VanderPloeg, Taaktje (Mrs. Tjasse) 1855-1940

VANDERPLOEG, VALK, BEKEMA

Posted By: Lydia Lucas - Volunteer (email)
Date: 7/15/2022 at 08:05:08

From the Sioux Center News, January 2, 1941:

MRS. T. VANDER PLOEG PASSES AWAY

The oldest member of the First Ref. Church passed away at her home Sunday at the age of 85 years. She was ill for several weeks preceding her death and in a coma for twenty-seven hours. Funeral services were held in the First Church Tuesday. Bearers were all grandsons of the deceased.

She came to America with two children in 1882 and to Sioux Center in 1883. Ten children were born here and ten survive. They are Mrs. J. D. Rozeboom of Steen, Mrs. Henry Van Roekel, Nick Vander Ploeg, Charles Vander Ploeg, Mrs. Dick Raak and Mrs. Teunis Den Herder all of Sioux Center, Mrs. G. Huitink of Orange City, Mrs. R. J. Lubbers of Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin, who was here for the funeral, John of Yucaipa, Cal. and William of Hospers’

Fannie, a daughter, died about 41 years ago, at the age of 12 years, and another infant died before they moved from Alton to Sioux Center. Her husband preceded her in death in February 1930.

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From the Rock Valley Bee, January 3, 1941:

WAS PIONEER MOTHER—SAW RAW PRAIRIE

Mrs. T. Vander Ploeg of Sioux Center, grandmother of James Vander Ploeg, of Rock Valley, passed away Sunday at the age of 85 years.

Coming to this country from the Netherlands in 1882, and to Sioux Center the following year, 1883, Mrs. Vander Ploeg saw Sioux county develop from raw prairie land to one of the most productive farming communities in the world. When she came to the Sioux Center vicinity from Alton where the family first located, very little land had been broken in the center of the county. Practically all of it was still waving prairie grass.

Mrs. Vander Ploeg was the oldest member of the First Reformed church of Sioux Center, perhaps the largest church congregation in the county. Her husband died in 1930. An infant child died in 1882 and in 1901 a daughter, Fannie, passed away, but ten children survive the pioneer parents. They are also survived by 54 grandchildren and 21 great grandchildren—a total of 85 direct living descendants.

The surviving children are Mrs. J. D. Rozeboom, Steen, Minn.; John Vander Ploeg, of Yucaipa, Calif.; Mrs. Rev. R. Lubbers, Sheboygan Falls, Wis.; Mrs. G. Huitink, Orange City; Wm. Vander Ploeg, Hospers; Nick and Charles Vander Ploeg, Mrs. Henry Van Roekel, Mrs. Dick Raak and Mrs. Teunis Den Herder, all residents of Sioux Center and vicinity.

Funeral services were held on Wednesday, the last day of 1940, at the church of which she was so long a member, the First Reformed, with Rev. L. A. Brunsting conducting the service. Grandsons were the pallbearers.

Transplanted, as a young women only 27 years old, from the old ways and customs of the old country into a raw prairie land where very existence had to be wrong out of the new-broken sod and a sodded house for protection against the wintry blasts was a Godsend, no honor is too high, no words eloquent enough to describe the high moral qualities, strength of character and sheer courage, of such a heroine of the prairies as Mrs. Vander Ploeg was. Memory of her will ever remain bright and untarnished in the minds of all who knew her.

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RESEARCH NOTES

Her death certificate gives her birth date as March 14, 1855 and her death date as December 29, 1940, 1:15 p.m.; cause, hypostatic pneumonia, duration 24 hours; due to old age – cardiac failure, duration 2 years; due to arteriosclerosis. A note underneath says “Over,” but there is no back page available online.

The Sioux County Cemetery Index merely says: Vander Ploeg, Mother, 1855 d. 1940 Memory Gardens Sioux Center IA.

Her FindaGrave.com page has Taaktje Valk Vander Ploeg, born 13 March 1855 in Uithuizen, Eemsmond Municipality, Groningen, Netherlands; died 31 Dec 1940 in Sioux Center; buried in Memory Gardens, Sioux Center. Spouse Tjasse Willem Vander Ploeg (1954-1930, married 1879). Ten children listed.

WieWasWie.nl has a birth index record for Taaktje Valk, born 13 March 1855 in Uithuizen, parents Klaas Valk, age 32, a cooper, and Altje Nannings Bekema.

WieWasWie.nl also has a marriage index record for groom Tjasse van der Ploeg, age 25, a mill-hand, born in Godlinze gem. Bierum, parents Tjark van der Ploeg and Rendsiena Mulder; bride Tjaaktje Valk, age 24, born in Uithuizen, parents Klaas Valk and Aaltje Nannings Bekema; married in Uithuizen 14 May 1879.