Sepia Saturday 750 - New arrivals

I feel there can't be any new arrivals without preceding departures. And sometimes new arrivals are not yet visible. Why these somewhat puzzling starting sentences? Well, I'll be honest. I have been looking in my albums and folders, and I can't find any inspiring pictures. So I have been looking for a backdoor to write a post that meets this month's theme. I hope I haven't strayed too far.                              My first picture shows a family on the verge of checking in for a departing KLM flight to New York Idlewild on April 24, 1947. I wrote about the Vander Dussen family before. Father Sybrand was a Rotterdam milkman with 11 children. He decided to emigrate to the USA and they developed an impressive dairy business in Southern California a.o. in Chino and Corona. Today, the family has over 300 members, and some moved to other states to start a dairy business there.

The Vander Dussens checking in at Amsterdam Schiphol
airport for their departure to the USA

The picture shows Mr. and Mrs. Sybrand Vander Dussen and nine children. Their baby twins in cradles were in the hands of stewardesses. In most of my photos of the family, father Sybrand is smoking a cigarette, not unusual in those days. If you have a closer look at the image below, taken over a decade earlier, you'll also notice a cigarette in the hands of all four men. In those days smoking was regarded as fashionable. Nobody knew or cared about the hazards, least of all the tobacco industry itself. Tobacco addiction was not something doctors spoke about. Why this attention to a few strands of smoking tobacco? Well, it is just to connect to another departure.

KLM aircrew before departure to Batavia on December, 18. 1933
F.l.t.r. Capt. Smirnoff, Soer, Grosveld, Van Beukering

Today it is out of the question that you see an aircrew posing on the ramp in front of an aircraft, each with a smoking cigarette. But at the time (1933) the rules and regulations apparently differed, if any. The idea behind this legendary (in The Netherlands) flight was to reach Batavia, today's Djakarta, in the (then) Dutch East Indies in record time to deliver the Christmas mail. The aircraft was a Fokker F-XVIII named 'Pelikaan' (Pelican), with registration PH-AIP. Many KLM aircraft at the time bore the names of birds. The crew managed to reach Batavia in four days! Today there is a non-stop flight covering the 7093 miles in 15 hours. The times they are a-changin'. 

The return trip in 1933 took a few minutes less, and the operation was a national event. Some 20,000 people came to Amsterdam Schiphol Airport to celebrate the arrival of the Pelikaan on New Year's Eve.

No cigarettes in the last picture nor is the new arrival visible.

Wedding of Cornelis Doelman (6) and Lea Libert (7)
in Cruyshoutem (B) on July 4, 1921

Our (Dutch) family has several ties with Belgium. My own roots are in Kuringen which today is Hasselt in Belgian Limburg. The brother [6] of my maternal grandmother married Belgian Lea Eulalia Hortensia Libert [7], one of the most poetic names in the family. She was from Cruyshoutem in East Flanders.

Marriage certificate Doelman x Libert

Under normal circumstances, the sister of the groom, my grandmother, should have been at the wedding. But she wasn't. However, my grandfather made his appearance there. His name was Gerardus Theodorus de Langen and he is number 9 in this serious-looking company. The reason Grandma wasn't present was that she was about to give birth to my mother's sister a couple of weeks later. So I can imagine that traveling from The Hague to Belgium v.v. was not her favorite pastime then. This new arrival was baptized Theodora Gerarda, how imaginative! But in those days, naming your child after a parent or grandparent was standard practice.

Anyway, it explains why the new arrival can't be seen in this picture. And even if Grandma would have been present ..., well, you understand.

This completes my post with new arrivals. My stock of arrivals is exhausted so this is it! But I'm sure there are more on Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 728 - Busy Times

Some 15 years ago, a former colleague in Copenhagen saved many old KLM pictures from the dustbin. KLM is the Dutch national carrier. The complete story of how and where that happened, you can read here. Obviously, among those pictures, there were many taken at airports. And having been a frequent traveler, I can testify that airports can also be busy. So most of my busy pictures are very much airport-related. They go back to the period before WWII or shortly after that.

