Chapter  3

OPA’S FAMILY

As far as we know there are no pictures of Opa’s parents, nor are there any stories that Opa ever told about his father.  This is not too surprising since Opa was just 12 years old when his father died and when Opa married, his father had been dead for 27 years already.  All we know is that he had asthma and died at the age of 47.  His mother died about 16 years later at 60 or 61 years of age.  On several occasions Opa told his children that Dina Wolsink, one of his cousins who lived close by, reminded him very much of his mother since she looked so much like her.

Opa’s Brothers and Sisters

Jan Willem was the oldest.  His date of birth is given as October 11, 1880.  This may be a mistake as this date indicates that he was born very soon after their wedding, which took place on September 16, 1880.  It is more likely that he was born on October 11, 1881.   He lived for most of his life with Opa.  The older children, especially Jantje and Hendrik, remember him well.  When Hendrik was still a little boy, Oom Jan Willem taught him how to smoke, although he did not smoke himself.  We were told that Oom Jan Willem had Lupus.

Opa’s brother Hendrik married a well-to- do farmer’s daughter and started farming in Westervoort, a village very close by.  His wife died young leaving him with a little baby.  Soon he married again and very soon after this the baby died.  The family was convinced that the baby’s death was due to foul play, likely from deliberate neglect or possibly even abuse.  Contact with this family ended at this time until September of 1944.  When the Canadian Army landed near Arnhem this family found themselves living in the war zone so they fled to Lathum.   Opa and Oma took them in with two of their children, Jantje and Gerrit, while their third child, Mies, stayed with Oom Johan van Dijk (married to Opa’s sister Marie).  When this family fled they were not able to take their cattle along.  They decided to go back to try get the cattle the next day.  Opa and Oom Johan van Dijk went along.  They had to go right through the firing lines, with so much shooting going on all around them that it took the entire day.  Thankfully they all made it safely, but Opa and Oom Johan said that if they had known how dangerous it was they would never have gone.  They were playing with their lives. 

This family was very selfish and hard to get along with.  They refused to help the hungry city people who came around for food.  Mies, who stayed with Oom Johan, went on her bike to other relatives and acquaintances telling them that they didn’t get enough to eat at the two farms.  She was able to get some extra food this way which she then sold on the black market.  When the Brouwers and van Dijks discovered this deception, the strained relationship became even worse.  Soon this family was able to rent a temporary place and from then on all contact with this family completely stopped.

Jan lived in Angelo, about a twenty minute bike ride from Lathum.  He was a quiet man who was quite active in the underground and in hiding Jews.  Jan had one daughter Hendrika Johanna, who married Hendrik Broekman. The Brouwers had a good relationship with the Broekmans.  Their son, Jan, was the same age as Ineke and they were good friends.

Marie and Johan van Dijk: Oom Johan was quite tall, straight and friendly.  Tante Marie looked short, partly due to her round back and having her head almost between her shoulders.  They had a big beautiful flower garden neatly kept especially with roses and dahlias.  The house was something else.  It was old, damp and drafty and really needed repairs and improvements.  Johanna and Harm and their children lived in with them and were anxious to make some improvements but Oom Johan, who was still the owner, saw no need for this. 

Derk and Lies: Oom Derk looked somewhat like Opa.  Tante Lies was a big women, who kept very busy cooking feed for the pigs.  She walked with big steps wearing wooden shoes even in the house.  They gave the impression that they didn’t care about personal appearance or comfort and just lived for their farm.

Frits and Anna: Tante Anna looked very different from her sister.  She was always very well dressed and friendly.  (Dirk and Frits were Opa’s brothers – the women they married, Lies and Anna, were sisters).  Oom Frits didn’t look at all like the other Brouwers.  He was smaller, had a very big mustache, was friendly, and talked with lots of emotion.  He looked more like a Russian than a Dutchman.  When he talked his whole face moved and his eyes flashed constantly.  He was a nervous-type of man who was constantly busy with something.  He had lost one eye somehow and had a glass eye instead.  At bedtime he took his glass eye out and put it in a cup of water.  He was often in a hurry and came one morning to the Brouwer’s farm without remembering to put his glass eye back in.  It sure scared the children to see that hole!

