DijkVan-VanHees
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"title": "Van Dijk & Van Hees: History of a Brabant family business",
"description": "Explore the history of the Van Dijk & Van Hees office stationery and printing company in 's-Hertogenbosch, including the life of musician and author Jan van Dijk, and the sale of the business.",
"content": "## Van Dijk & Van Hees\n\n**Inhoud**\n\n* [Jan van Dijk overleden / den bosch, 7 augustus 2006.](#Jan-van-Dijk-overleden)\n* [Begin Kantoorboekhandel/drukkerij](#begin-kantoorboekhandel-en-drukkerij-Van-Dijk-en-Van-Hees)\n* [Jan van Dijk over de zaak](#Jan-van-Dijk)\n* [Kantoorboekhandel verkocht](#Kantoorboekhandel-Van-Dijk-&-Van-Hees-verkocht)\n* [Voorouders Van Dijk](#voorouders-Van-Dijk)\n* zakelijke ontwikkeling\n\n----------------------------------\n\n#### Jan van Dijk overleden\n\nden bosch, 7 augustus 2006.\n\nOn Saturday, July 29, 2006, Jan van Dijk passed away at the age of 90. The musician Van Dijk was a descendant of the generations behind the office stationery and printing company Van Dijk en Verhees. The friendly 'Bosschenaar', who usually dressed in a dark suit with a bow tie, was known as a conductor and music teacher. In the later years of his life, he also gained recognition as the author of \"Rond de Geerlingse Burg,\" the neighborhood where he grew up and conducted business. For his contributions, Jan van Dijk was awarded the city's Cultural Medal [January 1995].\n\nJan van Dijk, who resided in the new Antoniegaarde complex, was buried in a private ceremony.\n\n-------------------------\n\n#### voorouders Van Dijk\n\nThe family tree of the Van Dijk family has three consecutive generations, each with a descendant named Richard. That name goes back to a distant ancestor, namely Richard \*14-1-1804. This skipper died in Den Bosch on his ship while it was in the Zuid-Willemsvaart. Richard was not a graphic artist, but a barge skipper who sailed between Den Bosch and Haarlem/Zaandam. His eldest son was named Richard 1851-1941, and his son was also Richard \* 's-Bosch June 2, 1877 + May 16, 1946.\n\nJan van Dijk, who also joined the business in 1942, left when his father sold the business to Jan's wife, Jeanne van Druenen. From that time on, he focused on music.\n\nBut that music was a hobby that was not accepted by his parents: 'They didn't allow me to play at fairs and in cafes in Bosch anymore, so I joined the business.'\n\n#### begin kantoorboekhandel en drukkerij Van Dijk en Van Hees\nWith this Richard van Dijk, who initially worked as a printer for C.N. Teulings, later for Max Cahen's paper goods factory, the history of the printing and book trade Van Dijk en Van Hees begins. The name Van Hees comes from Anna Maria van Hees, a miller's daughter [of Franciscus van Hees] whom he married on May 2, 1907.\n\nIn that year of marriage, they moved into the property at Hinthamerstraat 143, which Richard had bought. Apparently, this transaction happened together with his wife's brother Jan, who, like his unmarried sister Elisabeth, also moved in above the store. The properties where De Drie Mollen now has its office were also bought for a printing business, and later Hinthamereinde 66 [the current printing company Van Dijk en Van Hees] and some other properties in the Aastraat.\n\nIn this current printing company, another Richard, son of Richard van Dijk, married to Corry van Liempt, is in charge. This last-mentioned Richard [\* May 25, 1914] joined the business during the new construction of the printing company at Hinthamereinde 66 [1938]. He is the father of the current director.\n\nRichard and Anna van Hees's second son, Jan [November 25, 1915 + July 29, 2006], also worked in the business for a period.\n\n| | |\n| :-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | :-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |\n| *Jan van Dijk, musician, author, and businessman, but Jan started as a music clown... .*\n| *Jan, born on November 25, 1915, passed away on July 29, 2006.*\n| - photo © paul kriele, November 9, 2004. |  |\n\n#### Jan van Dijk\nOn November 9, 2004, Jan van Dijk, uncle of Richard van Dijk, owner of the printing company Van Dijk en Van Hees, recounted some anecdotes and chronicles from the family history.\n\nJan van Dijk joined the business at Hinthamerstraat 143 in 1942. His father had planned it that way. Jan's brother, Richard, whose real name was Arnoldus, was supposed to become a traveling salesman. But Richard wanted to become a typographer and started studying at the graphic arts vocational school in Utrecht. This Richard is the father of Richard of printing company Van Dijk en Van Hees.