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Archive for the ‘DeKorn’ Category

The Confusing Saga of The DeKorns or Dekornes or de Cornes from Zeeland and Michigan

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Joseph Peter DeKorn, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Netherlands history, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 14, 2013| 17 Comments »

When I grew up in Kalamazoo in the 1960s and 1970s (OK, the 1950s, too), the name DeKorn as it applied to my family was no longer known. Richard’s only son, Joseph, had moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he raised his two sons.

At some point DeKorne’s Ethan Allen store opened up in Kalamazoo. I know it was there when I got married in 1975 because I bought my first couch and chairs there.That’s when I first heard the rumor that we were “shirttail relations.”

Nobody could ever give me any facts about this connection.

In 2000, with the beauty of the internet, I discovered that there was another family connected to Boudewijn DeKorn. Boudewijn, my great-great-great-grandfather, was born in 1816 in Kapelle, the Netherlands, and died 1873 in Kalamazoo.

This other family who had a Boudewijn was the furniture company Dekorne family from Grand Rapids.

But their Boudewijn didn’t match ours. Theirs died in 1929 in Grand Rapids! Ours died in Kalamazoo in 1873!! But how odd, considering that the name is unique, Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids are not far from each other, and there was that rumor about us being related.

At the time (2000), I found an article about their Boudewijn and a rough family tree.  I printed it out and saved it, never knowing if it would be useful.

Here is their family tree:

Other Dekorne family tree

Other Dekorne family tree

I’m going to post the article that went with their family tree because I find it very interesting in light of Richard DeKorn’s talents as a mason and general contractor.

It’s an interesting story, but are they relatives of mine?

I didn’t know, and I couldn’t figure it out because on Ancestry more Boudewijn DeKornes starting popping up with different birth and death dates, but always from the same general area of the province of Zeeland in the Netherlands.

Then I gave Yvette Hoitink their family tree and she put it together with our family tree and investigated.

This is our family tree:Richard DeKorn family treeDo you see a connection?  Look at their Boudewijn who was born in 1700.  He’s married to Piatarnella Pieterse Michielse.  That is the same woman as Pieternella Machiels who is also found in old documents under the name Petronella Pieters.  We have a match for a husband and wife in both family trees.

That means that  my “7th great-grandfather” Boudewijn de Corne, born approximately 1730 and died 1734 in Goes is (I believe) the “3rd great-grandfather” of Boudewijn the wood-carver and furniture maker who died in Grand Rapids in 1929.

In the history of the family it seems that branches moved away from each other and then maybe moved near each other again, always staying in Zeeland and then in southwestern Michigan. It’s fitting then that Joseph DeKorn moved to Grand Rapids and raised his family there by the other Dekornes.

Note: so many spellings of the name!!  It makes it very difficult even to work at cleaning up my family tree on Ancestry.  Also, notice how the Dutch tend to name their children after the grandparents.

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Do You Recognize Any of These Dutch Surnames?

Posted in Caledonia Michigan history, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Mulder, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Remine, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , , on May 7, 2013| 16 Comments »

This post has been edited to correct errors!!  I will continue to do so as necessary.

Just for fun I thought I’d post the Dutch surnames that pop up in my family tree.

  • Zuidweg or Zuijdweg
  • DeKorn or DeKorne
  • Peek or Paak
  • VanLiere (this one is not a direct ancestor, but we have relatives in the United States)
  • Mulder
  • Gorsse
  • Bomhoff
  • Hijman or Heijman
  • Vandewalle
  • Boes
  • Bataille
  • Van Nek
  • Bassa
  • den Besten
  • Kriger
  • Remijinse or Remine (this name is one ancestor line, but is also more recently by marriage)
  • Engelse
  • De Jonge
  • Kole
  • Stroosnijder
  • Antonisse
  • Van den Berger
  • Cornaaij
  • Swedijks
  • Machiels or Pieters

Only a few of these surnames are found on lists of common Dutch names.

Mulder is on every list as it means miller.

My grandmother told me that Remijinse is a name which originally came to the family from Spain.

Zuidweg, meaning south way, also might have similar origins–it’s unclear. The results of my 23andme test does show that I have Spanish ancestry, and the likely source would be the Spaniards that left Spain at the time of the Inquisition and made their way to Holland.

When I visited the Netherlands, a man told me that DeKorn meant that the first DeKorn came to the Netherlands from Switzerland.