Chapter 4

THE OVEREEM FAMILY LINE

Oma’s family line, the Overeem’s (Oma’s father) and Reijersen van Buuren’s (Oma’s mother) was more difficult to trace than Opa’s family line.  Twice there is a change in the surname, with no explanation provided for the change.

Through the years, based on stories rather than facts, the family line of Oma’s mother was believed to have carried royal blood.  Unfortunately, this could not be verified when the family line was researched.  The story, which was probably embellished somewhat by each generation, told that the Reijersen van Buuren family came originally from France, and were connected to the French royal house of Louis XIV.  They fled to Holland during the French revolution.  Through intermarriage they remained part of the Royal family, but eventually through marriage with the Dutch, the French royal line disappeared, and they also became Protestants.  The story seemed quite plausible because there were very French names in the family such as Ludovicus Hendricus.  However, no French connection could be found. 

There was, however, a Belgian family name that appeared, the Wajon’s.  This family came from Luik and the first one was baptized in the Catholic church, but this was in the early 1600s.  It was through this family that the French sounding names came in the family.

Oma’s full name was Wilhelmina Adriana Overeem.  Her’s was an old name that was in use already in the 1600s.  Oma’s family line was traced back through nine generations.  The first families had the name “van Overeem” but sometime later the “van” was dropped.  Oma’s father was Ludovicus Hendricus Overeem.  He was born in 1865 and died in 1939.  Her mother was Geertruida Reijersen van Buuren.  She was born in 1869 and died in 1948.   The Reijersen van Buuren family line was quite difficult to trace.  The first member traced was named Reijer Evertsen.  He married Steventeen Goossens.  Their son, Evert, born in 1790 took the surname “Reijersen van Buuren” in 1812, at the time that all Dutch people were ordered through law to take a surname.

Evert Reijersen van Buuren married Ceeltje Rengersen van Lindenberg.  The name “Lindenberg” was taken by Ceeltje’s father on October 9, 1812.  Evert and Ceeltje had two sons, Aalbert and Jan, but instead of giving them the name Reijersen van Buuren, they were given the name Lindenberg.  One story told to explain this change is that Evert was a shepherd and was often away from home for very long periods of time.  Apparently he was not home when his sons were born and a cousin went to City Hall to register the births, and so the sons were given the last name of the cousin, rather than their father.

Aalbert Lindenberg was Oma Brouwer’s grandfather.  He married Wilhelmina Adriana Ravenhorst and they had eleven children, although four of them died as young children or infants. Oma’s mother was Geertruida Lindenberg, born 1869.  She was the second Geertruida in the family.  Her sister, born a year earlier, was also called Geertruida.  Her oldest brother was Anthonie, born in 1863.  He died in 1870.  Then in 1873 they named another baby girl Antonia.  When she died the next year they named their next baby, a boy, Anthonie again.  He died 3 years later.  The last baby, born in 1881 was called Antonia again. 

Then an inheritance dispute came up within the Lindenberg family.  This family battle was taken all the way up the court system to the highest court.  The court, “Arrond. Rechtbank te Utrecht” decided on October 12, 1881, that Aalbert Lindenberg and his children could no longer use the name Lindenberg, but had to change back to using the name Reijersen van Buuren.  Oma’s mother was 12 years old when she became Geertruida Reijersen van Buuren.  Through this court decision this family was eliminated from receiving anything from the inheritance.  Oma still remembered that her mother told her how unfairly they were treated through this dispute.  They firmly believed that the inheritance was rightfully theirs.

Geertruida Reijersen van Buuren married her cousin Ludovicus Hendricus Overeem.  It was thought that Opa Overeem’s mother’s name was also Reijersen van Buuren, but it was Ravenhorst.  Geertruida and Ludovicus were cousins on the Ravenhorst side of the family.

In Holland cousins were allowed to marry, although it seldom happened.  The frequency of cousins marrying cousins as found in the Reijersen van Buuren and Overeem families was a real exception.

