Three remarkable donations
The broad collection of Museum Maluku has been shaped by donations ever since the museum was founded in 1986. Institutions and private individuals, chiefly from the Moluccan community, donated objects or their archives to the museum. In the past the museum was glad of every donation, large or small. In the coming years our programming will focus on four subjects: living indigenous culture, the colonial period and decolonisation, Moluccans in the Netherlands, and art. The building of the collection will follow suit. Over the past months we have received some fine donations. I would like to mention three.
The estate of dr J.P. Nikijuluw
From Mrs Sarah-Joan Deetman Westerhuis of Alkmaar we received a poster of J.A. Manusama and objects and photographs from the estate of dr Jozef Pieter Nikijuluw, collected by her husband Huib Deetman, a cousin of Nikijuluw.
Dr J.P. Nikijuluw, born in 1898 in Ullath on Saparua, received his medical training at the Netherlands Indies Medical School (NIAS) in Surabaya. He graduated there in 1925. In 1934-1936 Nikijuluw spent his leave in the Netherlands and seized the chance to obtain the Dutch medical degree at Leiden University. After training as a gynaecologist in Vienna, Nikijuluw returned to the Indies in 1937 to work as a government doctor. On 1 December 1946 he was appointed supervising physician at the municipal health service in Rotterdam. Municipal doctor Nikijuluw became known as the representative of the RMS government in the Netherlands. On 27 April 1950, two days after the proclamation, the RMS government appointed J.P. Nikijuluw as general representative abroad. For his work he set up the Bureau Zuid-Molukken (BZM) in the Bazaarstraat in The Hague, a stone's throw from Museum Sophiahof where we are now.
The estate contains books, slides and an album of family photographs. Also remarkable are the black top hat and waistcoat, possibly dating from his time in Vienna.
Photo: Dr J.P. Nikijuluw seated behind his desk with an RMS flag. The location may be the Bureau Zuid-Molukken in the Bazaarstraat in The Hague. Dated July 1950
The estate of Wies van Groningen (1929-2022)
On 30 December 2022 Wies van Groningen died in her home town of Utrecht at the age of 93. Wies had been a volunteer at the Moluks Historisch Museum in Utrecht since the early 1990s. Later in life she began writing books, among them 'Clara Hukom: verhalen van Blangkedjerèn', 'Mijn vader zat ook bij het KNIL' and 'Holland ligt niet dicht bij de hemel', which she wrote together with Christien Hetharia, also a former volunteer at Museum Maluku. In 2021 Wies van Groningen published 'vertellingen uit een koloniaal verleden'. A number of copies of this last publication, along with a box full of books about Moluccans and the Moluccas, were donated by her daughter Saskia van Groningen. Through the good offices of Mr Jack Lanting and Ms Lilian Domenie, Wies's neighbours in her block on the Hartingstraat in Utrecht, Museum Maluku has gratefully received the bequest.
The private archive of Ron Habiboe
The Moluccan historian drs Ron Habiboe donated his private archive to Museum Maluku in February 2023. The archive covers close to 7 metres of archive material and press cuttings from Dutch newspapers and newspapers from Ambon up to the year 2000. Habiboe clipped the papers by keyword: Moluccas, Moluccan, Moluccans, Dutch East Indies, Indo, Indo-Dutch, Indonesia and VOC. An important part is formed by the archive material of Infodoc Maluku from 1999-2003. Infodoc was founded by Habiboe, and together with historian Wim Manuhutu, Infodoc Maluku collected all the news about the civil war in the Moluccas and served as a mediator of humanitarian aid. Infodoc contains, among other things, an extensive news overview including the international and Indonesian media, articles, reports, correspondence, lectures and project proposals for emergency aid and reconstruction. Habiboe's private archive is now being inventoried and described by volunteer Caro Matulessya, archivist at the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam. Part of Infodoc will soon be included in a digitisation project to be scanned digitally.
Huib Akihary Head of collections & curator
