~By Robbie Snow

Joan Bloemsma Winklareth

The year is 1967. The location is the Winklareth house on Berea Court in Vienna, Virginia. Robert Winklareth, a civilian mechanical engineer with the Army, has returned home with his family after an overseas assignment that started in 1964.

The news of the Winklareth's return has quickly traveled the five miles to Knox church prompting a welcoming visit...

“I understand you're back” Rev. Ibach^*1 declared among boxes and crates when Joan and Bob Winklareth came back after five years in Germany.

He didn’t even let us get unpacked before he was visiting us and making sure we were coming back to Knox, laughed Joan Winklareth on a recent Saturday evening.

Moving was nothing new...

Moving was nothing new to Joan. Settling in one place for more than a couple of years was the big change. Joan was born in Jakarta, Indonesia (formerly Netherlands East Indies), to a Dutch physician who had been assigned to the Dutch colonies to pay off his college and medical school grants. It was supposed to be seven years of service, but it stretched into 15.

The Bloemsma family moved often when her father, who was in the Dutch East Indian military service, was transferred from one city to the next on the islands of Java, Celebes, Borneo and Sumatra.. In 1940, he had the papers in hand to immigrate to the United States, but it was 10 years before the family made it America.

We had no schooling...in the camps.

The biggest obstacle to their coming to America was World War II. Joan's father was conscripted by the Japanese and sent to Burma. Joan's mother and four kids were interned on Java and spent two years interned in Bandoeng, where they still lived in houses. Joan was 10. Then they were transported to Jakarta and lived in barracks for two more years. Joan said of her time in the internment camps "We survived even though we suffered from beriberi and hunger edema²."  Joan turned 15 on the ship "New Amsterdam" that transported her family to Holland.

"After we got back to Holland, my sister and I went to school. We had no schooling for the four years we were in the camps."

The family finally made it to the United States in 1950. Joan was 19 years old.

The family settled in the Washington, DC area because of all the Embassies. My father could speak many different languages and so the embassy people were a given client base for him to set up a practice here.

But my father thoroughly investigated Bob...

1950 - A smiling 19 year old Joan after her first hair "perm"

It wasn’t too much longer after their arrival in Washington that Joan met Bob Winklareth at a dance on the roof of the YWCA. Bob was a member, because that was the only place Arthur Murray was giving dance lessons. It was a whirlwind courtship, laughed Joan. We met in April, got engaged in June, and were married in November 1951. But my father thoroughly investigated Bob, in the mean time.

Joan and Bob started at Knox in 1953. They moved into the neighborhood to start their family and Knox was within walking distance. Four of the five Winklareth children, Linda, Frank, Phillip, and John, were all baptized at Knox. Marilyn, the oldest, was baptized at Chevy Chase Presbyterian before the family moved to Northern Virginia.

Joan is not inactive.

Even if she isn’t moving into and out of houses, Joan is not inactive. She is an avid gardener even now at Lake Ridge^*3, where she and Bob moved recently. She has found a spot to plant some roses and is heavily into container gardening. She also cross stitches and is an accomplished painter, having just moved into watercolors. She also likes to play bridge and is on several committees at Lake Ridge

 "I would have loved to go back to Indonesia, but..."

Postscript: When asked if she ever wanted to return to the place of her birth Joan replied "I would have loved to go back to Indonesia, but it is too late now: It is not a very safe place to visit!"

footnotes:
*1: Reverend Doug Ibach was a somewhat controversial pastor of Knox from 1967 to 1972
*2: Beriberi is a vitamin deficiency disease that can damage the heart and nervous system. edema is abnormal watery swelling of organs & tissue
*3: Lake Ridge. Westminster at Lake Ridge is a continuing care retirement community located about 22 miles (35km) South of Washington, D.C.near Woodbridge Virginia

~~Thanks to Robbie Snow for the above interview.
Robbie will be reporting each month of the life of one of our Knox women.