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Heritage Stories

Heritage Stories

First housing project in Winterslag - Immovable Heritage Agency - beeldbank.onroerenderfgoed.be, photo by Evert Vandeweghe

My Cités

When coal mining began in Central Limburg shortly after 1900, the region was sparsely populated and largely undeveloped. The newly established mining companies therefore had to build entirely new residential neighborhoods to house their future workforce. Workers’ neighborhoods had a dubious reputation at that time. Business leaders and politicians did not want unhygienic ghettos’

Portrait of Adolphe Quetelet, astronomer, mathematician, and statistician (1796–1874) – Ghent University Archives – Photo by Ghemar, Brussels

Quetelet's meridian lines

In 1835, the first train on the European mainland departed from Brussels for Mechelen. But who was going to keep track of the schedule? At that time, the time in Belgian cities was still calculated locally based on the sun, and could vary by as much as half an hour from one city to another. You could literally

Dial with hour and calendar markers, Southern Netherlands, ca. 1500 – Museum M Leuven – artinflanders.be, photo by Hugo Maertens

Leuven Calendar Dial

In 1938, Victor Demunter, the former curator of the Leuven City Museum, bequeathed his art collection to the museum. One of the highlights was a painted oak panel dating from around 1500. The hours, days, and months are depicted in six concentric circles, as are the 12 signs of the

Announcement of the introduction and abolition of daylight saving time, Excelsior, 1916 - © Bibliothèque nationale de France

German Daylight Saving Time

On May 1, 1916, the West Flemish writer Stijn Streuvels wrote in his war diary: “Daylight saving time has thrown everyone off. (…) All the market-goers are arriving late for the tram—no one thought that if you set the clock forward an hour, the tram would arrive an hour earlier.”

De Liermolen - © het MOT, Grimbergen

The Liermolen

Have you ever dreamed of becoming a miller? You can still train to become one in Flanders! Or you can visit a mill that’s still in operation. There are dozens of them. For example, the Liermolen in Grimbergen. It’s a grain watermill on the Maalbeek dating from the

The Potato Eaters, Vincent van Gogh, 1885 - Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam - Wikimedia Commons

Potato Crisis

Less than two centuries ago, in 1845–1847, a devastating famine raged across the European countryside. In Belgium, it claimed the lives of some 44,000 people, mainly in East and West Flanders. The cause was a fungal disease—unknown at the time—that affected the potato. Originally from

Wagon maker Henri Vandewalle from Ramskapelle (Nieuwpoort), ca. 1940–1950 - © CAG, Dries Claeys Collection

The Wheelwright

In rural areas, for a long time it was necessary to be a jack-of-all-trades. Well into the 19th century, farming families had to make and repair their own tools, bake bread, sew clothes… Yet there were also specialized craftsmen in every village. They were indispensable to the farm. The blacksmith was