English section

Bicycle store Van den Driest celebrates 60th anniversary

MIDDELBURG – On Thursday, March 12 it was 60 years ago that the bicycle store Van den Driest in Middelburg was opened. The building on the corner Zusterstraat / Gravenstraat has been the address of ‘Van den Driest tweewielers’ since 1955, and became a household name in Zeeland.

Thirties
Since the early thirties the brothers Cor (1911-1999) and Bram van den Driest tinkered on bicycles and motorcycles. The first store with workshop was located in the Herenstraat in Middelburg. After the war Cor and his wife opened a store at the corner Scheldestraat / Paul Krugerstraat in Vlissingen.

Profile
In 1991 the current owner Jan van den Driest, son of Bram (1913-2012), joined the national retail organization Profile. Read the article below about the history of the bicycle shop in our Bulletin 2001 (pp. 12-15).

DeZaak2001

Handball player Thijs is looking for sponsors

KWINTSHEUL – Thijs van den Driest (1997) is a handball player at HV Quintus in Kwintsheul. The first teams compete in the Major League. Thijs’ team competes in the National A League. The Men’s A Team has started a campaign to raise money for a gym in the new building of the club. The intent is that in the future the entire village of Kwintsheul will benefit from this gym.

Athlete
During his high school years Thijs studied at Handball School Haaglanden. Currently he is studying Sport and Exercise in Delft. He now owns a NOC status and he is facilitated as a professional athlete. He is an active member of the club, he provides training and is a referee.

Request
This is Thijs’ request: “I am looking for sponsors who want to sponsor me with a ball of 5 euros. This is possible on the site https://hv-quintus.clubkit.nl/. If you want to sponsor me, I can be found among HA selection Thijs van den Driest.”

Turret in Ghent belonged to Floreyns van den Driessche

GENT – The turret at the Friday Market in Ghent was in the possession of Floreyns van den Driessche. He bought it on 15 April 1550 from Lieven Petrins. The turret was also called Huidevettershuis because it served as the guildhall of the tanners before 1540.

Dispute
A few months later, a dispute arose with the neighbors because Floreyns had built a shop at the bottom of the turret. The neighbours claimed that they were hampered in displaying their wares.

Wikipedia
These details emerged from historical research on our namesakes. They are also added to the Wikipedia-page on the turret.

Well-off
Of Floreyns (Floreins, Florens) van den Driessche little is known. In 1543 he also owned ‘het Mooriaenshoofd’ on the Friday Market. It is thus clear that he must have been “well-off”. In that case it is very likely that he had a family crest. All the more reason to perform further research in Ghent.

Source:
Frans de Potter, Gent, van den oudsten tijd tot heden. Geschiedkundige beschrijving
der stad, dl. 6, 351-352, 354.

 

Adrie van den Driest in ‘Our Club’

OOST-SOUBURG – Former football coach of Middelburg Adrie van den Driest was featured in the television program ‘Our Club’ on Omroep Zeeland. In this weekly show presenter Jan-Jaap Corré visits a football club in Zeeland.

Supporter
Because Adrie has been a lifelong supporter and can be found alongside the footballfield every week, he was named The Twelfth Man of football club Zeelandia.

Watch the episode below. Adrie be seen from 2 minute 15.

 

Anthon receives wedding bible parents

OOST-SOUBURG – Peter Jasperse has handed over the wedding Bible of his grandparents to his uncle Anthon van den Driest. It is a Bible of 1928, that belonged to Jan van den Driest and Maria Geertruida de Boo van Uijen.

Mohicans
After the death of Peter’s mother, Annie Jasperse van den Driest, Anthon is the only one left of the three children from that marriage. For that reason, he is called now “the last of the Mohicans.” The eldest son, conductor Jan van den Driest, died in 2005.

Roots
With his sister Connie and nephew Bram de Groot Peter visited Vlissingen and Oost-Souburg, in search for the roots of the family Van den Driest and Jasperse. They took a look at the site of the farm on the Koudekerkseweg 47, the old presbytery and the homes where their parents lived.

Connie de Groot-Jasperse and Bram de Groot in front of the old prebytery in the Badhuisstraat in Vlissingen. Jan and Annie van den Driest lived there as foster children of Ds. Smeenk.

Ruben photographs stranded porpoise

Last Saturday a porpoise washed up on the beach at Ter Heijde. Familymember Ruben van den Driest was there and took a picture.

Fighting spirit
The porpoise was a big one: five feet tall and full of fighting spirit. The finder took a pity in watching the animal struggle. With the strength of three men they tried to push him back to sea. They succeeded at the third attempt.

Too late
Before that EHBZ Noordwijk and the animal ambulance were alarmed, but on arrival the porpoise was already gone. Fortunately we still have the pictures yet!

