AWC Going Dutch Sept 2020

Jessie Rodell (cont.)
Continued from page 33
In the June 2020 issue of Going Dutch,
I related the story of the various Clubhouses
the AWC had, but not the work involved
in getting our 11-room house on Nieuwe
Duinweg ready for occupancy. This task fell
to Jessie and it was daunting―at least in my
eyes―as I am not one adept at renovations or
imagining a finished project. Under Jessie’s
tutelage, during the summer of 1984, the
transformation went quickly and beautifully,
so that in September 1984, we could hold our
very first Welcome Back Meeting in our new
Clubhouse. Since I had been in the US for
most of the summer, I remember distinctly
standing in the hallway and gaping at how
ideal the house had become.
This achievement was definitely Jessie’s.
She formed a House Committee; the chores
were divided up; volunteers found (including
many husbands); and additional money
and furnishings were sought from various
sponsors. We had bought the house and received
a mortgage because the Club had
sufficient funds. The purchase had used up
our financial reserves, so we needed help with furniture, curtains, lighting, kitchen appliances,
etc. The Board begged, borrowed and practically “stole” items for the house. Jessie’s
good friend, Hillary Gulliford, wrote letters to every American business in Holland, as well
as stores our Members frequented and tourist offices, asking for either some funds or their
hand-me-downs. We were proud to say in these letters that we had purchased the house with
our own money, but now needed a little help fixing it up and furnishing it.
The response from these companies was extremely gratifying. Heineken provided the
kitchen, including the crew to install it. Fluor had closed an office in England and offered to
bring everything from that office to The Hague for us, but we had to take all of it, including
around 50 desks and just as many filing cabinets and wastebaskets. When we reserved the
desks we needed, we sold the rest to Members to get the cash to buy supplies. (My kids
studied on those desks for years!) V&D, the former department store, provided carpeting
and display cases for our gift shop. (Yes, we had a gift shop then.) The Danish Tourist
Bureau gave us a beautiful teak desk for the front office. One drawer wouldn’t open, but
we could live with that! A large do-it-yourself store gave us paint and the supplies necessary
to keep the Members and husbands busy every weekend. Obviously, I could go on
and on about all the things we received and the fantastic teamwork it took to make Nieuwe
Duinweg 25 “our home.” To celebrate, we invited all of our donors to our Grand Opening
in November 1984.
Naturally, Jessie’s work was not done yet. The next very important step was to make
sure that our By-laws and Constitution reflected our new property, with very definite rules
34 GOING DUTCH
and regulations put in place to see that
this large Clubhouse was kept running
smoothly for all Members. And, of course,
this was in addition to the general running
of the AWC, which in a normal year is an
enormous task. Jessie did it all with grace
and competence.
Sadly for the AWC, but happily for
Jessie, we lost her just weeks into her second
term of office. The American School
of The Hague (ASH) had discovered that
Jessie was a very accomplished person
and hired her as the secretary to the High
School Principal. Jessie was off on another
career track. In all, she worked at
ASH from August 1985 until her retirement in July 2011, first as the High School Secretary,
soon after as Admissions Director, and lastly as Director of External Relations. During
this period, ASH moved from being a
school, spread out over three locations
in The Hague to its current campus in
Wassenaar in 1990. One past student
at ASH said recently, “Whenever I
think of Mrs. Rodell, I see her walking
through the school pointing and smiling
with either a new ASH family or
a soon-to-be new ASH family.” At the
AWC as well, Jessie was also always
greeting new Members and making
them feel welcome.
ACCESS said, Jessie was
“a true advocate for our
work in every sphere.”
She compiled an almost
complete history of the accomplishments
of ACCESS
for its 30th anniversary in
2016. And in the 1990s,
Jessie joined the Board of
the newly formed Overseas
Americans Remember
(OAR) and helped with all
of their events celebrating
or commemorating important
American holidays or
events.
>> 36
During her ASH period, Jessie also
served on the Membership Committee
of the American Chamber of Commerce
and on the Board of ACCESS from
1994 to 2016. As the Director of
SEPTEMBER 2020 35