Expats
Just read a post about the life as an expat, and some of it rang a bell for me. I came to the US for my husband’s education, so we were expats then. By the time the kids came along, we were immigrants, so would that make me a lifer …
Genealogy and History
For me as an immigrant to the US, the fact of researching my grandchildren’s ancestors has given me an insight in US history, that I would not have had otherwise. My database contains Mayflower passengers, immigrants to New Amsterdam, Revolutionary War soldiers, Civil War Soldiers, people fleeing from prosecution, and economic …
Another Birthday Letter
Here is the second letter, this one on the occasion of Afina‘s (dutch link) birthday. Nieuwe Pekela, Dec 1918 Dear Son and Daughter, Today we are reminded of your birthday, Afina, hoping you will pass that day in health, we stand before a new year, hoping that we will be …
De Haan Family Letter
In 1918 my grandparents Ulpen (dutch link) and Afina de Haan had moved from Groningen to Limburg, a very long distance in those days. I’m sure they missed their family, but Ulpen’s job required it. Two letters from Afina’s parents to the young couple have survived. Here is the first one. …
Isaac Bedient
My son-in-law’s grandmother descends from Thomas Bedient, who came to this country sometime before 1695. He settled in Fairfield County, CT. The family stays in Fairfield for about a century, when great-grandson Mordecai moves to Butternuts, Otsego County, NY before the 1810 census. His brother Isaac follows sometime after the …
Some more of my mother’s memories
In Friesland many kids and also the adults wore clogs, especially in the winter. I liked walking in clogs, no wet feet, …
From my mother’s memories
My sister had given our mother a notebook, with the suggestion she writes down some of her memories. While she was originally …
A Memory
Trees in the backyard In the back of the yard of one of our houses in Zwolle were three horse chestnuts. They …
Broekman in Indonesia
The Broekman family in Indonesia. Seated in Front of the Indian Regent’s house, where they were temporarily living in 1916. Left to …
Dieks ten Bruggencate
I never knew my paternal grandmother Hendrika Johanna, Dieks for short (dutch link), she died several years before I was born. Although …