The first one is about something many of us fear, customs formalities. Just after the war, oral declarations were obligatory and thus time-consuming. There were currency regulations and all kinds of import restrictions. Green and red lanes were nowhere near in sight.

Anything to declare?
Customs and Immigration at Schiphol Airport in the 1950's

Customs officers are not curious, it's just that they like to know everything. Judging by the carnation, the gentleman in the picture below looks like he is on his way to a/his wedding. Seemingly, he has difficulty explaining what he bought for the/his bride.

Convincing a customs officer is an arduous task

On October 16, 1961, one of the best soccer teams in the world, Real Madrid, made a transfer at Schiphol Airport. They were on their way to Denmark where they played the B 1913 Odense team during the European Cup competition two days later. The team consisted of legendary players such as Ferenc Puskás and Alfredo di Stéfano. They participated in this match so they appear in the picture below but I cannot pinpoint where exactly. If you want the result, Real Madrid beat the Danes bij 3-0.

Real Madrid at Schiphol Airport in front of the
PH-CGC Jacob Maris, a Convair Liner CV-340 

Speaking of legendary people, on May 8, 1946, Sir Winston Churchill and his wife and daughter, paid a visit to The Netherlands. They arrived from Croydon in a Dakota C-47A (DC3) with registration PH-TBO.

Sir Winston Churchill, Lady Clementine Churchill, and Miss Mary Churchill
and next to the great man, the Dutch ambassador to the UK, and his wife and
the KLM UK director.

In 1946 KLM was busy restarting its operations. One of the main handicaps was the lack of suitable aircraft. KLM obtained this Dakota from the USAAF on January 14 of that year. Barely 10 months later the plane flew into treetops on a hill shortly before landing at Croydon airfield and crashed. All (20) aboard survived.

45" video of Churchill's arrival at Schiphol 1)

My contribution to the Sepia Saturday theme of this month is best demonstrated by the crowdy picture below. Although I don't know when it was taken, several clues indicate a certain timespan. First of all the location. This is clearly on the apron of the old Schiphol Airport, currently known as Schiphol East. It was in operation until April 28, 1967, when the (new) Schiphol Centrum terminal was opened. Another indication is the KLM logo on the Volkswagen vehicle half hidden behind the mobile stairs on the right. It looks like the logo that was used in the 1959-1963 period. Seeing the many spectators including children, the event could be the arrival of sportsmen or a celebrity. On the mobile stairs, a couple of microphones are visible. So someone needed to be welcomed after having accomplished something admirable. During the period mentioned Olympic medal winner Sjoukje Dijkstra 2) (figure skating) and European Songfestival winner Teddy Scholten 3) arrived at the old airport attracting thousands of people. But I don't believe this picture was taken then. The reason is that I recognize one of the three gentlemen standing under the conveyor belt next to the mobile stairs. The man in the middle, with the brownish coat, is Dick J.M. Koek, at that time already one of the leading KLM Cargo managers. His office was in nearby building 205. And I can't imagine him leaving his desk to welcome one of the celebrities I mentioned. So the photo is likely to have been taken on another occasion.

Schiphol East 

To discern more detail, I colorized the picture 4). But that did not help me any further. Still, it is a quite different experience.

If there is any truth in the saying 'two's company, three 's a crowd', the family below certainly deserves to be called a crowd. 

After WWII many people from Holland emigrated to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United States. Rotterdam milkman Sybrand van der Dussen, his wife Johanna van Keulen, and 11 kids were among them. (If you count just 9 children, a twin is in the wicker baskets...) The family flew to New York Idlewild Airport (today JFK) and from there by train to Southern California.

The Van der Dussen family departing from Schiphol
on April 24, 1947

The flight to New York took place in one of the most elegant aircraft ever built, the Lockheed Constellation, also known as Connie or L-049. 

The PH-TAU that carried the Van der Dussens to
Idlewild Airport  5)

Should you wonder why the fuselage is so high above ground level, that has to do with the length of the propeller blades. And in turn, that has to do with fuel efficiency, which was an important aspect in the longer trans-Atlantic runs. 

