Word: surinam
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Queen Juliana of The Netherlands last week reminded the world that the Dutch are still a colonial power in the Western Hemisphere-by graciously relinquishing part of that power. The Queen proclaimed a new Statute of the Kingdom, giving Surinam (Dutch Guiana) and The Netherlands Antilles complete internal self-government and requiring consultation with the motherland only on such affairs as defense and foreign relations...
...Surinam and the six Antilles islands (Curaçao, Aruba, Bonaire, St. Eustatius, Saba and half of St. Martin) have been Dutch colonies since the 17th century. Dutchmen gained possession of the islands by driving out the Spaniards, who didn't even put up a fight. When the Dutch also tried to push the British out of the part of Guiana now called Surinam, the British countered by seizing New Amsterdam (Manhattan). Later, in the 1667 Peace of Breda, the Dutch traded off New Amsterdam (bought from the Indians for $24) for 55,000 square miles in Guiana...
...sugar and the slave trade. But when they turned their attention to Java and Sumatra in the East Indies in the 19th century, the western colonies languished. The long-term investment in the west did not pay off until 40 years ago, when vast bauxite deposits were found in Surinam, and Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo oilfields were opened. During World War II, Surinam provided 60% of the U.S.'s bauxite needs for aluminum. Huge oil refineries on Curaçao and Aruba processed 72% of the crude produced in Venezuela. With this new prosperity, the Negroes, East Indians...
...Real. Audrey's mother belonged to an ancient family in the Dutch nobility; their home was once the Castle of Doom, in which the defeated German Kaiser spent his declining years. Audrey's grandfather, Baron Aernoud van Heemstra, onetime governor of the Dutch colony of Surinam, was a familiar figure at the court of Queen Wilhelmina...
Most notable Surinamers are the 20,000-odd Bush Negroes, whose ancestors rebelled at plantation slavery and fled inland centuries ago. Tall and agile, they range the rivers in dugout canoes and carry on indifferent agriculture in burned-over clearings. This week, having paid his respects to Paramaribo and looked over the Moengo bauxite mines, Prince Bernhard prepared for a launch trip up the muddy Surinam River to powwow with the barrel-chested Bush-Negro chieftains...