Yvette Hoitink has another idea.  This is what she wrote about the name:

Boudewijn de Corne (sr.) was called De Corne and De Kooren. “De” is the Dutch word for “The” but can also be the French word for “From.” Since “Corne” is not a Dutch word and “Kooren” (corn) would have a different article (“het” instead of “de”), a French origin is possible.  One possible explanation for the name is that the family originated in a place called Corné. A village called Corné is located near Angers [on map it’s located in western France]. A lot of French Huguenots came to the province of Zeeland in the period after the Edict of Nantes was revoked in 1685.

Yvette’s theory fits with the family story I heard very often that we were descended from French Huguenots.

600px-Famous_Dutch_People

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Who Were the Champions of Michigan? Kalamazoo or Ishpeming? BREAKING NEWS–UPDATE UPDATE

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Joseph Peter DeKorn, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography late 19th century, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on May 4, 2013| 20 Comments »

Here is a photo which is in with all the other family photos, but I don’t know anything about it.  Somebody cared a lot about it, though, because the names of the boys are written at the bottom.  It’s titled “Champions of Michigan.”  On the right side, it says Lansing 0 Kazoo 30.  Maybe a game between Lansing and Kalamazoo determined the Michigan champions.  But on the left side of the photo it looks like it says Kazoo 21 Ishpeming 27.  Say it ain’t so.

I tried to research games to see which year this was, but the Michigan High School Football website only goes back to 1950.

Does anybody have any ideas on how to find more information about the photo? If this photo belonged to Joseph Peter DeKorn, who was born in 1881, it’s possible that the photo is from the late 1890s.

Get a load of the coach’s facial expression!  He’s at the back on our left.

###

Here is the breaking news update.

I went to bed last night with this post set to publish early this morning.  When I woke up this morning, I suddenly thought of my “training” from Jose at Enhanced News Archive:  check the newspapers!  And since I recently found Genealogy Bank to be such a wonderful resource, I checked in there.  Guess what?  There are articles which show that I was wrong about the 1890s–it was 1901–and  unfortunately correct that Ishpeming won.  What a fabulous article that details the game (I hope it’s not too hard to read since I had to copy it in 4 parts):Michigan championship 1Michigan championship 2Michigan championship 3Michigan championship 4

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A New Family by Second Marriage

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography early 20th century, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 30, 2013| 16 Comments »

After my great-great grandmother Alice Paak DeKorn passed away, Richard DeKorn remarried a woman named Jantje, called Jennie.  Her story begins this way . . .jenny j from ann marie

Once upon a time –well, in the 19th century–in the province of Groningen, the Netherlands, Martje Derks Wiltje married Harm Jansen.  They had two daughters, Kate and Jantje, who were both born in a town called Uithuizen. After Martje passed away, Harm and his daughters immigrated to the United States, where the family adopted the surname Johnson.

Harm Johnson

Harm Johnson
Probably a copy of his wedding photo from 1858 (copied 1891)

Jennie Johnson (eventually Sootsman and then DeKorn) and her family traveled to the United States on the SS Castor, arriving in New York on May 4, 1881. Below is a copy of the manifest and a photo of the Castor.SS Caster Page 1 Janssen immigrationSS Caster Page 5 Janssen Immigration name listMedia0050

Kate married Hemmens Edward Siertsema.  Kate and Hemmens had several children, including Annetta Lucile (Harmens) who was born in 1884 and died on 16 Dec 1974 in Kalamazoo.  Eventually Annetta had her own daughter named Annetta (born 1910), as well as a son, Lowell (born 1913).

Jantje (Jennie) married Oscar Sootsman.  They had two daughters:

1. MARION SOOTSMAN was born on 30 May 1892 in Kalamazoo, Kalamazoo County,

Michigan, USA. She died on 21 Apr 1948 in Kalamazoo, Kalamazoo County,

Michigan, USA. She married John Ewart McQuigg, son of Moore McQuigg and

Lizzie on 11 Aug 1928 in St Joseph Co. IN. He was born in 1894.

2. MAJORIE (MARGE) SOOTSMAN was born in Apr 1896. She married GEORGE OWENS.

3. There might have been a son, but if so, I haven’t been able to locate him yet.

Oscar Sootsman passed away in Kalamazoo in 1907. Three years later, Jantje married widower Richard DeKorn (you were waiting for the DeKorn connection, right?).  Richard died in 1930, eighteen years before Jantje, who passed on in 1948.

So these girls, Marion and Marge, were Richard DeKorn’s stepdaughters.  When Richard and Jennie married, the girls were 18 and 14. In the family photographs I have the girls are sometimes in family group shots.  Here is a photo of Alice Leeuwenhoek (Uncle Lou and Aunt Jen’s daughter) with Marge Sootsman.  To clarify, Alice’s grandfather was married to Marge’s mother.

