The University of Twente launched in 1964 as the first campus university in the Netherlands. The idea was that of civitas academia, an academic community where even first-generation students would feel at home. On campus there would be peace and regularity, with a focus not only on studies, but also on cultural development and living together. The establishment of student associations in the form of sports and cultural clubs was encouraged, but corporal associations were kept out. There was an effort to integrate technical and social sciences, and in 3.5 years, students could pass the baccalaureate, which in principle made them ready for a job in business.
The story of the early years of the then Technische Hogeschool Twente is well documented. What is less clear is how all the ideals of the founders turned out in practice. The Archive Department of the LISA (Library, IT Services & Archive) department has set up an oral history project in collaboration with Stichting Universiteitsfonds Twente, in which about 20 students from the first batch are interviewed about their experiences between 1964 and 1972. Why did students choose Twente, what were their expectations? How did female students experience their time on campus? What did studying at UT and the process of coming of age on campus give students of that time? An interesting area of tension is the desire to prepare students better for social life than was common at technical universities, while at the same time housing and educating them on a campus far from the city.
Marjan Beijering (History Lab) supervised the project. About five interviewers (almost all members of GEWIS, the association of UT pensioners) attended oral history workshops and worked closely with UT’s video team, which lent recorders and secured the recordings afterwards. Arjan van Hessen helped work with ASR. By the end of September 2023, 20 oral history interviews will be ready, recorded on audio and including permission for inclusion in archives, metadata, summaries. Some of the interviews will also be recorded on film. Interviewer Martin Bosker will use some of the interviews as the basis for his podcast Campuswalks.
An overview of the interviews can be found on the Atlasvanooit
The interviews can be found on Youtube with the search terms “Atlas van Ooit interviews vuurwerkramp”
On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the commemoration of this disaster, a series of interviews with people involved were made between 2018 and 2019. Marco Krijnsen, public historian and journalist portrayed 23 people who were affected by this disaster. The interviews give a good picture of the experiences during and after the disaster of both residents of the neighborhood and various other people involved including a journalist, a police officer, a firefighter, the widow of a firefighter who died, a factory manager, a head of social affairs and an alderman.
Some individuals spoke for 15 minutes and others for an entire hour. One thing is certain: those involved take center stage and get to tell their stories.
The beautifully situated Oxerhof estate, under the smoke of Deventer, harbors a dark and well-hidden wartime past, only fragments of which have become common knowledge over time. The estate was requisitioned by the occupying forces in 1943, officially it was a hospital for SS soldiers, but in reality it was school for secret agents who had to gather information in Allied territory. A spy school. From November 1944, the Oxerhof became an SD prison where resistance fighters and deserters were incarcerated. In total, there were around two hundred prisoners and more than a hundred did not survive the war. The last 10 prisoners in the Oxerhof, a few hours before liberation by Canadians, were gruesomely murdered.
Around 2009, Huub van Sabben conducted fourteen interviews on this subject with different people for a book. The Oxerhof is central to these interviews. The interviews can be found in Collection Overijssel
The collection has not yet been digitized and therefore cannot be viewed directly at Sound & Vision. Digitization can, however, be requested from Sound & Vision via: zakelijk@beeldengeluid.nl
The interviewees are all people from Utrecht who talk about their experiences in daily life and work during the occupation period 1940-45. They discuss: the German invasion in May 1940, raids in Utrecht and the NSB. Leo van Rhenen conducted the interviews out of interest in (daily) life in Utrecht during World War II.
The interviews have not yet been digitized and therefore cannot be viewed directly at Beeld & Geluid. Digitization can, however, be requested from Sound & Vision at: zakelijk@beeldengeluid.nl
The idea for the interviews and the three-part documentary series is based on the book: The First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Kosovo, Phillip Knightley, Johns Hopkins University Press, ISBN: 9780801869518
The interviews were made on behalf of the three-part documentary series De waarheid ligt op het slagveld (16mm film), which Roelof Kiers made for VPRO television about the role of reporters in various wars. Jan Blokker, a Dutch journalist, also helped to create the series. The documentaries was broadcast on November 26 and December 3 and 10, 1978 and lasted a total of 5 hours and 45 minutes. In the VPRO guides of the weeks in which the series was broadcast, background articles relating to the episode under discussion were included.
