Dutch and German Immigrants The Prins Family - Pier 21

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In the mean time, several marriages had taken place in the Prins family;Aunt Nel and Uncle Theo Traa; Aunt Greet and Uncle jan Dykstra; Klaarand Leni van der Wolde; Uncle Cor and Aunt Doortje Rykeboer; andUncle Jack married Aunt Maartje Smit.In February 1949, Oma Prins passed away. She was ill already for quitea while with diabetes and was on a diet prescribed by Dr. Rutte. Shewas buried at the Driehuis-Westerveld cemetery. Opa had a small benchinstalled at the graveside and it the weather was good twice a week hetook the train to Driehuis-Westerveld, sat at the grave of Oma andsmoked his pipe. Opa Prins used his birthday cigars as pipe tobacco; hehad once a cancerous growth removed from the inside of his mouth,probably caused by his pipe.When Klaar married Leni, I thought there were three obstructions ontheir path, but more about that later. They met in high school; whenLeni had some difficulties with chemistry, Klaar came to the rescue, butapparently not to teach her chemistry because at her final exam she triedto burn H+ ions! But she was pretty good in the language departmentand gave me a hand with learning proper Dutch. According to me, thegovernment went to the races; no she said, the government went onrecess.Back to the obstacles on their path. First, she came from Zandvoort.Second, 'she isn’t one of the tallest ones'. Oma Prins must have said,"She is kind of small. She doesn’t show". Third, once when she stayedovernight at Oma’s and was going to her bedroom, she had to go throughthe men’s bedroom where she managed to squeeze Uncle Cor’s big toeinstead of Klaar’s. Wish I could have been there to hear that commotion!In the summer of 1949 Dick van Iren, a friend of mine, and I made abicycle trip through Holland which took us about four weeks to complete.We went across the 'Afsluitdyk', through Friesland, dropped down southto Limburg, then westwards and northwards back home again; and thatall for the cost of one guilder a day a person. We kept a journal of thistrip and I have that account now here in Canada.Other summer holidays I either worked for Opa at the Perseus, or laterGenius, Uncle Jack’s company. Uncle jack had started this businesswith two partners at Opa’s premises but a growing workload made itnecessary to expand and set up a new and bigger building. Thewindows, high up in the work hall, were all second hand and I did all theremoving of the old putty, cleaning and priming.
When the Perseus was in the harbour it always was a hectic time to gether ready for sea again. Sometimes, she went with her first catch toEngland to the auction market in Hull, if I am not mistaken. Then,fishing again bringing her catch this time to Kjmuiden. I made sure tobe there when she came into the harbour; most of times I cam away witha package of English cigarettes. I never had a chance to go along on afishing trip; with six bunks in the front and six bunks in the aft, and acrew of twelve men, there was no room for an extra sailor. Once, when itwas close to departure time and I was still aboard doing the odd job, theyopened a bottle of gin and passed it around. I had to take my turn. Idon’t remember if I liked it or not but it sure hasn’t been my last drink.Another time, when the boat was ready to sail, one man was still missingbut a little later we saw him coming, staggering towards the boat; youmight say he was drunk. With one foot balancing upon the jetty, he wasyelling that he wasn’t ready to go to sea yet. The mate though pulled himaboard and off they went to go fishing.I also like to mention another story of the farm in Aalsmeer. I oftenhelped in the field when I was there and on day after lunch when Klaasand I walked back to the field and funny thing happened. At the end ofthe yard was a dam, with a gate, across a water-filled ditch. The gatewas there to keep the cattle out of the yard. You never opened this gateor went over it but you would swing around the end post. An extra boardwas placed against this post and in the ditch, but apparently this boardwas not secured. When Klaas grabbed it to swing around the gate (heprobably wasn’t quite awake yet after his nap) he ended up in the waterfilledditch, fully submerged, his cap floating upon the duckweed. Ididn’t dare to laugh out loud, not knowing how he would react. Hecrawled out of the ditch, went back in the house to change clothes andoff we went again to the field, this time without a mishap.After I left Utrecht, I studied for a year at a chemistry school in the centreof Amsterdam, close to the 'Muiderpoort' railway station. The thing Ilearned there was a methodical approach to chemical problems; and notmuch else. It was quite a neighbourhood; you only heard undilutedAmsterdam’s dialect spoken there. The café, where we ate our lunch,was frequented by the market merchants. They treated you as if youwere one of their own; lots of salted comments when we played ournumerous games of pool.In the fall of 1950 I went to work at the MEKOG, a sister company of theSteelworks as an apprentice lab technician; they wanted to promote meto a first class technician when I left. You started working shift, directplants, all variations on the several processes of binding nitrogen.However, after a year or so, it became very routine work and when theyasked me to come and work in a pilot plant extracting potash out of
Page 1 and 2: The Prins Familyby J. PrinsDutch an
Page 3 and 4: and Willem the youngest son provide
Page 5 and 6: got together with other bakers in t
Page 7 and 8: school supplies. Even so, some supp
Page 9 and 10: After Uncle Klaas finished his five
Page 11 and 12: My earliest memories go back prior
Page 13 and 14: Memories of my Aunt Nel Traa-PrinsA
Page 15 and 16: He came to stay with the Prins hous
Page 17 and 18: Two sons, Joe and Kippie, were argu
Page 19 and 20: Klaar came along with my dad to ass
Page 21 and 22: In Egmond where they both lived, pe
Page 23 and 24: When I was sick, a few times I had
Page 25 and 26: If there were no black horses avail
Page 27 and 28: the war, the Perseus sailed back ho
Page 29 and 30: En zo hebben ze elkaar gekregen.Tra
Page 31 and 32: 4. 1941-1945Family NeervoortStyn de
Page 34 and 35: hair with a cute face, even then al
Page 36 and 37: Jack and Klaar disappeared into the
Page 38 and 39: were too heavy loaded. An ideal che
Page 40 and 41: The streets were crowded with excit
Page 44 and 45: seawater, I didn’t hesitate too l
Page 46 and 47: flowers and looked at them as if th
Page 48 and 49: about living out of a suitcase! The
Page 50 and 51: them all. I got hired on with appro
Page 52 and 53: the bus I met three other Canadians
Page 54 and 55: ·living in Wisconsin, USA3. Johan
Page 56 and 57: Once back I IJmuiden, I visited wit
Page 58 and 59: In the summer of 1960 I had been a
Page 60 and 61: Robert was born December 20th 1964,
Page 62 and 63: so desired. In February 1968 I boar
Page 64 and 65: piece of land from Carl Schneider f
Page 66 and 67: approximately 120 ton/day plant and
Page 68 and 69: not. There was a pilot strike on an
Page 70 and 71: children, Herman and Marja in Strat
Page 72 and 73: First visit outside Ijmuiden was to
Page 74 and 75: talking away and pointing out all t
Page 76 and 77: dinner was more formal with always
Page 78 and 79: During a later period in her life s
Page 80: I am sure that I speak for all of y

Dutch and German Immigrants The Prins Family - Pier 21

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