Coordinating a Dutch project

Pearl Beach resident Mr Klaas Woldring is coordinating a Dutch Migrant Experience project for the Dutch Australian Cultural Centre.

The centre is extending its earlier migrant history program, oral history interviews, by distributing a large number of questionnaires to principally first generation migrants of Dutch origin in NSW.

The Dutch migrant experiences are to be recorded for posterity.

"The results will be scanned and most of them displayed on our website but, of course, only with written permission by the migrants concerned," Mr Woldring said.

"We believe this to be a viable and increasingly popular method of research and publication.

"In this way migrants and their descendants can trace each other and the younger generation can discover their origins."

Mr Woldring said it was amazing how many people had links to the Netherlands.

"The Olympic Games demonstrated that", he said.

"We invite all Dutch migrants in NSW who haven't heard of this project as yet, or who are not members of clubs, to contact us and request a questionnaire package."

The Royal Australian Historical Society has also taken an interest in the project.

The society has organised a special one-day workshop in May, to be held in History House, to discuss Dutch migrant experiences in Australia.

"Nearly everyone knows about Abel Tasman and Dirk de Hartogh but the combined contributions of post-World War Two Dutch migrants to Australia, visible and invisible, is pretty substantial.

"We just want to record that for posterity," Mr Woldring said.

Press release, March 26