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Yvette's Dutch Genealogy Homepage  
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Introduction

This site helps people of Dutch descent research their Dutch ancestors.

Many articles explain the research opportunities in the Netherlands, both offline and online. Other articles give background information about Dutch history in general and emigration in particular. Also, some primary sources you can use for your research are provided. Special attention is given to online research, with many links to useful websites.

View of New York, then known as New Amsterdam
View of New Amsterdam, 1664

 
The family of Pieter Oebeles Viersen
This is the first of a series of 12 articles about emigrants from the Frisian municipality of Dantumadeel, who settled in Pella, Iowa. This article was written by Kor Postma and translated by Thys de Jong.
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New Dutch genealogy store

AmazonI've just added a Dutch genealogy store to the site. In this store, visitors can buy books, DVDs and prints about Dutch genealogy, history and culture. I've selected publications that I think would benefit somebody researching his Dutch roots. The store is powered by Amazon. This website receives a commission for all sales, enabling this website to remain free.

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15th anniversary of Yvette's Dutch Genealogy Homepage
fireworksIt was about 15 years ago that I started this website. It was during my second trimester in University. All the computer science students were given internet access. We had discovered that we could place web pages on our personal internet accounts which would show up on the World Wide Web. I don't know the exact date but it must have been towards the end of 1993 or early in 1994. So I'm celebrating 15 years of Yvette's Dutch Genealogy Homepage today! 
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Setting up an image bank

In 2007, I wrote a guide on how to set up image banks. The aim of the guide is to share best practices in creating online access to collections of images.  

The project was an initiative of the Taskforce Digital Accessibility of Archives (Taskforce Archieven) in the Netherlands. We formed a project group, consisting of image bank specialist from several archives in the Netherlands. I was involved as project manager and author of the guide. 

The Dutch National Archives are involved in a project to share knowledge with their Croatian counterparts. As part of this program, the guide was translated into English and then into Croatian. I thought visitors of this website might also be interested in this guide, so I put the English version here as well. The guide is available under a Creative Commons license, so feel free to share the document with others.

Download 'Setting up an image bank' (PDF, 381 KB).

 
Nationaal Archief emigration photos on Flickr

The Nationaal Archief, the National Archives of the Netherlands, has now joined Flickr the Commons. Like the Library of Congres, the Nationaal Archief is now using Flickr as a means to create wider access to the photo collection and ask the visitors for help in describing the collection. The first collections include a set of pictures of emigrants.

Emigranten

 
Updated database

I've just updated the genealogical database. It now includes about 42,500 people and their families. This includes almost 3,200 emigrants from the eastern part of the Achterhoek who emigrated to the United States in the nineteenth century. This is just the tip of the iceberg and is by no means complete. I did enter all of the Winterswijk emigrants I could find in the period 1840-1880, often with their ancestors as well.

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English versions of Dutch last names

When Dutch people arrived in the United States or other English-speaking countries, often their names got changed. This was either done on purpose, to make the name easier to write and remember, or by accident because the clerk didn't know how to spell the name and wrote it down phonetically. For this reason, a single family name can often be found in many different spellings in different documents.

This article gives an overview of the types of changes that names underwent and also gives a list of English versions of Dutch last names. This list is not complete and even for the names that are listed, chances are that many people with those names used even more exotic variants as well.

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Death record

Death records are a part of the civil registration. A death record lists the following data:

  • Place, date and time of death
  • Names of parents
  • Names of spouses
  • Name, profession and age of the one registering the birth
  • Names, profession and age of the witnesses
  • Often: address where the death took place

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Zeeland

Zeeland is a province in the south-west of the Netherlands. It borders on Noord-Brabant in the east, the country of Belgium in the south, the North Sea in the west and Zuid-Holland in the north.

The capital of Zeeland is Middelburg. Other larger towns are:

  • Vlissingen
  • Goes
  • Terneuzen
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Esselinkpas, Hendrik Jan
Hendrik Jan Esselinkpas was one of the survivors of the Phoenix disaster. He later settled in Michigan. His son corresponded about his father's memories of the disaster with William O. Van Eyck.
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Post World War II emigration

After World War II was over, many people wanted to start a new life across the ocean. Five years of war had destroyed the Dutch economy, and it would take years to recover. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, many Dutch people emigrated to Australia, Canada and the United States.

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