\n\nJan van Dijk: My father started that printing company in the cellars of the retail building. A Heidelberger did the typesetting there. It had come at the suggestion of his brother-in-law and [co-]namesake of the business, Jan van Hees. On Sundays, funeral cards were made, and during the week, birth and business cards.\n\nBecause the store had to expand, the printing company moved to a building owned by wholesaler Mallant on the Zuid-Willemsvaart, where the offices of De Drie Mollen coffee factory later came to be.\n\nFrom my childhood, I remember that before our time, Verhoeven, a florist, ran a flower shop in the building Hinthamerstraat 143. Verhoeven was a well-known florist and grower from Den Bosch, whose farm was in a side alley off Vughterstraat, the Kruisbroedersstraatje.\n\nIn the row from Hinthamerstraat 141, now Het Inloopschip, lived Mr. P. Loeff, then followed the cigar shop of Van de Boogaard, whose yard extended to the Binnendieze, and then Paulussen, who had a forge in Clarastraat. Then we come to the corner building of Verhoeven, which had been for sale for some time. That widest building on the street had once been the castle of Count Geerling. 'I could infer that function from the so-called castle bricks and a stone staircase,' Jan explains. During the war, we stayed in the cellars which served as shelters.\n\nOur building had a window on the left and right and a door in the middle. Through that door and a hallway, you entered the store, but you could first choose between an inner door left or right. Because the living room was on the right, we put a 'Winkel' sign there with a hand pointing to the left. On a table in front of the window, my father had displayed his collection of notebooks, pencils, and stamps.\n\n**Jan talks about his ancestors.**\n\nGrandfather once started on the Vughterdijk in a building opposite the Raad van Arbeid. It was one of the smallest buildings in the city. I didn't know great-grandfather - also a Richard - and the skipper, but I did know grandfather Richard. He liked to walk. During my father's business days, grandpa walked every day with a stick from the Vughterstraat to the shop/printing house in the Hinthamerstraat. He was a quiet old man, but I don't remember much about him. His business visit was more meant as a break so he could walk back to his small house on the Vughterdijk afterwards.\n\nFirst, office stationery. In that small house, he founded an office stationery business. His daughter Dina, who married Meekers, continued the business. I don't know the details of what happened to Dina.\n\nFather, who worked at Cahen's paper factory, wanted his own business at some point. So, Hinthamerstraat 143 was purchased.\n\n**Music Forbidden**\nJan: I loved music, but my parents were against it. So it often had to happen in secret. As a young man, I became friends with a son of the pharmacist/chemist Van Beek & Schellekens. That boy drove a motorcycle, which he stored in the narrow alley Achter de Engel. On that property, there was also a small building where we stored our circus equipment, my large and small accordion and a xylophone and a singing saw.\n\nFor the practice of that circus, I apprenticed with Burgemeester. That small man was actually a wine merchant in Kolperstraat. With our musical instruments and clothing, we would go out on the motorcycle to the cafes in the villages and to fairs and such. After that period as a music clown, Jan went to work for Miss Hansen, the daughter of a contractor in Vught who later married Frans van Amelsfoort.\n\nMy parents forbade me to continue in music. Of course, I wanted to pursue music. But I wasn't allowed to play at fairs or in cafes. At the 'dikke' Van der Elst in Peperstraat, I had perfected my piano playing. But that man did perform in revue orchestras, though he could barely play. Every lesson he started with 'My grandfather's clock.'\n\n**Slaughtering a chicken**\n\nOne day, at the time the lesson was supposed to begin, Van der Elst was busy in his garden. He was slaughtering a chicken there and made me wait outside on the sidewalk. The animal hung from a tree and 'the fat one' chopped off its head. I found it so sad that I smashed my books on one of the spikes of the street gate at notary Rits's. After that, I never went back to Van der Elst for piano lessons.