Wilhelmina Adriana Ravenhorst had a daughter who was named Geertruida.  Geertruida married Ludovicus Overeem and they had a daughter named Wilhelmina Adriana.  This Wilhelmina Adriana married Albert Brouwer and they had a daughter named Geertruida.  Geertruida married Cor DeJong and they had a daughter whom they named Wilhelmina Adriana.  But there the chain ends.

Chapter 5

OMA’S FAMILY

We know much more about Oma’s family than Opa’s family, as they were younger and the older children knew them well and visited there.  Oma’s parents, Ludovicus Hendricus Overeem and Geertruida Reijersen van Buuren, lived about a 1½ hour bike ride from the Brouwers.  Opa and Oma Overeem were cousins.  Opa Overeem was born in Emmers and Oma Overeem in Ysselstein.  Opa Overeem was a very big man, while Oma was tiny and skinny and never reached 100 pounds.  (In Dutch weight, 90 pounds equals 100 Canadian pounds).   Oma Overeem was a believer, while Opa Overeem, who was a member of the Reformed Church like everyone else, was very indifferent about faith. 

Oma’s Parents

 

First Opa Overeem had a farm in Leersum, later he rented one in Hemmen.  Hemmen was about the smallest village in Holland.  The whole village belonged to one person, an aristocrat.  He owned all the land, farms, houses, the church and even appointed the minister.  It was a very liberal church where Jesus was held up as a good example, rather than the Christ.  This didn’t bother Opa Overeem in the beginning.  But at one time he was in another church and heard a much different sermon that led him to conversion.  After that he didn’t like going to the village church anymore.  This all happened around the time that Oma was born.  Oma was the fourth child in the family, born on October 18, 1899.  Since Opa Overeem didn’t want her baptized in the village church anymore, they tried to find another minister for the baptism, but they couldn’t find a minister who was willing to baptize a member of another congregation.  Then they went to the Gereformeerde Kerk (Christian Reformed Church) in Zetten and Oma was baptized there.  Then the trouble started.  The news reached the Lord of the village and Opa Overeem was called into the office and told that he had to return to their church or otherwise leave the farm at the end of the year.  Opa Overeem went all over to find another farm for rent, but nothing was available.  When he went back to the office at the end of the year and told them that he was unable to rent another farm, they let him stay for one more year, but then it was final. 

At the end of that year there was still no farm available.  So he rented a piece of land with a very big and very old run down house in Driel.  This is not very far from Arnhem on the south side of the Rhine river.  He rented that for 12 years and this is were Oma grew up and went to school.  They went to a public school as there was no Christian school in the whole area.  The house was in very poor condition but the owner refused to spend any money on it.  Opa Overeem usually had a few cows, some pigs and grew lots of potatoes.  Close to the end of the 12 years when Oma came home from school one afternoon, someone from the Municipal Office put a sign on the house which said “onbewoond verklaarde woning” (translated as ‘declared unfit for occupation’).  Now it was up to the owner to tear it down or bring it up to municipal standards.  They were happy when the owner started repairing the old house, but when it was finished, he sold it.  So the family had to move again. 

Opa Overeem then bought a piece of land, about 4 acres, deep in the country at the end of a lonely country road which was about 1½ km. long, usually used only in summer to bring in the hay and to bring the cows to the field.  It was really what could be termed “in the sticks” or in the middle of nowhere.  Since they had to build a house first, they moved in with acquaintances for a few weeks.  The new house had a bedroom and one large room that functioned as living room, dining room and kitchen downstairs, plus two bedrooms and an unfinished area upstairs.  It was likely quite a simple structure, but compared to what they were used to, they thought it was a castle.  Opa Overeem soon bought an additional 10 acres of land close by, just on the other side of the railroad.  In the beginning it was a little crowded, but soon the oldest children left home.  Oma’s oldest sister, tante Geertje, went as a maid to a farm of an uncle close to Bodegraven.  Later she married Piet van Leeuwen, a watchmaker, and stayed in Bodegraven.

