12 april 2013 · Yellowknife, NT, Canada ·

Derk and Audry Kaemingk’s only son Peter Kaemingk
From Kakabeka Ontario Canada

What is sooo cool I think, is that Peter and Wendy’s son is now a preacher in the Rainy River District, where many of the Kaemingh clan resides.
Derk Kaemingk, our cousin, (his dad and my dad are brothers) also began his life with a young Dutch bride he met in the Rainy River District.

Derk and I now live in the same neighbourhood here in T. Bay Ont.

writen by Ada Shortreed 

The little church our family attended all during German occupation of Holland, in early 1940s
Still there, due conservation of the area, including our farm home, and neighbouring area.

I met Brian and friends on the train station and from there we drove to meet Ida at the first family farm, which has been since 1978 of here parents, where I visited myself also frequently.

Ida and I are double family, her father was a brother of my grandfather(96) and her mom(91) is a sister of my grandma(92).

we started and met Ida at the Hassink Farm
(for photo’s click here (for sale now)

this ‘Family Tree’ was planted during a Kaemingk-familyday there,
in summer 2006 where both Ida and I were too.

Luckily everyone had the same idea about how many time to spend together, so all day we were spending together with visiting farms, driving and taking photo’s as if we were tourists, but the most beautiful part:

We weren’t tourists, we all felt home at all the farms where only our ancestors had been, living, where they raised our (great)(grand)parents. And one where Ida had been growing up too.

Brian and I share the same great-greatgrandparents
they must have been great … Pioneers !

We have seen all around Hassink (where older Kaemingk generations have lived and being raised too, like Johan Gerrit too, one of the 12 children, from which Englebert is Brians greatgrandfather and Hendrik Jan mine)

On our way to the Teesink farm we came across the farms where Hanna & Liza have been living too.

The Teesink farm, is where all 12 children of Theodor Johann & Johanna Hendrika have been born and raised until they moved and or emigrated:  to USA: Englebert & Ted and to South Africa: Gerrit and to Canada: Arnold)
Later on Johan Gerrit, took over the Teesink farm.

From there we moved on to Broekhuis,
where the new owners were home and invited us to look inside,

which still had much the same or even traces of the past.

My grandfather and Ida’s father grew up here and so did Ida herself and her brothers and sisters.

Then it was time for lunch, and we headed for a “Pannenkoekenhuis” the one with the best pancakes in Holland.

On our way there we went in business

After the pancakes we went to church

The smallest one in all Holland
(the only one which fits in 1 picture)

We decided at this hour that,
now we are doing the Kaemingk tour,
we should do ALL, so there we went,
crossing the border with Germany

The story which my grandfather told us very often
that in this town, this road is the border, (still is)
and in the past they sold flowers on both sides of the streets and the signs were “Bloemen te koop” (in Dutch) and on the other side  “Blumen zu kauf” (in German)

 so the question is:
On which side of this street they lived?
Are our roots Dutch or German?

So there we went for ice cream, in the German part,
because it is typical Dutch to get your stuff where it is the cheapest I took Malaga taste which at us is called “Boerenjongens” (farmerboys) as long as I remember when we went for ice cream with my grandparents they took this one.. Brian discovered why
also without the ice cream it is a often given gift at birthdays in our Kaemingk family

Just after war time the price difference were the opposite, then coal got smuggled from Holland, by putting them in Footballs and kicking them over the border into Germany, which was forbidden but tolerated. (this story (in dutch and german) on the sign next to statue made for the oldest citizen a man at that time 102 years old, who wished to honor the smugglers

The greatgrandparents, and their descendants
of our great-greatgrandfather were all born in this town.
the one most far back in history was born in 1767

“wir gehen fahren zu Friedhof”
In this town we went to cemetary,
in search of relatives, all we found was it was updated
and only recent graves far relatives which the last name is spelled
“Kemink” (photo’s later)

From there we went back in Holland, to Ida’s house,

where she has very old family photo’s and letters
(see other posts in Family History)

And in the end of the day back home and to the train.

We all had a wonderful day!

Just a memory to share with you.. Last Christmas we picked up my grandparents to have once again a lovely Christmas Diner with them, for more than 10 years we’re telling eachother.. it just might be the last Christmas that we can share with them   because they get older and older.. one of the passions of my grandpa (oldest Kaemingk alive as far as we know) was years ago making, and lately only talking about the family-tree that he made.. last year he commented that he is too old to keep up “with all that family-stuff” and I dicided to take it over.. and i use facebook to help me find all of you

… my grandpa was telling years and years stories about uncles that had (he knows all in details) this amount of children and named all the names in order and well.. there came all the time that story about that one uncle he never met, because that uncle went to America before he was born.. another one went too, but that one came back one time.. but Englebert he never met… years ago, he went to Canada, met some Kaemingks there and one of them helped my grandpa to get the american info for the familytree.. Last year septembre thanks to facebook i got some info and arranged a meeting.. not just with me but especially for my grandpa..

because it just might be the last possibility to have this meeting..
1 week after the meeting my grandpa got a call from a friend who received a church (the other passion of my grandpa) newsletter and in that newsletter they mentioned a person with the same last name Kaemingk. the lady asked my grandpa if this was family and he could happily say : “Yes and we met him last week”.. 3 weeks they’ve been enthousiastic.. but grandpa had a surgery to have too in that month.. and although he was cool about it, you never know what happens.. so since then.. i visit them weekly, i did’nt hear nothing about it or any family info anymore.. as if he had let it go.. it was too much for him.. often he is tired.. (happy to still be together with my grandma but sadly she is forgetting a lot and keeps him busy more than he can handle (now that is been taking care of)

but when we picked them up for Christmas Diner.. we took care of grandma.. and Grandpa took the chance to talk all evening and on a certain moment it came on beautyfull memories from that year.. he forgot how it happened but he started to tell us the story that ended with the story of the lady and started with telling my mom:” did you know who we met? were you there with us? I don’t remember good…. my mom reminded him that i was there.. “Oh Yeah he said.. we met a very far cousin.. his name is Matthew he is same age as Judith..one of the great grandchildren of Englebert, the uncle that i never met.. so I kind of met all the ‘family-lines’ now.. so Judith and him are in the same line to my grandfather.. 3rd degree..where she found him i don’t understand but We were so excited!! and he is from the same church!! so Englebert seemed to ended up good there in the States..   than the story of the lady came and they were both so happy, grandma confirmed “yes you spended many many hours, days, months! at the typewriter to make that familytree and now you finally met one Kaemingk of that “lost” uncle of yours.. and my grandpa continued.. “but i forgot where we met, so i reminded him: “at a birthday of another first degree cousin of mine.. because it was like old days.. going unexpected to visit my grandparents, then they were not home.. so we called and we joined you there.. this made it also happen to meet more cousins of mine.. oh yeah, my grandpa followed his story.. that this meeting could happen to us at 94 & 91 years of age.. i never expected it anymore but this was the best experience this year!

written 6 januari 2014

photos of septembre 2013

Top row: Willem, Gerrit, Hendrik, Engelbert, Liza

Middel row: Herman, Johan (the smaller one), Grandfather, Grandmother, Hanna (the little girl), Lyda

3rd row sitting: Arnold, Grada, Ted

updated in 2015

red details added 2019

This Teesink farm, the story goes (we have to check some details though) that our shared Opa Theodor Johann lived here with his 12 children before they moved to ‘anywhere around the world’

is in making process offline,

in the future, when at least the paper version is completed digital,

the family tree will be uploaded here.

visible for family only

and only those who are okay with publishing this details

for any questions please email me at:

kaemingk.familytree@gmail.com