Wijster is a village in the
Dutch province of
Drenthe
Drenthe () is a province of the Netherlands located in the northeastern part of the country. It is bordered by Overijssel to the south, Friesland to the west, Groningen to the north, and the German state of Lower Saxony to the east. As of Nov ...
. It is a part of the municipality of
Midden-Drenthe
Midden-Drenthe () is a municipality in the northeastern Netherlands. The municipality was created in 1998, in a merger of the former municipalities of Beilen, Smilde, and Westerbork. Between 1998 and 2000, the name of the municipality was Middenve ...
, and lies about 11 km north of
Hoogeveen
Hoogeveen (; nds-nl, 't Ogeveine or '' 't Oveine'') is a municipality and a town in the Dutch province of Drenthe.
Population centres
Elim, Fluitenberg, Hoogeveen and Noordscheschut, which still have the canals which used to be throughout ...
.
History
The village was first mentioned in 1206 as in Wisnare. The etymology is unknown. Wijster is an ''
esdorp'' which developed in the Early Middle Ages as a satellite of
Beilen. It used to have no church, but did have a large funnel shaped ''brink'' (village square).
Wijster was home to 300 people in 1840.
The Dutch Reformed church dates from 1929 and is a simple church with a little
ridge turret.
Wijster is best known for its
landfill
A landfill site, also known as a tip, dump, rubbish dump, garbage dump, or dumping ground, is a site for the disposal of waste materials. Landfill is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of the waste ...
. From 1929 onwards, garbage was dumped in Wijster, and has resulted in high hill.
1975 train hostage crisis
Wijster was the site of the
1975 Dutch train hostage crisis
On 2 December 1975, seven South Moluccans seized a train with about 50 passengers on board in open countryside near the village of Wijster, halfway between Hoogeveen and Beilen in the northern part of the Netherlands. The hijacking lasted for ...
. In 1949,
Indonesia became independent, and the
Royal Netherlands East Indies Army was disbanded. The islands of
Ambon
Ambon may refer to:
Places
* Ambon Island, an island in Indonesia
** Ambon, Maluku, a city on Ambon Island, the capital of Maluku province
** Governorate of Ambon, a colony of the Dutch East India Company from 1605 to 1796
* Ambon, Morbihan, a co ...
,
Buru, and
Seram had fought on side of the Netherlands. They were opposed to a
Java-dominated Indonesia, and proclaimed the
Republic of South Maluku which resulted in an attack by Indonesia. In 1951, 12,000 refugees from South Maluku were temporarily resettled in the Netherlands. They started to feel betrayed, because it developed into permanent exile.
On 2 December 1975, the train from
Groningen
Groningen (; gos, Grunn or ) is the capital city and main municipality of Groningen province in the Netherlands. The ''capital of the north'', Groningen is the largest place as well as the economic and cultural centre of the northern part of t ...
to
Zwolle stopped in a field near Wijster. Seven South Moluccans had ceased the train and killed the driver. The Dutch government was reluctant to negotiate, and the hijackers tried to kill a passenger, however he managed to escape and after being shot at, pretended to be dead. During the twelve days which followed, two more passengers were shot.
Johan Manusama
Johannes Alvarez Manusama (17 August 1910 – 29 December 1995) was a former schoolteacher and freemason, RMS Minister of Education and Minister of Defence (1950), was the third president of the Republic of South Moluccas (1966–1993).
His ...
, the former president of the Republic of South Maluku, managed to persuade the hijackers to surrender. In 1976, the hijackers were sentenced to 14 year imprisonment.
Education
There is one primary school, Zuiderenk.
Gallery
File:HUA-167952-Afbeelding van het storten van huisvuil op het terrein van de VAM Vuil Afvoer Maatschappij te Wijster.jpg, Train unloads its garbage (1954)
File:Treinkaping bij Wijster dag 12 (1).jpg, Train hostage crisis of 1975
References
{{Authority control
Midden-Drenthe
Populated places in Drenthe