Oma’s parents farmed for over 25 years on that lonely road.  The only thing they saw on many days was the train that passed by close to their house.  They lived along the Arnhem-Nijmegen line.  Then in 1939 Opa Overeeem had a stroke.  He lost his speech and was paralysed on one side.  Later his speech returned somewhat but he remained lame.  It was not easy to care for him as he was a tall and stiff man.  After a few weeks he died from this stroke.  His mother had died the same way.  Oma remembered that her father told them how hard it was for the family to turn this heavy woman several times each day.

Oma’s siblings

 

Oma was named after her grandmother, Wilhelmina Adriana Ravenhorst, who died five months before Oma was born.   Oma had three brothers and two sisters. 

Her oldest brother was Willem, born in 1893.  He died in 1973 at the age of 80.  He married his cousin Wilhelmina Adriana Reijersen van Buuren who was born in 1899.  This was the same year that Oma was born and the two cousins were both named after the same grandmother.  Willem and Wilhelmina moved to South Limburg, so close to the German border that their neighbours lived in Germany.  They owned a road construction business, making roads with cobble stones.  They had 1 daughter, Aartje, who came to Canada once with her husband, their son and his girlfriend.  They also had 4 sons, Willem, Hendrik, Gerard and Glen.  Henk was killed in a car accident.

Oma’s second brother was Albertus Jacobus.  They called him Bep, and the Brouwers called him Oom Bep.  He became engaged with another cousin, Wilhelmina Adriana Benschop, who went by the nickname “Mienepoes.”  Mienepoes had stepped on a rusty nail as a child.  The wound was neglected for too long and she never walked normally again.  When they broke their engagement, Bep moved to Iowa for several years.  He then returned to Holland and became engaged to Mienepoes again.  But they broke up again, and he remained single.  Bep lived with his parents until they died and then stayed in the house together with his sister, tante Wies.  Oom Teunis, another brother, lived quite close by and they often helped each other with the heavier farm work.  In 1947, while helping at Oom Teunis’ place to bring in the hay he fell from the hay wagon, broke his neck and died instantly.  Derk (Dick), who was working there at the time, saw the accident and went back home to tell his family about this terrible accident.  Oom Bep was 52 years old when he died.  Oma kept in contact with Mienepoes, since she was one of her cousins.

The third member of the family was Geertje, Oma’s older sister.  She was born in 1897.  For a while she worked on a farm of an uncle who lived in Bodegraven.  There she met Pieter van Leeuwen whom she married.  (Pieter was a brother of Ali Mijderwijk, who lived for years in Beamsville and whom many will remember).  They didn’t have any children of their own but they raised Geertje van den Broek, the second daughter of Oma’s youngest sister.  Pieter van Leeuwen died around 1960.  Some years later Geertje remarried with Piet Koren, a cousin and friend.  Geertje died in 1969.  Their adopted daughter Geertje married Henk Dykland and lived in Schoonhoven.  When tante Geertje died, she took her stepfather Piet Koren to live with them and cared for him.  Geertje and Henk had two boys.  Several years later she became pregnant again, but at birth both mother and baby died.

Oma, Wilhelmina Adriana, was the fourth child in the family. 

Three years after she was born, another boy was born on February 17, 1902.  He was named Antonius Marie (Oom Teunis).  He married Geertruida Louise van den Broek who was a cousin from the Overeem family, and called tante Trui.  They had a farm in Driel, not far from where Oma’s parents lived.  They had five children, Geertje, Annie, Alie, Henny and Piet.  Geertje married with Jan Treur and they came to Canada once for a visit.  One of her daughters moved to Israel to work as a nurse and married there.  Several family members visited her when they went to Israel for a trip several years ago.  The Brouwers had the most contact with the two youngest, Henny and Piet.  Tante Trui was born in 1898 and died on April 27, 1968.  Oom Teunis remarried very shortly after her death to tante Dirkje.  Oom Teunis died on September 6, 1970 in Deventer.  So the second marriage was very short.  Oma did write to his second wife occasionally.

Oma’s youngest sister was Louisa Catharina (tante Wies) born in 1904.  She also married a cousin, Albertus Adrianus van den Broek, a brother of tante Trui.  This was the second Oom Bep in the family.

