Dikes, Polders and brave boys

 Yesterday (Saturday) Elizabeth and I spent our time in quiet enjoyment of each other’s company. 

A lazy breakfast was followed by Elizabeth doing a little shopping.  Whilst she was away I did some Dutch language lessons. 

After lunch we took a fairly long walk along dikes and polders in a bracing breeze. Good fresh air and fun!

Those of you from outside the Netherlands might like to know that a polder is an area of low lying land (much of the Netherlands lies below sea level) that has been reclaimed from a body of water (usually the sea or a river) and is protected by dikes. So a dike is a flood barrier and a polder is the area that it protects from flooding.  Here are a couple of pics of the area we walked in.

Outside of the Netherlands many people are familiar with the (fictional) story of the boy with his finger in the dike. Do you know it? I remember hearing it at primary school. 

The story.
In 1865 the book “Hans Brinker and the silver skates”appeared in America. The author was Mary Elisabeth Mapes (later Dodge). The book tells the story of a poor Dutch family. A sick father, a mother who can just make ends meet and brother and sister who have no money to buy new ice skates. That is the common thread through the whole story: an ice skate competition in which brother and sister want to participate.

The book tells many details about life in the Netherlands. Some are correct, others are almost unrecognizable for those living in the Netherlands. The source of the book was a series of books about the Netherlands that had been published in the US and possibly also stories in the family of the writer. One of her grandfathers was a Dutch immigrant who left for America in 1789. When Mapes wrote the book she had never been to the Netherlands. She wouldn't get there until after the book had become a big sales hit.

The story ends well. Father heals and the silver skates are won.  The family also appear to have money and Hans later becomes a renowned doctor.

However, what does this story have to do with the boy who put his finger in the dike? 

This boy, the son of a lock keeper, saw a trickle of water running from the dike, which could have been the start of a major dike breach. So what did he do, he put his finger in the dike and lay there like that all night. With this he saved Haarlem (the story takes place in this city) and he became world famous. At least, famous through Mapes' book. In the book “the silver skates” this story is briefly told in a school class (as it was to me). The boy's name is Peter and that is almost all we learn about him. Because the main character in the book is called Hans Brinker, the boy with his finger in the dike has come to be called that. However, that is not correct, it is a story within a story and Hans Brinker was therefore not the boy who would have saved Haarlem.

The story of the boy and the dike was unknown in the Netherlands Before Maples wrote about it. So it is not part of historical or folklore stories here. The general view among Dutch historians is that it was largely invented by Maples herself.  There are no sources in the Dutch archives that a boy ever prevented a dike breach in this way. 

But there is a possible link to an historic event.  In the ecclesiastical archives of Spaarnedam (a place near Haarlem) the name of a lock keeper, Klaas Brinquer is recorded. He had two sons.

One of them had the name Johannes (Hans).

Hans Brinquer is well known here as the boy, who at the age of 13 behaved extremely courageously during a near dike breach in 1646 and with a few others prevented a disaster.

Could this be the basis of the story from Mapes? The leading role in her book is Hans Brinker. I guess we will never know.

As I sit in Wormer, which like 26% of The Netherlands is below sea level, I know I am very grateful to the engineers who built  the dikes and to those who maintain them.

Moving on….

 For various reasons I did not get any cycling practice done. But I have plans to do it tomorrow (Sunday).

Elizabeth prepared a lovely dinner of beef steak for me and nut burger for her. Lekker!

Then we relaxed with our iPads until bedtime. 

More adventures tomorrow….