About me

My former working life:

I was born in Nederweert in the southern province of Limburg in the Netherlands in 1947. After graduating from high school, I moved to Tilburg to study at an arts and crafts school. My theoretical exams in 1969 were unsuccessful as my interests extended more toward activities surrounding greater democracy in the country.

I moved to Delft and started working part-time at the Delft University of Technology – Faculty of Architecture. Aside from this, I studied labor market policy (now HRM). I was active in the democratic movement too. Almost every student there was male in those days. I was elected as a member of the Faculty Council for the so-called non-scientific personnel, which was followed by taking a seat on the Faculty Board for two years: the first woman ever on a board at that university.

My portfolio included HRM and communications. Shortly after that the number of students increased enormously as a result of the baby boom after WWII: from 350 to 3000 students including many female students. I was asked to start a communications office.

After finishing my part-time study, I worked at the Employment Office in Rotterdam for a while.

On August 1, 1976 I became the first remunerated National Ombudswoman in The Hague, which had been a foundation of volunteers until that time. The aim of the foundation was to improve the situation of women in the job market and to improve their equal treatment. We were supported by female politicians: the so-called Kamerbreed vrouwen overleg (KVO) (consultations among the females in parliament – only twelve females in total in those days) and regularly wrote a column in Opzij, a feminist magazine.

After that, I became an HRM conference developer at Elsevier, an academic publishing company where I also headed the so-called HRM pre-master school.

After recovering from a burnout, my next job was as a communications consultant for the Provincial Executive of the Province of South Holland.

When I turned 57, the former minister of Internal Affairs, Remkes, was convinced that the civil service had become ‘too elderly’ so civil servants aged over 57 could take early retirement. That was great for me and I decided to return to Limburg. Actually, I didn’t really want to leave Rotterdam, the city where I had lived for over 25 years, but I preferred to return to the countryside.

I found a great little house – plus garden – in the village of Cadier en Keer, part of the municipality of Margraten. I spent my time painting, writing and hiking.

My second career:

In 2008, a national project was started: ‘Heritage of WWII: eyewitness stories’ in relation to the celebration in September 2009 of the 65th year of the Netherlands’ liberation.

Part of it was a course in ‘oral history’.  With the local heritage organization I started the ‘Fields of Margraten’ .

We decided to record interviews with farmers who had experienced how the US Army had – unannounced – brought thousands of dead bodies to their fields to be buried. Those were victims of the Battle of Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge. A huge cemetery known as the Netherlands American Cemetery was developed by the ABMC.

A short while later, I discovered that the US Army was completely segregated. This fact characterized my work until May 2023.

See Publications and Spin offs.