Krimpen aan de Lek, The Netherlands for Weathervane Wednesday

 This is the second time I have featured this weathervane here on Weathervane Wednesday!  

My 6th great grandfather, Michiel Ockers Hogerzeijl, was born in Krimpen aan de Lek on 18 July 1696, and was buried at this church after his death in 25 May 1779.  This 1425 church was demolished in 1939 and rebuilt, and his tombstone was moved to the chapel in the village cemetery.  However, the church retains a bit of my ancestor's history, since he was the commander of whaling ships, and the weathervane features a gilded whale! 

I first visited this village in 2017 with my distant cousin, Hans Hogerzeil.  You can read all about that trip HERE.  I featured the weathervane and the tombstone (see the links below).  This time, in April 2025 we were taking a river cruise around The Netherlands and Belgium and we sailed right by Krimpen aan de Lek and stopped nearby at Kinderdijk.  I was thrilled to see this village, and also the city of Dordrecht nearby, where Michiel Ockers Hogerzeijl's son, Simon Machielszoon Hoogerzeijl was buried, and where several other generations of my family lived until my 3rd great grandfather, Peter Hoogerzeil (1803 - 1889), immigrated to Beverly, Massachusetts in the 1820s.  

I loved my visit to Dordrecht and Krimpen aan de Lek in 2017.  I remember sitting in a restaurant with Hans and watching the river outside the window.  I kept seeing the river cruises go by, and I made a wish that maybe someday I would return and take one of those cruise tours of The Netherlands.  When we finally were able to make that wish come true, we did it during the tulip season, which was even extra fun!  

According to Wikipedia, the first mention of the name of this town in 1396.  The town is located nearby rotterdam, and in the 1700s the Van Holst whaling business was established here. Many Krimpen residents worked on board the ships, including my ancestor as a commander. He was a respected member of the community, and his impressive gravestone certainly verifies this!  

For the truly curious:

My previous blog post about Krimpen aan de Lek:     https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/02/in-footsteps-of-ancestors-touring.html   

Tombstone Tuesday featuring Michiel Ockers Hogerzeijl's gravestone in Krimpen aan de Lek:    https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/tombstone-tuesday-michiel-ockers.html  

Kerk aan de Lek website in English:  https://www.kerkaandelek.nl/locaties/   

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To cite/link to this blog post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Krimpen aan de Lek, The Netherlands for Weathervane Wednesday", Nutfield Genealogy, posted June 25, 2025, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2025/06/krimpen-aan-de-lek-netherlands-for.html: accessed [access date]). 

Zuiderkerk, Enkhuizen, The Netherlands for Weathervane Wednesday

 

The Zuiderkerk (Southern Church) is a protestant church in Enkhuizen, The Netherlands.  The church was originally Sint Pancraskerk (St. Pancratius) built in 1458.  The tower with the weathercock is owned by the town, and was restored in 1992. The first musical clock in this tower was installed in 1524. There are two bells in the tower which were installed in 1653. There is also a carillon of 52 bells connected to the keyboard of the organ inside the church.   The interior was rennovated in 2013 and 2014. 

We could see the weathercock on the church tower from the main square of Enkhuizen while we were touring the town a few months ago.  We even heard the church bells while we were having a tea break in a local cafe.  This old weathercock is a very old Christian symbol, dating back to Pope Gregory I (between 590 and 604 AD) who declared that every church should install the rooster as a symbol of Christianity.  Pope Nicolas made the decree official in the 9th century.  Many early churches took advantage of this decree to install weathercocks.  The rooster stayed as a popular weathervane over the centuries, still seen on churches and farms in Europe and in America. The oldest weathervane known to exist is the Gallo di Ramperto, in the Museo di Santa Guilia in Brescia, Italy (thought to date between 820 and 830 AD).  

For the truly curious:

Zuiderkerk website (in Dutch):   https://www.pgenkhuizen.nl/ons-gebouw/  

Southern Church, Enkhuizen at Wikipedia (in English):    https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuiderkerk_(Enkhuizen)   

Another weathervane seen in Enkhuizen:   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2025/05/enkhuizen-gatehouse-netherlands-for.html  

Click here to see over 550 more Weathervane Wednesday posts:   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/search/label/Weathervane%20Wednesday    

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To cite/link to this blog post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Zuiderkerk, Enkhuizen, The Netherlands for Weathervane Wednesday", Nutfield Genealogy, posted June 18, 2025, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2025/06/zuiderkerk-enkhuisen-netherlands-for.html:  accessed [access date]).