultural workers, so none were so posh as to have had servants. However, I do have ancestors who were the servants.

Sometime in my early teen years, I heard it told that during the war my paternal grandmother worked as a domestic servant. I’m unable to verify the story, as there is no longer anyone who would have first-hand knowledge of that fact. What civil records that might provide more information are not yet publicly available due to privacy laws and the lack of passage of sufficient time.

My grandmother’s mother, Elizabeth Bakker, was also a domestic servant (“dienstbode” in Dutch) before she married. It appears she spent time working in Amsterdam as a domestic servant before returning to her hometown of Den Helder, where she performed similar work until 1920 or 1921. However, by the time she married in April 1921, she as “zonder beroep” (“without job”). Elizabeth’s older sister Johanna and her younger sister Cornelia also worked as a domestic servants.

The *Bevolkingsregister* (“Population Register”) family card for Cornelis Jan Bakker and family. His daughter Elizabeth (my great grandmother) is shown as a *dienstbode* (“domestic servant”).

My third great grandmother, Maartje Mettes, was a domestic servant when she married her first husband, Klaas Buur. Klaas was also a domestic servant at the time of the marriage. My suspicion is that they may have worked in the same household, which I will need to research. However, by the time Maartje married her second husband, my third great grandfather Cornelis Komen, she was “van beroep zonder” (“without a job”).

My great x4 grandmother, Vrouwtje Hilbert Hilberts, also spent time as a domestic servant and was doing that work when she got married.

Marriage registration for my great x4 grandparents, Nicolaas Cornelisz (“Klaas”) Komen and Vrouwtje Hilbert Hilberts. Vrouwtje was noted as *van beroep dienstbode* (“working as a domestic servant”) at the time of marriage in 1811.

Although in the majority, women were not the only domestic servants in my tree. While I have not done much research on my great x4 grandfather, Thomas Hadlond, he was a domestic servant in England before leaving for America and settling in Nebraska. I also have a 3x great uncle, Petrus (“Pieter”) van der Fluit who worked as a dienstknecht (“manservant”). Finally, in another form of domestic service, William Stockwell, my 8x great grandfather, likely came over to America as an indentured servant, gaining his liberty before he married.

Addendum

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