The first episode, subtitled “…or should I hold my tongue?”, features an interview with Ross Munroe in addition to an overview of reporting from the Crimean War through the Vietnam War. Munroe, a Canadian war correspondent, talks in the interview, among other things, about the raid on Dieppe in August 1942 and what he had to consider in his reporting at the time. The second episode, titled “It was all rock and roll,” incorporates interviews with American reporters of the Vietnam War: Peter Arnett (Associated Press), David Halberstam (New York Times; Pulitzer Prize winner), photographer Tim Page (Life, Time) and CBS television reporter Jack Laurence. The third installment, “Bitte, berichten Sie,” features excerpts from Kiers’ conversations with some of the journalists who provided news coverage on the side of Nazi Germany during World War II. They were then united in the so-called Propaganda Kompanien (PK): Katzke (cameraman east front), Riegger (leader PK team west and east front), Stephan (leader department PK press Propagandaministerium), Viertel (radio reporter east front) and Heysing (journalist west and east front). Interviews that were not included in the series are the interviews with PK reporters Nannen and Ritter von Schramm.
All interviews can be found on the Sound & Vision website.
The interviews were conducted for the VPRO television film Socialisme met een menselijk gezicht, which was never broadcast. The interviewees talk about Eurocommunism and the implications of the Cold War. They are all ex-communists and/or Eurocommunists. In particular, the Eastern European among them were expelled from the respective communist parties as dissidents at some point in their countries of origin. All interviews can be found on the Sound & Vision website. The interview with Djilas was conducted in Serbian, the other interviews in English, German or French.
Interviewees:
Type interview: journalism
This collection has not been digitalized and can therefore not be viewed directly by Beeld & Geluid. Digitization, however, can be requested from Beeld & Geluid at: zakelijk@beeldengeluid.nl
In DAAN, the digital archive of Beeld & Geluid the following item can be found: Jean Rouch en zijn camera in het hart van Afrika 14-03-1978 NOS, Bregstein’s film for which the interviews were used
The interviews were made on behalf of Bregstein’s television film Jean Rouch en zijn camera (1978) about French filmmaker and ethnologist Jean Rouch (1917-2004). Rouch was an idiosyncratic director, often starting a new film without a clear approach. Initially, he recorded as much material as possible with uninterrupted shots. Then this realistic material was incorporated into a film, which characterized the cinéma verité. Rouch spent most of his life in Niger.
In the interviews, Rouch talks, among other things, about his insights regarding film, the use of different types of cameras and about his work at the Musée de l’Homme in Paris. He also tells Bregstein, as they drive through Niger in a car, about the country and his contacts with it. In addition, Bregstein speaks with several Nigerian individuals who have worked with Rouch.
The following individuals were interviewed:
The interviews are in French.
The collection will be public and accessible during 2023. The collection can then only be accessed in the reading room or listened to online via a protected environment (password required).
The files cannot be downloaded.
The interviews were conducted as part of Dirk Vlasblom’s publication Papua: a history. This book covers five centuries of Papua’s history, focusing on the period from 1945 onwards and with a special focus on the transfer from the Netherlands to Indonesia in 1962. The book focuses on the perspective of Papuans.
The interviews focus on events and experiences in the years 1920 – 2004.
They mainly discuss Indonesia and West Papua. Themes include World War II, Indonesian revolution, transfer to Indonesia in 1962, occupation.
The collection has been digitised and stored permanently at an e-depot.
Papoea: Een geschiedenis
Vlasblom, D.
University Press, Amsterdam, 2004
ISBN 90-5330-399-5
9 789053-303993
Dirk Vlasblom (1952) studied cultural anthropology in Utrecht. With a brief interruption, he has been a correspondent for NRC Handelsblad in Jakarta since 1990. He previously published Jakarta, Jakarta – Reportages from Indonesia (1993), In a warung on the South Sea – Stories from Indonesia (1998) and Anchors & Chains – A Rotterdam Chronicle (2001).
In a compelling way, the author tells the stories of Papua. For this, he drew on unique sources. Protagonists and eyewitnesses speak for themselves, often for the first time. The archives of mission and mission were systematically researched for this book, also for the first time.
With this magisterial work, the author gives the Papuans their history.
The material can be requested via the online catalogue of UB Leiden. The recordings can be listened to in the Special Collections Reading Room.
IJzereef, W.T., De wind en de bladeren : hiërarchie en autonomie in Bone en Polombangkeng (Zuid-Sulawesi), 1850-1950. Proefschrift Groningen, 1994.