Returning to the Vander Dussen emigrants, father Sybrand continued in the dairy business. His son told me 12 years ago that their family business expanded to milking approximately 100,000 cows! If that doesn't keep you busy... Quite an impressive achievement!

In more ways than one, this is the last picture. I took this picture of the Canadian Cemetery in Holten in The Netherlands during a visit last December. It is one of the largest military cemeteries here. It saddens me to say that it is a busy place, with almost 1,400 memorial stones belonging to Canadian soldiers who lost their lives during the first months of 1945. They liberated the eastern and northern parts of my country including Apeldoorn, where I lived at the time. Can't say I remember that 17th of April as I was only a little over a year old.

Canadian Cemetery, Holten, The Netherlands

The Canadian liberators in the Deventerstraat
in Apeldoorn on April 17, 1945
Source: apeldoornendeoorlog.nl

For more 'busy times' please see the contributions of my fellow Sepians.

Credits and notes

1) Polygoon Hollands Nieuws (producer) / Dutch Institute for Images and Sound (administrator)

2) March 19, 1962

3) March 13, 1959

4) Colorized with the My Heritage tool

5) Source: https://www.klmsafetyherald.com/klm-l-constellation-fleet

Saved from the dustbin (2)

Under this title, a number of pre-1966 photographs have been and will be published in this blog. One way or the other, all are related to KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. When possible, relevant details will be added. The origin of these pictures has been explained in 'dustbin #1'.


The KLM headoffice in The Hague has been designed by Dirk Roosenburg (1887-1962), an architect born and bred in The Hague. He knew KLM "founder" Albert Plesman since his youth and in 1936 Mr. Plesman asked him to make the office design. Much earlier, in 1919, the architect had been asked to make a design for the first KLM logo, which he did.
The first wing of the new headoffice was made available to KLM in 1940. During the war all building activities came to a stop but in 1946 building continued. At that time the picture below was taken. Today the building is owned by the Ministry of Traffic and Waterways.

The first wing of the KLM HQ in The Hague in 1946.
Further extensions have been built to the left.
The concrete structures alongside the road, are remains
from the war viz. anti tank obstacles.

As of August 1, 1947 KLM had a subsidiary in the former Dutch East Indies named the KLM Interinsulair Bedrijf (KLM-IIB). It operated domestic routes, between the many islands in the archipelago. Most of them were without any airport facilities.  Therefore, the use of Catalina Flyboats does not come as a surprise. KLM-IIB was in fact the predecessor of Garuda Indonesian Airways. Garuda came into being in 1949.

Unloading baggage from the PK-CTD, a Consolidated Catalina.
Note the KLM logo on the aircraft's nose.

In the years after WWII, a lot of Dutchmen emigrated to other continents with Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA being the most popular destinations. Usually they expected that in those countries there were more opportunities for a better future. Among them the Van der Dussen family from Rotterdam. The family consisted of Daddy, Mummy and eleven children which, even by Dutch standards then, was considered to be a small crowd. They went to California. The fact they travelled to New York by air probably drew a lot of media attention. In those days most emigrants travelled by ship to their new homeland. 

Newspaper article from the Utrechts
Nieuwsblad April 23, 1947

The Van der Dussen family boarding the KLM Lockheed Constellation
PH-TAU "Venlo" at Schiphol Airport on April 24, 1947.
Note the KLM stewardesses carrying the cradles in which the baby twin was "seated". 

Almost all models manufactured by Douglas have been operated by KLM. That included the DC-2. The picture below must have been taken before December 9, 1936 as on that date the DC-2 named "Lijster" (thrush) with registration PH-AKL crashed near Croydon, UK. The second aircraft, the PH-AKT "Toekan" (toucan) was confiscated by the Germans on May 16, 1940 and transferred to Lufthansa. I am unable to identify the third DC-2.

Douglas DC-2 line up and boarding passengers at Schiphol Airport

Update March 9, 2012 After publishing the above post about the emigration of the Van der Dussen family from Rotterdam to California back in 1947, I successfully tried to make contact with family members there. Please click 'reacties' below for excerpts from emails written by Marianne Carter Vander Dussen.