Penstraat (part 2)

Part 1 told the history of one of the oldest streets on Curaçao, mentioning among other things "The Government Premises at the Penn". This is the present Avila Beach Hotel, after which the Penstraat was named.

The English governors Cockburn and Layard officially stayed in the governor's house in Fort Amsterdam but preferred to be at The Pen, where they held their receptions in the lush tropical gardens. Part of these gardens was fenced off for the animals belonging to the house, as a result of which the name The Pen was henceforth used for the manor house. The author Bernadette Heiligers-Halabi mentions that in 1812 the English governor Hodgson decided he no longer wished to live in the dilapidated governor's house with its many leaks and moved permanently to the country house. After which all official documents were signed with the notation "at the Pen".

Dutch governors

The first Dutch governor after the English period, Albert Kikkert, visited the departing English governor "at the Pen" on his arrival in 1816. He had no wish to live there: the location lay too close to the sea, so that he could easily be attacked or kidnapped before help from Fort Amsterdam would arrive. But after Kikkert had visited the dilapidated governor's residence in Fort Amsterdam, he refrained from selling the government country estate and lived alternately there and in his house in Otrobanda. Kikkert was known, among other things, for his ban on painting houses in Willemstad white: the glare in the sun would be harmful to his eyes. Hence the origin of the cheerfully coloured buildings in the inner city. Of his successor Roelof Cantz'laar it is known that he left The Pen only twice a week to go and work in the governor's house in the city. The interim governors van Starckenborgh and Elsevier also lived at The Pen, and for a long time the ruin of the little house where an honour guard was stationed for the governor's security could be seen here.

Gungu Maal

The villa was later leased to the lodges Union no. 444 and De Vergenoeging and in 1880 bought by the father of Pieter Hendrik Maal, better known as "Gungu" Maal. Maal senior leased the house in 1917 to the teacher Antoine Pijpers, owner of the boys' boarding school — Internario Pijpers — which enjoyed great prestige in Venezuela, Colombia and Panama. The death of Pijpers in 1920 also meant the end of the school. Pieter Hendrik Maal Sr died in 1929; his daughter Mary inherited the house, which was divided into apartments where various families lived. In 1940 she sold the house to her brother Gungu, the surgeon and ophthalmologist who had studied medicine, gynaecology, surgery and ophthalmology in the Netherlands, Germany and England.

In 1935 he established here the Thelma clinic — named after his only daughter — for ophthalmology, gynaecology and skin transplants. With 20 beds, a fully equipped operating theatre and qualified nurses and medical facilities that his brother, the ear-nose-throat doctor Willem Pieter Maal, also used. The clinic was later leased to military personnel and also functioned as a guesthouse for expats.

In 1942 the clinic closed its doors, to start in 1949 as the Avila Beach Hotel, named after the Spanish city where Gungu had lost his heart. The versatile physician was also known for agricultural projects that he set up at San Juan, among others, and he was also involved in centralising prostitution and in the founding of the brothel Campo Alegre.

Whereas the first occupants of the house were members of the colonial administration, Gungu was in fact their fierce opponent. His protest against the colonial administration once led to a conflict with governor Piet Kasteel, as a result of which he ended up in prison. Gungu then placed an advertisement for his patients in which he stated that the doctor's surgery had moved to the prison…. This striking resident of Penstraat no. 100 died in 1961.

Art in Avila

In 1977 the hotel was bought by the Danish jeweller Nic Møller and drastically expanded to 150 rooms and suites in 5 buildings. In addition there were restaurants, bars, beaches, a shopping gallery, conference rooms, a tennis court and car park. The expansion of the hotel took place on the 10,000 square metres of land east of the original hotel building. A water-distillation plant stood there, which was demolished by the government, after which the terrain was leased to the hotel. The government also financed the construction of new piers and a beach at the hotel.

Møller, a great music lover and singer, also had a hall built for cultural events, reintroduced the name La Belle Aliance and ensured that Art in Avila took a special place in the artistic world on Curaçao. The artistic Møller died in 2015.

La Belle Aliance, which celebrated its 70th anniversary in 2019, is one of the longest-operating hotels on Curaçao and was the holiday residence of as many as 3 generations of the royal house. The characteristic main building with lobby and the cosy front terrace were spared during renovations.

The name The Pen lives on among older neighbourhood residents who prefer to say that they live "in the Pen" rather than give Nieuw Nederland as their address.

Ciro Galoppi

The Møller family lived in the converted house opposite the hotel, where Nic's Rolls-Royce stood on the driveway for years. It is now on display in the Avila Hotel.

A neighbour of the Møllers was another illustrious personality: the Italian businessman and fashion designer Ciro Galoppi, who made sure that the Venezuelan little ships got marble sales counters. He also donated a bronze monument to the Curaçao community, which can now be seen at the start of the Pietermaai District at the Waaigat.

On the site of the new apartment complex of the Avila Beach Hotel stood until 1987 the building of the old seawater distillation plant of the Landswatervoorzieningsdienst, the LWV, which also supplied the hotel with water. According to the LWV commemorative book 1928–1953 it first supplied untreated groundwater (intended as flushing water) for 2.50 guilders per cubic metre and distilled (drinking) water for 4 guilders per cubic metre. When it turned out that the poor population started drinking the untreated groundwater, the government decided to purify the groundwater and mix it with distilled water before offering it for consumption. The old water factory was replaced in 1950 by a new one at Mundo Nobo.

