Nuenen

Nuenen (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈnynə(n)]) is a town in the municipality of Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten in the Netherlands. From 1883 to 1885, Vincent van Gogh lived and worked in Nuenen. In 1944, the town was a battle scene during Operation Market Garden. The local dialect is called Peellands. In 2009, Nuenen had a population of 22,437.[1]

Nuenen
Town
Nuenen, windmill: de Roosdonck
Nickname(s): 
Mooiste dorp van Nederland
Nuenen
Location in North Brabant in the Netherlands
Coordinates: 51°28′24″N 5°32′48″E
CountryNetherlands
ProvinceNorth Brabant
MunicipalityNuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten
Population
 (December 30, 2009)
22,437
Nuenen, church de Sint Clemenskerk

History

Nuenen is listed in the 1792 Gazetteer of the Netherlands, which lists it as "a village of Brabant, two leagues W. from Helmont".[2]

World War II

During Operation Market Garden on September 20, 1944, Nuenen was the scene of a battle involving the American 506th PIR of the 101st Airborne Division and the British 15th/19th The King's Royal Hussars of the 11th Armoured Division equipped with Cromwell tanks, against the German 107th Panzer Brigade.[3] The British lost two tanks, and four American and three British soldiers were killed. The Germans suffered two fatalities. The fight is dramatised in episode 4 "Replacements" of the television series Band of Brothers.

Dialect

The spoken language is Peellands (an East Brabantian dialect, which is very similar to colloquial Dutch).[4]

Notable residents

In 1882 Van Gogh's father became a pastor in Nuenen and the family lived at the vicarage there. After a stay in Drenthe for several months, Van Gogh moved to live with his parents in December 1883 and stayed there until May 1885.[5] Vincent van Gogh resided in Nuenen from 1883 to 1885. During that time he painted many character studies of peasants and weavers that culminated in The Potato Eaters, and paintings of still life. He also painted his father's church, vicarage and its garden, one such work being Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen (Het uitgaan van de hervormde kerk te Nuenen) depicting the church, which is situated in a park area on the corner of Papenvoort Street and Houtrijk Street in the north of Nuenen.[6] This painting was stolen from the Van Gogh Museum in December 2002 and recovered in Italy in September 2016. There is a street named after it in the town, as well as a cafe, college and bar. A statue of Van Gogh is located in the central park of the town.

Theoretical computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra lived in Nuenen later in his life, and died there in 2002.[7] The following year, the ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) PODC Influential Paper Award in distributed computing was renamed the Dijkstra Prize in his honour.

Dutch cyclist Steven Kruijswijk was also born in Nuenen and had lived there in his youth.

See also

References
  1. Bernd Holznagel; Arnold Picot; Sebastian Deckers; Nico Grove; Marc Schramm (9 August 2010). Strategies for Rural Broadband: An economic and legal feasibility analysis. Springer Science & Business Media. pp. 65–. ISBN 978-3-8349-8692-4.
  2. A Gazetteer of the Netherlands: Containing a Full Account of All the Cities, Towns, and Villages, in the Seventeen Provinces, and the Bishoprick of Liege, ... G.G. & J. Robinson. 1794. pp. 240–.
  3. Lydia Scholten Ott (1 May 2013). From Polders To Skyscrapers. Xlibris Corporation. pp. 96–. ISBN 978-1-4797-9144-6.
  4. Jos & Cor Swanenberg: Taal in stad en land: Oost-Brabants, ISBN 9012090105
  5. "The Vicarage at Nuenen, 1885". Permanent Collection. Van Gogh Museum. 2005–2011. Archived from the original on 2013-09-15. Retrieved 2011-05-15.
  6. David Hempton (1 December 2008). Evangelical Disenchantment: Nine Portraits of Faith and Doubt. Yale University Press. pp. 133–. ISBN 978-0-300-14282-2.
  7. "World-renowned University of Texas at Austin computer scientist Edsger Dijkstra dies" Archived 2016-10-26 at the Wayback Machine. University of Texas at Austin. Aug. 7, 2002
  • Media related to Nuenen at Wikimedia Commons
  • Nuenen travel guide from Wikivoyage

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