The Van den Broek family

This family is closely tied to the Brouwers and Overeems and needs to be introduced here.  The family line could be traced till the mid 1700s, but the first generations are not important to this book.  Our interest starts with Pieter van den Broek, born in 1856.  He married Aaltje Overeem, a sister of Opa Overeem who was two years older than Opa Overeem.  So they were an uncle and aunt of Oma’s.  They were farmers and had eight children.  They moved to Germany, likely in 1896, due to the economic crisis from 1875 till about 1900. 

Many farmers went bankrupt in that time.  The reasons were mainly due to all the new machines that were invented and the use of fertilizers which had recently started.  In Holland these changes came slowly.  The Dutch were good farmers, but very traditional and as there was plenty of cheap labour available they didn’t see any need to spend money on machines.  In other countries these innovations were received much differently, especially in North America.  Plenty of land was available there so when machines were invented for plowing, seeding, mowing and threshing, the production rose very fast.  The introduction of fertilizer reduced the need for cows and hogs, etc., that had been raised partly for crop manure.  The Americans and Canadians started large grain farms.  At the same time sailing vessels were replaced by the larger steam boats that could cross the ocean much faster.  Soon lots of cheap grain was imported and flooded the European markets.  Grain and meat prices dropped to such a low level that many farmers couldn’t make ends meet anymore.    

At that time there were, of course, no social benefits or bankruptcy laws.  Society was also much more class oriented than today, and a bankrupt farmer was truly a “nobody.”  Working farmers turned their backs on them and refused to hire them as labourers and the working classes in the factories, etc., also wanted nothing to do with them.

Thus, out of necessity, the family moved to Germany.  Three more children were born there.  It is these three that later became so important to the Brouwer family.  They were Geertruida Louise, born in 1898.  She later married Oma’s youngest brother, Oom Teunis, and became Tante Trui.  The second was Albertus Adrianus, (Oom Bep) who later married Oma’s youngest sister, Tante Wies.  The youngest of the three was Johan, born in 1906.  According to Oom Johan they moved back to Holland in 1909 or 1910.  However, in the material researched for this book, it stated that Pieter van den Broek died in 1912 in Germany, in the town of Holwerd, close to Cologne.  The family moved back to Holland shortly before World War I.  Whether they moved because of Oom Pieter’s death or the coming war is not known.  Tante Aaltje moved to the Ysselsteyn area with the girls.  She died there in 1934.  The oldest boy went to America but the other boys moved to Limburg, the southern part of Holland.  This was not far from where they lived in Germany.  The distance between Cologne and Limburg is much closer than the distance between Limburg and Lathum.  One of these boys had married a girl from Germany.  Oma’s oldest brother, Oom Willem went along with them to Limburg and thus closer contact between these families came about. 

In Holland there was still much unemployment while in Limburg labourers were needed.  Coal was discovered in the ground and several coal mines opened.  Much coal was needed for the upcoming industries, the trains and steamships.  People were also very eager to replace the wood and peat they used for cooking and heating.  The men all found work in Limburg as cobblers.  The oldest boy, who had gone to America, married with a Dutch girl there.  After 22 years, during the depression, he returned to Holland and also settled in Limburg.

In 1931 Geertruida Louise van den Broek (tante Trui) married Oom Teunis (Antonius Marie)  and started farming in Lange Ruige Weide, a small village close to Bodegraven.  She was his cousin and was 4 ½ years older than her husband.  Later they moved to Driel. 

Then Albertus Adrianus (Oom Bep van den Broek) married tante Wies (Louisa Catharina) and they also settled in Limburg.  Soon they had three boys, Pieter, Ludo (Hendricus Ludovicus) and Albertus.  The baby, Albertus, had severe health problems.  According to the doctor it was caused by air pollution.  There were several mines close by as well as other industries.  All that coal smoke and dust caused a lot of respiratory problems.  Oom Bep’s health was not very good either, so the doctor advised them to move away from Limburg.  They moved back to Driel, into the same house where Opa and Oma Overeem lived.  This was in 1938 or 1939, shortly before Opa Overeem died.  It was too late for the baby unfortunately, who died shortly after the move.  Oom Bep recovered his health before too long.  Now there were two Oom Bep’s in Driel.  To distinguish between them, Oma’s brother was called “dunne Oom Bep” (skinny) and Oma’s brother-in-law was called “dikke Oom Bep” (fat).  Oom Bep didn’t care much for farming and when he felt better later, he started a street repair business in the area. 