Next to the water factory stood two dwelling houses designed by Pieter van Stuivenberg. One survived the demolition of the water factory and for years was the home of Tone Møller, the daughter of Nick, who was once the manager of the Avila Beach Hotel.

Kurá di Kaluf

With the demolition of the water factory and the expansion of the hotel, the Kurá di Kaluf (Kaluf's yard), which was diagonally opposite Penstraat 77, also disappeared. The author Faroe Metry tells that the Lebanese ancestors of Antonio Kaluf had settled on Curaçao from Cuba. Around 1920 Antonio lived next to the water factory, where he built little houses that he rented out at a low price. He sold clothing door to door and often travelled to Bonaire, where he was known as Antonio Turko and did good business. After the death of his first Bonairean wife he settled permanently on the island, remarried a Bonairean beauty and was buried on Bonaire in 1950.

Young people

Diagonally opposite the Avila Beach Hotel, since 2012, stands the Boutique hotel Villa Tokara, a monumental building that until the end of the 19th century was still owned by the Capriles family. In the 1970s it was the home of the progressive youth movement Hubentut 70, whose activities were aimed at making local young people aware of their roots.

Shon Aura — Manita — Winkel, a pioneer in the field of childcare, started in 1965 at Penstraat number 55 with the girls' home "Casa Manita", forerunner of the foundation Casa Cuna Villa Maria, which celebrated its 65th anniversary in 2016.

De Goede Hoop

Further along the Penstraat stands "landhuis" De Goede Hoop, formerly really more a country residence. It is the most-sold property in the then Pietermaai, to which the Penstraat also belonged: according to Els Langenfeld as many as 15 times in half a century. Owners were Jewish businessmen, wealthy Protestants, an American, a Scot, an Englishman, a German and "the wealthy negro woman Dominga Thomas": on 3 October 1806 she bought Buena Esperanza, as it was then still called, for 900 pesos. It was she who gave the house the name De Goede Hoop when she sold it on 6 February 1810 for 1,300 pesos to Frederik Ernst König. The profit of 400 pesos was in those days the annual salary of a labourer. König sold it again after a year and a half, having converted two old rooms into a dwelling house and extended it with various outbuildings. Another remarkable resident was Geertruyda Berch, a fabulously rich woman who lent money with jewellery as collateral. Christel Monsanto tells: "In the time before official banks existed, that was the way for some residents to get money. In the inventory drawn up at Berch's death in 1826 I found the largest inventory ever of everything she had accepted as collateral. Besides jewellery, including a golden rosary, there were also (clothing) fabrics, bonds and even an occasional mortgage on a piece of land with buildings."

Besides De Goede Hoop, Berch also lived in the Breedestraat, where she ran a pawnshop. De Goede Hoop came from 1877 into the hands of Jesuah de Sola and remained in the possession of this family for more than 70 years until in 1953 it was leased to the government. It was afterwards restored by Monumentenzorg and until 1991 leased to Arbeidszorg. Afterwards it decayed into a "chollhouse" (squat/drug den) where addicts lived. After it was fixed up again, a restaurant was established here. Beyond De Goede Hoop and west of the small estate Vianen lies the little fishing beach Hala Canoa. Neighbourhood children sitting at the waterside when the fishermen came in with their catch encouraged them by shouting "Hala kanoa, hala kanoa!", which means roughly "pull the boat ashore!".

Vianen

The small country residence Vianen, also called Fiane, Viana or Zuster, stands at the end of the Penstraat. It was built in 1800 by a retired priest who was born in Vianen (Netherlands). Its location at the junction of Penstraat and Walcherenstraat was then so remote that even shooting practice was held there. According to Christel Monsanto, around 1920 Vianen was the home of the Russian painter who later became very famous in Venezuela: Nikolas Ferdinandov. He worked as a diver for the oil refinery, lived with his family at Vianen, died there and was buried in the Protestant cemetery on the Roodeweg.

People formerly swam along the entire coastal strip of Pietermaai and to the end of the Penstraat, with the Pen and Vianen as favourites. At Vianen the sea was calmer than at the Pen, but in the inner water of the Pen you could swim in peace.

Boka Simon

East of Vianen lies the former Boka Nobo, now called Boka Simon, after the fisherman with a very numerous brood of whom several are also fishermen. Simon's boat was always loaded with fish such as Dradu and Buni. He sometimes fried it himself on the beach in a tin of Argo cooking oil on a small konfó. At Boka Simon there were as many as 20 to 30 boats, and the neighbourhood knew many fishermen, such as Bezeu, Lang, Theodor alias Mr Heiliger, Big Jim, Ildo and Bati heru. The fishwives stood ready, when the boats arrived at Hala Kanoa and Boka Simon, with a stick with nails to scrape the scales off the fish and clean it. Well-known fishwives were Cordilia Muzo, Malven and Ursula — better known as U-la la …

For the sea side of the Penstraat, once a dumping place for (human) waste and animal carcasses, millions are nowadays being laid down…

Sources

• Heiligers-Halabi: La Belle Alliance (1992)
• Langenfeld: "Landhuis de Goede Hoop", Antilliaans Dagblad (2006)
• Gedenkboek Landswatervoorzieningsdienst Nederlandse Antillen, 1928–1953 (2023)

With thanks to: François van der Hoeven, Christel Monsanto, André Rancuret, Unidat di Bario and Mongui Maduro Library.