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Thanksgiving always gives us the opportunity to count our blessings, and this year was no exception.
However, a tinge of sadness colored the celebrations as I prayed for the family of U.S. Army Spc. Sarah Berkstrom, a 20-year-old member of the West Virginia National Guard shot and killed Nov. 26 in Washington, D.C. I also prayed for the survival of U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, who is fighting for his life after being shot.
Although dying is an inevitable part of life, knowing that doesn’t necessarily make it easier to lose a loved one — even someone who may be ready to go.
I opened a text message last week and learned of the Wednesday morning death of Audrey (Doelman) Rademaker, a Dutch native and longtime Chehalis resident, who died just weeks shy of her 93rd birthday. Her husband of nearly 65 years, Peter “Dick” Rademaker, died on May 3.
I was blessed to meet both Audrey and Dick 17 years ago when they welcomed me into their home across from Stan Hedwell Park in Chehalis and shared stories of their lives in The Netherlands before, during, and after World War II.
In May 1940, when Audrey was only seven and her father milked cows on their dairy farm, German Nazis invaded her neutral homeland. They dropped bombs on their farm near Zwammerdam, in the province of South Holland. The blasts blew out every window in their house as they sheltered in the basement. Her father feared his family had perished — and they likely would have.
“The tail of a bomb lodged beneath the house but failed to explode, or I would not be sitting here,” Audrey said during a January 2008 interview. Her brothers helped Dutch soldiers gently remove it from the house and explode it in the field.
The Germans required Dutch men between 18 and 45 to carry identification papers. They took over their school, forcing students to gather in an attic above a mill. They confiscated horses, cars, bicycles and weapons. After a year, they rationed bread, meat, sugar, coffee, shoes and clothes.
“Nobody was allowed to have a radio,” Audrey said. “We never had a radio before the war, but when it was illegal, we had one.”
Her brothers stashed the radio behind tiles in the kitchen. Her eldest brother, Jacob, served in the Dutch army, which fought only four days before capitulating. Her brothers refused to carry ID cards, sheltered rebels and Jewish families on the dairy farm, robbed ration cards from City Hall, blew up trains and bridges, and helped political prisoners escape. An uncle, Pieter Doelman, published an illegal newspaper, which Audrey’s second-oldest brother, Pieter, helped distribute.
Their courageous resistance cost the family dearly. Only months before the Allies liberated The Netherlands, the Germans executed her 24-year-old brother, Pieter, and her father, Nicolaas, who was only 48.
Nicolaas and Anna Doelman, who operated a dairy farm, had 11 children, eight boys and three girls, but only seven survived to adulthood, said Audrey’s daughter, Ann Alves of Centralia.
“Mom grew up as a tomboy,” Ann said. “She was the only daughter that actually made it all the way through to actually getting married, having kids and all that.”
During the war, Audrey couldn’t invite friends over in case they saw strangers at the farm or any resistance activity. The Germans demanded most of the farm’s milk, but her father said most of his cows were dry. But when Dutch neighbors with bottles tucked beneath their coats sneaked to the farm, the family filled their bottles with milk.
When the Allies invaded France on D-Day, June 6, 1944, her ecstatic family anticipated freedom. But first they faced starvation, living on 900 calories a day, which dropped to 460.
“I can’t throw anything away,” Audrey said. “I still remember people came to our place, starving. I saw them on street corners; they were hardly able to walk.”
Her daughter recalled how frugal her mother remained through most of her life.
“Growing up, we were only allowed to have one cookie,” Ann said. “When it got to the grandkids being there, my one niece was telling me, ‘Oma let me have two.’ She was pregnant with her first great-granddaughter.”
Before the war, Dick Rademaker and his family operated a creamery near Koudekerk in The Netherlands, but during the occupation, they closed it and sheltered people there, providing a community kitchen where they eventually cooked tulip bulbs with onions to feed the hungry.
Eleven times, the Allies dropped weapons, ammunition, explosives and food packages near the Doelman dairy farm, where her brothers dozed and then ran out with lights to retrieve the goods. Unfortunately, on the 12th drop, on March 5, 1944, the plane dropped parachutes an hour early and one landed on the other side of the Oude Rijn, a tributary of the Rhine River, where collaborator Garret Vis found it and told the Germans.