His youngest brother, Johan, came from Limburg and joined them in the business.  Johan never married.  Oom Johan is not really an uncle to the Brouwers, only a second cousin.  But since he always lived with their relatives and they all called him Oom Johan, the Brouwers called him Oom Johan as well.   Oom Johan died on November 10, 1999 at the age of 93.

After Opa Overeem died of his stroke in 1939.  Oma Overeem became part of her youngest daughter, tante Wies and Oom Bep’s household.  (There had been two families living in one house; now Tante Wies and Oom Bep became the main owners).  Tante Wies, her children, and her brother Bep, looked after all the farm work.  Although her husband, Oom Bep owned a road repair business, Tante Wies feared that he would not be able to continue this for long, and that they would need to fall back on the farm for the family income.

The Brouwers often went there to visit their Oma and sometimes to help out when Tante Wies was sick.  Jantje and Geertje also had to help out after Tante Wies had another baby.  She had a very hard time weaning her babies from breastfeeding and could only accomplish this by going away for a week to her sister’s home in Bodegraven and leaving the baby at home.  So one of the girls had to go there.  Tante Wies was a very friendly person who loved to talk and loved company.  It didn’t matter to her when they dropped in, whether it was during the spring cleaning or Monday’s wash.  She would drop whatever she was doing and sit down to talk.  That may not seem strange today, but in those days in Holland everything was done at a very specified time.  To break a custom like this was almost unbelievable.

Oom Bep was very different.  He was quiet and very calm.  Being a cobbler may seem like a very simple job, but it wasn’t as easy as it might appear.  In Holland many streets were paved with bricks.  The van den Broeks were very good cobblers who often worked very nice designs into their street work.  One peculiarity of Oom Bep was his ability to sing in his sleep, usually the Psalms, in Dutch or German.  He sang quite loudly and very slowly.  When some of the Brouwers were sleeping over they would be all excited about hearing Oom Bep singing in the middle of the night.

Tante Wies didn’t care too much that her house was not always spotless and she was not dressed in the latest styles, but when necessary she could accomplish what she wanted.  When Oom Bep had problems getting a permit or a new contract, Tante Wies went to the Hague (the capital) to get it.  She didn’t let them send her from office to office, or even back home, with just vague promises.  She resolutely held her ground until she had what she wanted.  

After about a year of living in Driel, with Oma Overeem, the war broke out in May 1940.  The van den Broeks were very active in hiding Jews from the Germans.  It was a good place since there were no neighbours and when the Germans came they could be seen from a long distance so the Jews could be safely hidden before the Germans arrived.  The fact that they could stay calm no matter what, and that Oom Bep spoke fluent German since he had lived in Germany for years and gone to school there, certainly helped.  

They thought they lived in a really safe place, so alone out in the country.  As the war went on they told the Brouwers that when things really got bad, they had better move in with them.  However, in September of 1944 the Canadian paratroopers dropped over Arnhem.  When this army ran into trouble, the Allied forces under General Montgomery tried to rush to Arnhem from Belgium and from the south of Holland and defeat the Germans.  The Germans brought out all the forces they could muster to avoid this and one of the fiercest battles of the war was waged there.  This battle was crucial to the outcome of the war.  Many books have been written about it such as A Bridge Too Far.  The van den Broek family found themselves living right in the middle of it.  There was heavy bombing and much damage was done to the buildings. 