De Zuid-Celebes affaireKapitein Westerling en de standrechtelijke executies
Willem IJzereef
Uitgeverij de Bataafsche Leeuw B.V.
For his research on the history of South Sulawesi, in particular political-military developments during the Indonesian revolution, Willem IJzereef conducted some 15 interviews with former government officials and former military personnel.
Records of the interviews and research correspondence are also included in the archive.
The interviews focus on events and experiences in the years 1905 – 1986.
They mainly discuss Indonesia, South Sulawesi. Themes include World War II, Indonesian revolution, Domestic Administration, government officials, South Celebes affair.
Publications linked to the collection: IJzereef, W. (1984). The South Celebes affair: captain Westerling
and the summary executions. Batavian Lion.
Archive and inventory no: D H 1284. Thirteen cassette tapes have been transferred to the AV collection of the KITLV (D AUD 1085 – 1097)
The collection has not yet been digitized and therefore cannot be viewed directly at Sound & Vision. Digitization can, however, be requested from Sound & Vision via: zakelijk@beeldengeluid.nl
In DAAN, the digital archive of Sound & Vision the following item can be found: the documentary for which the interviews were made: De geschiedenis van een plek 14-05-1978 VPRO
Title: Geschiedenis van een Plek, concentratiekamp Amersfoort
Authors: Armando, Hans Verhagen en Maud Keus
Publisher: De Bezige Bij, 1980
ISBN: 9789023452683
The interviews were made for the three-hour documentary film History of a Place, which Hans Verhagen made together with Armando in 1978 for VPRO television about the concentration camp Amersfoort (municipality of Leusden). They approach their subject as the history of the (‘guilty’) site. Discussed are: the origins of the camp in 1939 as an army site for mobilised Dutch soldiers, its function as the German occupier’s concentration camp during World War II, its use as a repatriation camp the first months after liberation and as an internment camp for Dutch SS and NSB members immediately afterwards, its demolition in the late 1960s in favour of the new building for the De Boskamp Police Training Centre. The focus, however, is on the period when the camp served as a concentration camp for the German occupiers.
The film was broadcast as the final episode of the series Het gat van Nederland, on 14 May 1978. Many of the interviews are partly conducted walking, including a film camera, through the area around the camp.
As ex-prisoners, Van Dam, Kleinveld, Molenaar, Zoetmulder, Wolders, Van den Burg, Van den Berg, Robeer, chaplain Slots and Schols recount their experiences in the camp. They had mostly ended up there because of resistance activities. They talk about the camp executioners Berg and Kotälla, among others. Also
The following are also interviewed: the contractor who built the barracks in 1939 (Herzinger); the caretaker of the cemetery near the camp, who buried the dead from the camp but also smuggled the living from the site (Jansen); a municipal worker from Leusden who helped prisoners escape whenever possible,
sending letters etcetera (Schut); the son of the owner of Hotel Oud-Leusden, which had been requisitioned by the Germans during the occupation period and was located right next to the camp (Jets); the house painter who painted the barracks both in 1939 and in 1945, shortly after liberation (Van Hoven); the camp’s Amersfoort vegetable supplier (Van Zomeren); the demolisher of the last barracks in the late 1960s (Van Essen); the German Engbrocks, who had been living in the Netherlands for some time before the war, and who was trained as a punishment to become an SS camp guard in Amersfoort in 1941, and was called the “good German” by many prisoners because he tried to help them the employee of the Dutch Red Cross Van Overheem, who, especially in the last year of the war, tried to get as many food parcels into the camp as possible and who was called the ‘white angel of Amersfoort’ by the prisoners (she also played an important role in the camp in the few months it served as a repatriation centre for Dutch people returning from Germany); the camp commander after the liberation (Van Zwol); the director of the Police Training School De Boskamp, whose institute was established on the site in the late 1960s (Steenlaar); some unnamed students and a sports teacher from the police training school on the past of the site in short interviews.
Interviewees: Frans van de Berg, Jan van den Burg, N. van Dam, Willy Engbrocks, R. van Essen, H. Hertzinger, A. van Hoven, Evert Jansen, Martin Jets, Gerrit Kleinveld, Rev. O. Molenaar, mrs. van Overheem, Henk Robeer, Joep Schols, Arie Schut, Jean Slots, M. van Steenlaar, Hans Wolders, S.H.A.M. Zoetmulder, A. van Zomeren, C. van Zwol, some anonymous persons.