Source: 112Bollenstreek

 

Carel van den Driest in top 20 of influential boardmembers

OUDERKERK A / D AMSTEL – In the Top 100 most influential supervisory boardmembers Drs. Carel van den Driest is listed 20th place. The list is compiled annually by the magazine Management Scope. Last year he was 23th.

Position
Carel earns this position through his chairmanship of the supervisory board of the national rail company NS, Anthony Veder Group and Van Oord. He is also supervisory boardmember of Vopak.

Van Ommeren
From 1974 he held various positions at the Rotterdam shipping company Van Ommeren. He was chairman of the board of directors from 1991 to 1999. After that, the company was renamed Vopak. In 2002 he returned as chairman. Until 2009 Carel van den Driest was commissioner of Van Gansewinkel.

Source: Management Scope

 

Coby’s baptismal registration emerged

Grote of Sint Jacobskerk in Vlissingen

VLISSINGEN – At the family gathering in Gapinge Coby Ritman-van den Driest wondered if her baptismal registration could be found somewhere. She was baptized in Sint Jacobskerk in Vlissingen in ’46 or ’47.

Church Office
The secretary of the foundation sent a request to the Church Office of the Protestant Church Vlissingen and thanks to a friendly employee the registration emerged.

South Africa
Coby was baptized as Jacoba Maria van den Driest on November 24, 1946, along with her younger brother Cornelis. They are children of Gerrit van den Driest and Mary Coppoolse. The family, including older sister Leny, emigrated in 1954 to South Africa.

See also: Jaarbericht 2003, p. 6-7, and Jaarbericht 2012, p. 23-25

 

Coenraedt published in Ballustrada

DORDRECHT – The poem Insemination by Coenraedt van Meerenburgh has been published in literary periodical Ballustrada. Coenraedt is the pen name of our familymember Marcel van den Driest (1967).  In this special “light verse’ episode, edited by Cees van der Pluijm, Coenraedts is listed  between names like Drs. P Kees Torn, Jaap van den Born, Daan de Ligt, Frits Criens and Ko de Laat.

Revived
This year the magazine Ballustrada was revived by publisher Liverse in Dordrecht. At the same publisher Coenraedt’s translation of the 154 sonnets of Shakespeare came out in 2012.

Zeeland
Ballustrada originated in 1986 in Zeeland.  Current editors are André van der Veeke, Jan JB Kuijpers and Johan Everaers. The magazine is on sale at the foundation Zeeuws Licht.

 

Welcome to our newly redesigned website!

VLISSINGEN – The website of our family foundation has been redesigned! After nine years, the site was in need of freshening up. The technique is progressing and it became more and more complicated to update the site.

Weblog
We have chosen to switch to a weblog, maintaining our domain http://www.vandendriest.nl. This offers more possibilities for less money and it is more user-friendly.

Satisfactorily
The website was designed in 2005 by Thomas Siahaya and has functioned satisfactorily. Our presence on the internet yielded many visitors and unexpected contacts with relatives worldwide. The move also takes place in consultation with him and on his advice.

Domain
Because our domain name remains the same, nothing changes really. We remain accessible via http://www.vandendriest.nl. So enjoy the new website, do not hesitate to leave a comment and spread the word!

 

Marcel is working at high level

VLISSINGEN – In case you missed it: just walk to the bin with old newspapers, for Wednesday, October 29 Marcel van den Driest (36) from Vlissingen was in the Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant, under the heading “Zealanders in the outside ‘.

Marcel van den Driest is a service engineer at a manufacturer of wind turbines. He performs maintenance on turbines in Zeeland, Rotterdam, Belgium and Noord-Brabant.

In the picture taken by photographer Lex de Meester, Marcel is standing in front of a windmill on Neeltje Jans.

Celebration and future concerns at third lustrum

GAPINGE – On October 11, our family gathered together for the second time in De Spil in Gapinge. During the friendly meeting, which was attended by more than 40 family members, chairman Maarten dwelled on the 15th anniversary of the foundation and board member Marcel unveiled the new pedigree of the family. Singer Adrie Oosterling managed to strike the right chord in the afternoon.

Future 
Although the third anniversary was every reason for a party, Maarten expressed some concerns about the future of the foundation. The donor base is declining rapidly and finding copy for the annual bulletin and website remains difficult. Not for the first time Maarten pressed donors to bring in ‘new blood’ and to take initiative in the field of supplying copy.

Pedigree 
The previous graphical pedigree of the Van den Driest family dates back to 2001. The new version that Marcel has made​​, gives a clearer picture of the various branches of the family and their relationships. Marcel has been busy making family trees since his tenth year. The genealogies of the Bible and the TV series Roots have inspired him, he thinks.

Splendor 
As usual, after that it was time for a lunch buffet. To put more splendor to the 15th anniversary of the Foundation, Adrie Oosterling offered a varied program of songs, poems and skits in the afternoon. In a subtle way he referred to our quest for Flemish ancestors.

Photos: Martin Hubers