On March 6, soldiers searched the farm and arrested her father and three brothers — Jacob, Pieter, and Bruin (Brian) who was 14 — and marched them all to town, hands linked behind their heads. Three other brothers evaded capture. That day the Germans also arrested two of Pieter’s friends — Dirk Van Ommeren of Zwammerdam and Dedelef Gustaaf Pronk of Amsterdam.
They ordered the family to leave the house, so they stayed with relatives and friends.
The Germans sent Audrey’s eldest brother and another man to Germany, but they jumped from the train and escaped. Two days later, the Nazis released her father and 14-year-old brother.
After an assassination attempt on SS Gen. Hanns Albin Rauter, the Nazis retaliated by executing 263 prisoners by firing squad in early March 1944. The Germans retaliated after the murder of Nazi Dietrich Desselberger by executing 30 political prisoners on March 12, 1944, 24-year-old Pieter, 23-year-old Dirk, and 22-year-old Dedelef among them.
After his release, Nicolaas tried to work the dairy farm, although Audrey said her father should have gone into hiding. When the Nazis found more weapons, they arrested him again, hauling him to Rotterdam, where he was executed on April 6, 1945.
The war in Europe ended a month later, on May 5, 1945. Freedom proved bittersweet for Audrey’s mother, who lost both a husband and a son. A monument honors the Doelmans and 18 other men for their sacrifice. Her 19-year-old brother Nicolaas returned home after incarceration in a concentration camp for failing to register to work.
An organization helped widows and children of resistance fighters who were killed, and the government provided money to send her younger brothers to college. After the war, Audrey’s sister Margaret died of a brain hemorrhage at 22 and her brother John died of heart failure at 26.
Audrey said her brothers didn’t speak about the war, but the community honored the sacrifices of those killed every year on May 4. When collaborators instead of resistance fighters received free farmland from the government, most of her brothers left The Netherlands for Canada or the United States. Only Nicolaas and Arend remained in Holland with their mother, who died at 93.
Audrey married Dick Rademaker on July 13, 1960, in The Netherlands, and within months, the couple emigrated to the United States and settled in Bellflower, Calif., by October. Dick worked as a ranch hand for a year, a hay bucker for a couple of years, and then as a United Dairymen mechanic from 1967 to 1980. Ann described herself as their honeymoon child, followed by Elbert, Nelly Schaap, and Nick.
“We’re all named after our grandparents,” Ann said. “That’s a Dutch thing as well.”
The family moved north to Chehalis at the urging of Audrey’s brother, Case Doelman. Dick bought the Chehalis Dairy Service, which he operated as Chehalis DeLaval until the mid-1990s. He was a gifted mechanic who converted a Dodge truck to run on vegetable oil.
Every New Year’s Day, Audrey prepared “olliebollen,” a traditional Dutch breakfast treat of fried dough balls filled with apples and sometimes raisins and then dipped in powdered sugar. Her grandchildren are carrying on the tradition.
“We’ll be doing Ollie bowling on New Year’s Day,” Ann said. “I’m fortunate to have had her for my mom.”
Her mother also loved to play Scrabble, Dominos, and other games with the children and then grandchildren.
“She was very competitive and always wanted to win,” Ann said, adding with a laugh, “If you didn’t keep an eye on her, she’d cheat.”
The family loved to go camping with friends and family. One time, after a couple of glasses of wine, she said, her mother spelled out Dutch cuss words on the Scrabble board.
For 45 years, Dick and Audrey attended the Olympia Christian Reformed Church, where she taught Sunday school and led children’s church.
“She loved little kids,” Ann said.
Audrey also became involved in the Centralia/Chehalis Christian Women’s Connection, a nondenominational women’s monthly luncheon affiliated with Stonecroft Ministries that began in February 1965 and shut down in January.
After Audrey received a pacemaker in September 2024, both she and Dick moved in with their son, Nick, and his wife, who cared for them at their Chehalis home. In addition to their children, Audrey leaves nine grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren.
Although she suffered dementia the past five years, Audrey kept her positive outlook.
“She was always happy,” Ann said. “Until the last three days when she was non-responsive, she was still smiling and happy.”
I’ll never forget her advice — check current events, know who you’re voting for, and be alert to what’s happening.
“They’re building up to do the same thing. It’s so frustrating. And young people, they need to get involved and get familiar with what’s going on. Don’t stick your head in the sand and remember, history can repeat itself.”
A private graveside service will be held with a celebration of life planned in the spring or summer.
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Julie McDonald, a personal historian from Toledo, may be reached at chaptersoflife1999@gmail.com.