On the following page, first photograph, you can see Jantje (Jennie) with her daughter Marion.  In between them is Jennie’s sister Kate’s granddaughter Annetta (1910 – 2005).  The top middle photo is Marge (Marjorie) and Marion Sootsman.  Below that is a photo of Marge by herself.  The next, or fourth, photo is Richard and Jennie DeKorn.  The man at the right is George Owen, who married Marge Sootsman.

In this next set of photos, we have the granddaughter of Kate, Annetta in two photos by herself and one perhaps with her brother Lowell (1913 – 2004).  There are three photos of Marion Sootsman.

The final set of photos shows Annetta at the piano and Lowell playing, Comstock, Michigan.  Then Richard (“Uncle Dick”) and Jennie DeKorn are pictured with Annetta, Lowell, and their parents, Everett William  and Annetta Harmens VanHoeve.   The center photo is Annetta at Comstock School.  The top right photo is in front of the Bath House at Ramona Park at Long Lake, which was owned by Richard DeKorn’s sister-in-law from his first marriage and her husband.  Annetta is seen here with her cousin Herman Harmens.  The bottom right photo seems to be Annetta with Lowell’s bicycle.

The following obituary belongs to Jantje/Jennie Johnson Sootsman DeKorn:

Blog reader Grady Ellis sent me these copies of scrapbook pages, as well as some family history from that family group.  These photos came to Grady from Susan A. VanHoeve McEwen, who owns the originals. He says that the Harmens family owned the Shell Service Station on Portage Street, just north of the Lovers Lane intersection.  He worked there while he was going to college in the early 70s “back in the days when you really received service in a gas station . . .  long ago.”

Grady shared the contents of an obituary in the Kalamazoo Gazette on July 19, 1907 for Oscar Sootsman:

“Funeral for Oscar Sootsman.

The funeral of Oscar Sootsman who was killed by being run over by the city sprinkling wagon Wednesday night, will be held at the home, on South Burdick street at 3 o’clock Saturday afternoon.  The Rev. William Pool and the Rev. Mr. Koolker will officiate.  Interment will take place at Riverside.”

Here is another:

What a sad death.  He was run over by the truck he drove. No wonder the paper said he was a man of great courage.  Here is his death certificate:

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Good Manners and Genuine Dutch Intrepidity in Fierce Battles

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Leeuwenhoek, Netherlands history, Photography late 19th century, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on April 23, 2013| 12 Comments »

Remember Lambertus Leeuwenhoek (Uncle Lou), husband of my great grand-aunt Jennie DeKorn Leeuwenhoek?  He’s the one who owned the Bibles I showcased in one post.  He and Aunt Jen owned a general market in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Grandpa gave me this photo of Uncle Lou’s younger brother Gerrit/Garrett (five years apart in age) and told me Uncle Lou and Gerrit were orphans, and that they both lived in Kalamazoo. Years later, I wondered why there were no more recent photos of him or stories of who he married or children he might have had.

In doing a newspaper search for the name Leeuwenhoek in Kalamazoo on Genealogy Bank, I discovered why.

He was a war hero who met an untimely death at age 21. (Yes, another family hero!)

As the July 26, 1898 Kalamazoo Gazette article states, Gerrit, who was born to Arie Leeuwenhoek and Mary Hoogedoom Leeuwenhoek in the Netherlands, had only been in the United States for a year when he heard the whistles blow in Kalamazoo that war had been declared on Spain (Spanish-American War).  He immediately enlisted in the army, was sent to Cuba, where he died of malaria.

Notice that it mentions Uncle Lou in Kalamazoo, but it also mentions two brothers and two sisters left behind in the Netherlands, as well as a brother who is in the Holland regular army in the East Indies.

I think it’s possible that my grandfather did tell me that Gerrit died in the war, but that I didn’t remember it and, if I took notes, I don’t know where they are.

His death even made the news in the Muskegon Chronicle on the same date.

On August 17, 1898, the Kalamazoo Gazette published a letter Uncle Lou received of his brother’s service and death.

To put the letter in the context of Uncle Lou’s life, he’d been married 26 months, and his daughter Alice was 15 months old, when he got word his young brother had died.

This letter makes it look as if Gerrit was buried in Cuba. Here is the interment control form which I found on ancestry.com.

Garrett Leeuwenhoek interment control form

What I suspected from this form is confirmed in the following article in the Kalamazoo Gazette on April 5, 1899.

Garrett’s body was re-buried in 1899 in Kalamazoo.  There are conflicting reports of his death date and name of his Company, but I feel pretty confident about the date of July 23, 1898 as the day he died.