They were with quite a group.  Beside Oma Overeem and Oom Bep (her son & Oma’s brother who had returned from America), tante Wies, Oom Bep and their four children, there were also two Jews in hiding and at least five members of the underground –one a cousin from Limburg–who were also in hiding.  By this time Tante Wies and Oom Bep had three more children, Alie, Geertje and Hans.  Hans was a baby in 1944.  Geertje had been sent to live in Bodegraven with tante Geertje.  After the house was destroyed by bombs they hid in the barn without food.  Lack of food was especially hard on the baby.  But when a chicken laid an egg, Tante Wies, who had a little spoon in her pocket, carefully fed the fresh egg to baby Hans.  It soon became very critical for them.  After a few days of hiding in the barn they decided to cast lots to decide whether they should stay or flee.  They believed the Lord would show them what to do.  The lot fell on fleeing so they all took off through the cross fire.  They had a big plank with them to put over all the ditches to cross from one field to another.  Piet van den Broek, the cousin, was carrying Oma Overeem who was old and frail.  It was a terrible trip with bullets zinging by, bombs exploding, etc., and could have meant certain death.  The Lord was certainly watching over them because they all crossed over to the allied forces’ side in safety.  They had to remain in Brabant in the neighbourhood of Eindhoven till the end of the war.  For more than half a year there was no contact possible and the Brouwers were worried for a long time about what had happened to them.  Finally in the spring of 1945 they received a telegram via the Red Cross saying they were all living, including Oma Overeem.  This was a huge relief to everyone.  After the war, when the landmines had been removed and permission was given to travel, they returned home.  There was not much left of their farm, only one chicken coop and one tree, so they stayed with Oom Teunis for at least ½ year. 

Many villages in that area were heavily damaged during the fighting.  The village of Hemmen where Oma was born was completely destroyed.  Accidents also happened later since not all the landmines were removed.  The van den Broeks fixed up the chicken coop so that it was tolerable to live in and moved in there until better accommodations became available.  This wasn’t easy since materials were not available, merely what could be salvaged from destroyed buildings. 

After the war the family grew again.  First Bep was born.  A few years later, in 1949, the  twins Gretha and Joke (pronounced yo-ke) were born and finally Wim.  They started farming again and Oom Bep was busy with his road repair work.  Oma Overeem died there in 1948.  The family was still living on this farm when the Brouwers moved to Canada.  This farm was so isolated that when the Brouwers emigrated they still didn’t have electric lights.

Tante Wies and Oom Bep had 10 children, although one died in infancy.  The oldest one was Pieter, who married Pouli van Duivenboode.  The second, Ludy, married Wiep Knoop.  They visited Canada a few years ago.  The third child was Alie.  Alie stayed single for many years and stayed home to look after her younger siblings, her aging father and uncle Johan after her mother died.  About 15 years ago Alie married Jan van der Schoor, a widower.  Jan had three children from a previous marriage.  Alie never had children of her own.  Alie is still the administrator of the road construction business.  Piet had left the business shortly after his marriage and become a brick layer and is a home builder now with his sons.  Ludy started his own road construction business.

The fourth child was Geertje.  Due to the war and evacuation she was sent to live at her aunt and uncle’s home, Tante Geertje and Oom Piet in Bodegraven.  Because they had become like her real parents, she remained with them after the war, instead of going back home.

The fifth child was Hans.  He married Dini Haverkamp.  He stayed in the family business, but added road paving to the firm’s work.  When the business split up some years ago, Hans kept that part of the business as his own.

The sixth child was Bep, later called Bert.  He emigrated to Canada in 1965, moving to Thunder Bay.  He came to visit Opa and Oma on the occasion of their 40th wedding anniversary.  Later he came to this area and worked for Uncle Henk as a framer.  When the construction industry slowed down he moved to B.C.  His relatives back in Holland wanted him to move back home and he eventually did.  He married Leny.  Soon after this the family built a large new home in Driel.  This house had an apartment for Bep and Leny, the main house was used by Alie, Oom Bep and Oom Johan, and the business offices were built on to the back.  Gretha married Will van Duivenboode, a brother of Pieter’s wife, and Joke married Henk Haverkamp, a brother of Han’s wife.

After the war the city of Arnhem began expanding, especially south of the Rhine river.  Eventually the farm was taken over by the city.  So the farm where Opa Overeem started completely out in the country is now part of the outskirts of Arnhem. The youngest son, Wim, who married Dinie, was still farming there when the city of Arnhem took over the farm.  He emigrated to France where they bought another farm.  Tante Wies had a heart attack in 1964 on the farm in Driel and died a few hours later.