\n\nMy father eventually granted me that music study, just to stop the nagging. After the Evening Commercial School in St. Josefstraat, where I earned my Middle Management diploma from the friars, I was allowed to go to the Tilburg Conservatory. But I had to pay for that study myself. I did that by visiting the fairs in Brabant again. I was about 17-18 years old then. We were friends who went out to Breda, Tilburg, and those places. We stayed in a boarding house or with friends, like the son of the conservatory director of Tilburg, Overbeek. Our group of friends included: Antoon van Vught, the drummer Jan Meulensteen, violin, and Karel van de Velden as a double bass player. Van Asperen from Hintham played the banjo, and I myself played many instruments. For me, it was a necessity to be able to pay for my studies.'\n\n**Employment opportunities**\n\nDuring the period of unemployment relief, Jan was employed by the Social Service of the municipality as a music teacher. 'I taught at Concordia in the Boerenmouw, the former parish house of the Redemptorist fathers. These lessons consisted of learning notes and playing an instrument. My students were children of wealthy people or people who, for status, insisted on having a piano at home. In our family, there were six children, all of whom shared in the status of that piano!\n\nBut nothing special came of it, if you're talking about talent. Eventually, I was no longer allowed to study. It had already cost so much money...\n\nIt must have been approximately 1949 when I graduated from the conservatory for choir conducting and orchestra conducting. That's late due to the war which disrupted social life. The Conservatory was closed, so I had to complete the second part of my studies after the war. Once married - and even before that time - I was a piano teacher.\n\nFather sold the business to my - then - future wife, Jeanne van Druenen. From that time on, I increasingly focused on teaching.\nWith the orchestra, we performed here and there. That was still during the time of German music. There was nothing else during the war. English or England or English songs were not featured then. The genre of Richard Tauber played, and all pieces from German and Viennese songbooks. My father's office stationery also sold that music. In the first years of our marriage, I continued to create the window displays, and those songbooks were among the quarter editions of Smit Publishers from Amsterdam.\nBut I dared not enter a café to play music. My father would have beaten me out of it.'\n\n**Author**\n\nJan van Dijk is also known as the author of 'Rond De Geerlingse Brug', a book containing numerous anecdotes and facts about the neighborhood in which Jan grew up. In November 2004, he stated that he was working on a kind of tourist book about the city. Jan called it a VVV-like book.\n\n### Kantoorboekhandel Van Dijk & Van Hees verkocht/\n\nden bosch, 28 oktober 2004.\n\nAs of November 1, 2004, the - almost - hundred-year-old office stationery store of Van Dijk & Van Hees will come under new management. After twenty years, Piet Rijkers has transferred the business to Peter Emmen from Tilburg. This buyer from the office stationery trade will continue the business in the traditional manner.\n\n| | |\n| :--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | :--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |\n| *Piet Rijkers, who took over the business in 1984 from Jeanne van Dijk-van Druenen, is stopping due to health reasons.*\n| - photo © gerard monté, October 28, 2004. |  |\n\nDue to his health [rheumatism], the 55-year-old Rijkers is ceasing his business activities but will remain the contact person for Hinthamerstraat on behalf of Hartje 's-Hertogenbosch.\nThe office stationery business had gradually expanded from building 143 to 145 [Paulussen's forge] and finally to the cigar shop of Van de Boogaard at number 147.\nIn 1984, Piet took over the business, which was founded in 1907 by two brothers-in-law Van Dijk and Van Hees, from Jeanne van Dijk-Van Druenen. In the 1980s, the business at numbers 143-145-147 moved to number 131, where Van Mackelenbergh's hardware store was once located.\n\n---------------\n\n**De drukkerij van Van Dijk**\n\n\n\n*At the Zuid-Willemsvaart, in the part where the office of the Drie Mollen now stands, the printing company established itself. In that row of facades, the Mallant building once stood.*\n\n===================\n\n© paul kriele, november 2004\n\n"
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