Today he is honored with a brick at the Rose Park Veterans Memorial Park–a memorial park which my father Rudy Hanson and the Kalamazoo Sunrise Rotary Club were instrumental in bringing to the city.

 

 

If you would like to see first-hand newspaper accounts of the war from a Michigan newspaper, these links to articles in the Ludington Appeal show the general climate in Michigan at the time Gerrit decided to enlist.  These were provided by Jose at Enhanced News Archive.

Newspaper : Ludington Appeal – Apr 28, 1898
Ludington Appeal – May 5, 1898

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The Virtual Cemetery

Posted in Alice Paak DeKorn, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Paak, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , on April 8, 2013| 16 Comments »

I’m still thinking about Alice’s terrible accident.  She died in 1908, 17 years after it happened.  I looked through my photos to see if there are any of her after the accident, and this is the best one to see that her hands did recover.

Alice Paak DeKorn with her granddaughter Alice Leeuwenhoek (born 1897)

Until I have a chance to do some work on FindAGrave for my ancestors, I am paying my respects through this blog.

Here are photos of the gravestones of Alice Paak DeKorn and Richard DeKorn.   The grave sites are at Riverside Cemetery in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

The photos were submitted to Find A Grave by “Barbara from Michigan,” and I’m indebted to her for this service.

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A Series of Disasters

Posted in Alice Paak DeKorn, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Paak, Peek, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , on March 28, 2013| 22 Comments »

I’m picking up here from my post All the Peek Girls.  In that post I showcased photos of my great-great grandmother Alice and her sisters.

The girls’ parents, my great-great-great grandparents, Teunis Peek (born on 5 Jun 1822 in Everdingen, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands) and  Jacoba Bassa (born on 18 Jun 1824 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands) were married on 21 Dec 1848 in Everdingen, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

At the time of their marriage, Teunis was a “farmer’s hand” in Everdingen.

On 23 November 1865, Jacoba died at the age of 41 in Lexmond.  At that time, Teunis was a farmer in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

Teunis and Jacoba had the following children:

Joost Peek was born on 25 Aug 1850 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

Aaltje Peek, born 9 Sep 1852, Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands; died 5 May 1908, Michigan,
United States.  This is my great-great grandmother, Alice Paak/Peek, who married Richard DeKorn.

Anna Catharina Peek was born on 6 Jan 1855 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

Maaike Peek was born on 29 Jul 1859 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

Cornelia Peek was born on 8 May 1862 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.

Willempje Peek was born 17 dep 1856 in Lexmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands. [Additional info:  must do research to see if Willempje survived or not]

Teunis and his children emigrated in 1868 to the United States.

After reading this information on the family, I speculated that Joost probably stayed behind in the Netherlands.  He would have been eighteen and might have already started his own life.  I had photos of the four girls (Alice, Annie, Mary, and Carrie), but no information from my family about the oldest, the boy Joost.

I recently discovered a clipping tucked in with the family photos.

There is no date or newspaper name on this clipping.  Here is an excerpt:

The residence of George Paake at 1016 Trimble Avenue was burned this morning about 10:30 o’clock and a worthy family which has had a series of disasters, left without a home.  The house which Mr. Paake was paying for in the Building and Loan Association was entirely ruined although most of the contents of the home were saved. Mr. Paake receives no insurance whatever and the little which had been accumulated by the family was lost.

The fire is only an incident in the history of the family. Mrs. Paake died a short time ago leaving five children, the oldest being fourteen years old. Since the mother’s death the little girl has had entire charge of the house and the four little children and has had all the responsibility of the family except the support which Mr. Paake gave as a laborer.  Recently he has been unable to work and was ill this morning when the fire occurred.

The neighbors have taken in the little ones and are doing all that is possible to alleviate the sufferings of the family. Mrs. Carrier has been responsible for raising a sum of money to which the neighbors have liberally contributed.

So many facts here.  But more questions.

Since the clipping was in with our treasured family photos, was this my family described in the article?

The size of the family seems to fit with the family of Teunis Peek, as is the recent death of the mother.  The impression is of an immigrant family who has been beset with many tragedies: the death of the mother, either the death of the first son (or him staying behind), the illness of the father, the loss of their home and the value they had in it.

Is Teunis George?  Most of the family changed their first names from a Dutch first name to an “English” first name.  It’s possible.

Although the Dutch records show the last name as Peek, my grandfather told me that the family was Paak or Paake.

