This site is for my wife's family and contains Bishop, Mennenga, and a lot of Schans, a total of 2807 names. They all started out in The Netherlands, and generally settled in western Michigan, Canada and other places. My (Ron's) family files (Riemersma, Rietsma, Brouwer & Veen) has 5412 names.

Much of the information on this site came from "Our Schans Family From Smilde" by Henry Boersma and an unpublished report done by Pauline (Karsten) Bos that was supplied by Joel Bergsma. More recently a lot of help came from Jan Schans in Germany. And more comes in little bits & pieces through e-mails. My thanks to all. The Family Trees thing below should give you a good starting point for your searches.

Until I figure out how to add more files to this page, please click on The RootsWeb link below for Shirley's (or Ron's) Family. This can produce a lot of information, but you'll have to play around with it some if you're not familiar with how RootsWeb works. It can produce nice Descendants Report if you hit the right buttons. I figured it out quickly, so most anyone else can too. Click on the List button on that page to show all names there. Click on those names to get more information.

Please let me know if you see any errors, have more information, or have questions I may help you with. Ron Rietsma

• Shirley Bishop Rietsma's Family Tree (578 KB)
  Contains Bishop, Mennega, Schans and more
• Ron Rietsma's Family Tree (1193 KB)
  Contains Brouwer, Jansen, Veen, Riemersma, Rietsma and more

• Early Bishops (49 KB)
  Left: Aldert Bisschop (1836-1916) & Sytske Pot (1843-1921) Right: Foster A. Bishop (1874-1964) & Lucy Helmus (1874-1950) From Ken Bishop Collection
• Harm Mennega, 2 children, 2 grandchildren (52 KB)
  L-R: Egbertje (Betty) Mennega (1900-1962), Harm Mennega (1860-1942), Klaas Mennega (1896-1977), Margareta Staal. In front: Wubbina & Harry, children of Klaas. Photo found in Larry & Ann Bishop's house; names provided by Aaldert Mennega
• 32 Mennegas & family in Netherlands about 1907 (100 KB)
  Thanks to Gertrude Christensen for the photo and many names, and to Larry Lanting for more names.
• Martin Schans & Grietje Klok (about 1910) (58 KB)
  Martin Schans & Grietje Klok about 1910 (Thanks to Joel Bergsma & Jan Schans)
• Edward (Evert) Mennega & Johanna Schans & Family (150 KB)
  In front of their house on Division Ave. (Now an RV lot).
• Elbeltje Klok Schans 1862-1931 (171 KB)
  Elbeltje Klok Schans (1862-1931)
• Graves of some Mennegas in the Netherlands (147 KB)
  Harm Mennega, Wubbina Feijen, Angnietje Zantinge Mennega, Grietje Mennega (Photo from Gertrude Christensen)
• Evert (Edward) Mennega Family, late 1930s (50 KB)
  L-R Standing: Wubbina (Ann), Hilbert, Herman, Grace. Seated: Johanna (Schans), Evert, Evelyn

• Immigation Diary (10 KB)
  By Gertrude Christensen (nee Geertje Mennega) detailing her family's immigration to the USA by ship and train from the Netherlands to Michigan in April of 1950. (Permission to share this received from her 6 Nov 03, Thank you, Gert!). Note- This report had to be submitted to this site in .txt format. Sorry it's hard to read now. It was much better when Gert sent it to me.

• Ron Rietsma's family at FamilyTreeMaker
• More information for Shirl's family (worldconnect. rootsweb)
• Ron Rietsma's RootsWeb web pages

Ronald Rietsma
449 Robin Road
Hatboro, PA 19040-3137
United States
215-672-3831
rrietsma@msn.com

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