Ode to Alida Maria Prumers | It's Daatje's Day!

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Amsterdam, November 8, 1887/2024

Dear Daatje,

'There you sit, in the red-and-black robe, bent by the burden of a century and not so clear-headed anymore.' I will read something like that, tomorrow, in the newspaper, on the occasion of the celebrations of your hundredth birthday at the Civil Orphanage. That is what I also see in the photo of you on this day, when you have been staying in our loving 'Huys' for almost 90 years. From this side, I too would like to congratulate you on this day.

As an employee of the Amsterdam Museum, which has also long been allowed to reside in the same House, I am aware of the many other orphan girls who would be totally forgotten without the objects in the museum's collection. In particular, the many samplers and darning rags produced here attest to the special orphan existence. But in deciding which orphan I want to dedicate a heartfelt tribute to, I still fall for your portrait; the only real portrait of a civilian orphan girl, known by name, to be found in the museum collection. 

I think it is even the oldest photographic portrait of an orphan girl here in the museum! Today you know national fame, but in the coming decades there won't be so many words dedicated to you. Certainly not an ode! And that may well happen. Because I do think you are a very special Daatje! And that makes this autumn day a very special one.

Yes of course, you might object that by now we have pictures with lovely young ladies, also in those striking black-and-red costumes of the middle-class, in the spring of their promising lives. But those photographs have never achieved the status of museum objects! Of course we have those postcards from around 1900 in the collection, as well as the graceful creatures in the paintings of Max Liebermann, Therese Schwartze and Nicolaas van der Waay. But you know as well as I do, those are all idealized images, models - not a real orphan girl like you! We both know, real life in our House is less poetic than we see in these pictures. 

Still, I also think that when someone lives to be over 100 years old, 90 of them in the Civil Orphanage, it says something about the quality of life here, the excellent care. We may even stay here all our lives! What I discover, in beholding your kind smile: that the living conditions in the orphanage can keep the residents happy and healthy. I think we have it pretty good here, right? What a fine city this is, where such a thing is possible. 

Many people keep claiming that you are intellectually challenged and saying that you suffer from “mental retardation". But well, you know what I think, Daatje? You are much more than that! What amazes me and other fellow orphans is not only your toughness, but also the baffling thought that in 1813 you saw the little boy Jan van Speijk enter the orphanage as an 11-year-old and that in the following years you saw his status grow into that of a national hero... While we can also see him as a war criminal, can't we? So many idiots are walking around in this world. Give me Daatje any day! You symbolize for me all those (almost) forgotten sweet orphans. And now I think about it: as far as I know, not a single portrait photo of our national hero has been left, just imaginative depictions.

Much love from your fellow orphan, Maarten

Sources

1) Amsterdam City Archives, Archives of the Civil Orphanage, Access Number 367.C, Inventory Number 1263, Gelukwensen en krantenknipsels betreffende de honderdste verjaardag van weesmeisje Alida Maria Pruimers, 1887

2) https://www.delpher.nl/ (newspaper articles from 1887 by keywords ‘Daatje’ and ‘Burger Weeshuis’)

2) Het Burgerweeshuis der stad Amsterdam. Herdenkingsboekje ter gelegenheid van het 400-jarig bestaan van de Stichting, samengesteld door den oud-burgerwees B. de Ridder (Stadsdrukkerij Amsterdam, 1920), p36-37.

3) B. de Ridder, ‘De vroegere klederdracht der Burgerwezen’, in: Ons Amsterdam, August 1965, p250

4) R. Meischke, Amsterdam Burgerweeshuis (Staatsuitgeverij, ’s-Gravenhage 1975), p68-69, 93

5) Ben Endlich, 450 Jaren Burger-Weeshuys (Aspect, Soesterberg 2002), p334