However:  Jacoba, the wife of Teunis, passed away in 1865, and the family emigrated in 1868.  Alice, my great-great-grandmother, was born in 1852.  She would have been 16 when they arrived in Kalamazoo and caring for the household and her four younger siblings.    The very ancient clipping is now a deep gold color and very crisp.  If it’s from 1869 or 1870, and the family was that of Teunis, then Alice was probably 17 or 18, not 14.

In a 1906 City Directory, George is still listed at the same address (a rebuilt house?) and Cora W. Paak is listed as a boarder.  I wonder if that is his sister because Alice named one of her daughters Cora W (for Wilhelmina). Could be Cornelia (Carrie).

Or was George a brother of Teunis? (NO)

I’m waiting with bated breath for Yvette Hoitink to find me a little more information which might shed light on this mystery.  As of now, I don’t have any information on siblings of Teunis Peek.

EVENTUALLY we discovered that the fire happened to George (Joost) and his family.

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Some More Buildings and Building Sites

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , on March 21, 2013| 24 Comments »

 

I wonder which Richard DeKorn building site this is.  The thin line of trees behind it is interesting because that doesn’t look like right downtown.  What do you think the buildings behind the site are?  And that long low structure?

The next photo was identified by reader David K. as “the old city hall in Grand Rapids.” http://cdn.loc.gov/service/pnp/habshaer/mi/mi0000/mi0015/photos/089268pv.jpg This makes sense because the photographer, Joseph DeKorn, ended up going to work for the City of Grand Rapids, eventually becoming  Superintendent of the Grand Rapids Water and Light Company. The details of the building are beautiful, as is the landscaping.

Joseph DeKorn took the following photo of Kalamazoo’s downtown. Comments by readers help to describe more about the location.

Downtown Kalamazoo

Downtown Kalamazoo

As usual, I don’t know enough about these photographs.  The first one was a photo I found with old newspaper clippings.  The other two were from glass negatives taken by Joseph DeKorn.  Any guesses on age, based on the clothing of the people?

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Extra, Extra, Read All About It

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , on March 18, 2013| 12 Comments »

I just discovered an article which explains the Telegraph building in Kalamazoo.  As I’ve mentioned before, it was built by my great-great-grandfather Richard DeKorn.  In my earlier post today I wrote about him building the Pythian building.  From this article, I now find that the two buildings are the same.  The Telegraph building was for the Kalamazoo Telegraph, a rival newspaper to the Kalamazoo Gazette.  This article explains the history.

The building was first called the Telegraph Building and later the Pythian Building. Apparently it is also called the Park Building, according to the website of the Portage District Library.

Be sure to look at the article because it has a couple of great photos of the building, including one from 1881 where the front is festooned with striped awnings and garlands.

The building stood at 132 W. South Street, near the intersection of Rose, across from the Kalamazoo Public Library.

Does it still stand there?  I no longer live in Kalamazoo, so I don’t know.  I looked on a Google satellite map, and this is what I found.  Is this a new building or a remodel of the old building or am I at the wrong address?  Does anyone know?  BREAKING NEWS:  the Miller Canfield building was built on this property.  Great-great-grandfather’s building was probably demolished in 2005 or 2006, according to reader Kathryn Lightcap.

So once again, here are the photos I’ve published on here of the Telegraph building site and then of the finished building, eventually known as the Pythian or Park building.

Telegraph Building

Telegraph Building

Pythian Building

Pythian Building

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More Mighty Kalamazoo Buildings from Richard DeKorn

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on March 18, 2013| 13 Comments »

Richard DeKorn obituary

This obit confirms that Richard’s (Dirk de Korne)  sister, Jennie Culver, did move to Seattle and raise her family there.  Also, although the genealogy research done by Yvette Hoitink shows Richard was born in Kapelle, this obituary states what I had always been told, that he was from Goes.  Those towns are not far from each other.

I’ve written a couple of other posts about Richard DeKorn, including Richard DeKorn, Brick Mason and General Contractor.  This obituary mentions two other buildings I didn’t realize he had built:  the Pythian Building and the Merchants Publishing Company building.  I also learned that he was a member of the brick masons union.

Pythian Building

Pythian Building

I’ve mentioned before that he built the Telegraph building, the tower at the state hospital, and the Ladies Library Association building (and many others).

You see Park Cafe in the low building to the side of the building?  I remember them from the sixties and seventies when they used to make the best olive burgers anywhere in the world.  The grease would soak right through the waxed paper, and they were absolutely smothered in green olives.  I recall walking past the building to get my burger and thinking what a beautiful old building it was, never dreaming that my great-great grandfather had built it.

NEW INFORMATION ADDED IN THE NEXT POST!!  EXTRA, EXTRA, READ ALL ABOUT IT!!!

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