Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten

Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten
Municipality
Windmill in Nuenen
Flag Coat of arms
Location in North Brabant
Coordinates: 51°29′N 5°33′E / 51.483°N 5.550°ECoordinates: 51°29′N 5°33′E / 51.483°N 5.550°E
Country	Netherlands
Province	North Brabant
Government[1]
• Body	Municipal council
• Mayor	Maarten Houben (CDA)
Area[2]
• Total	33.94 km^2 (13.10 sq mi)
• Land	33.72 km^2 (13.02 sq mi)
• Water	0.22 km^2 (0.08 sq mi)
Elevation[3]	16 m (52 ft)
Population (May 2014)[4]
• Total	22,567
• Density	669/km^2 (1,730/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postcode	5670–5674
Area code	040
Website	www.nuenen.nl

Dutch Topographic map of Nuenen, June 2015

Water Mill at Opwetten, by Vincent van Gogh, 1884 (F48)

Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten ( pronunciation ) is a municipality consisting of the larger village of Nuenen and two adjacent smaller ones. It is located in the province of Noord-Brabant, about 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) east of Eindhoven, the fifth largest city in the Netherlands. From being a small farmers town of less than 1000 inhabitants around 1950 Nuenen grew steadily as ever more new employees of Philips and the Eindhoven University (TUE) chose Nuenen as their new home.

Population centres

• Eeneind
• Gerwen
• Nederwetten
• Nuenen
• Opwetten
• Stad van Gerwen

History

A battle fought in Nuenen during World War II was shown in an episode of the miniseries Band of Brothers. The historical battle took place there during Operation Market-Garden in September 1944.

Notable people

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh spent two years in Nuenen from 1883-1885. His father lived and worked there as the Protestant pastor in the largely catholic environment. Van Gogh lived in the small carriagehouse next to the beautiful pastors house, which is well preserved and visited by art lovers from all over the world. Van Gogh was extremely productive in his years in Nuenen. It is referred to as his so-called dark or sombre period. Here he painted his famous painting The potato eaters as well as Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen (Het uitgaan van de hervormde kerk te Nuenen). The latter painting was stolen from the Van Gogh Museum in December 2002.

Edsger Dijkstra

Edsger Dijkstra, Dutch computer scientist, then a professor in the Mathematics Department at the Technical University of Eindhoven, moved to a newly built house in Nuenen in 1964. Nuenen was added to the world map of computer science in 1973 when Dijkstra started to circulate his reports signed ‘Burroughs Research Fellow’ with his home address. Many thought that Burroughs, a company known at that time for the production of computers based on an innovative hardware architecture, was based in Nuenen. In fact, Dijkstra was the only research fellow of Burroughs Corporation and worked for it from home, occasionally travelling to its branches in the USA. Dijkstra moved in 1984 to the University of Austin, Texas, USA, until his retirement in the autumn of 1999. Dijkstra returned from Austin, terminally ill, to his original house in Nuenen in February 2002, where he died half a year later, on 6 August 2002. ^[5]

References

1. "College van B en W" [Board of mayor and aldermen] (in Dutch). Gemeente Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten. Retrieved 2 June 2014.
2. "Kerncijfers wijken en buurten" [Key figures for neighbourhoods]. CBS Statline (in Dutch). CBS. 2 July 2013. Retrieved 12 March 2014.
3. "Postcodetool for 5671CK". Actueel Hoogtebestand Nederland (in Dutch). Het Waterschapshuis. Retrieved 2 June 2014.
4. "Bevolkingsontwikkeling; regio per maand" [Population growth; regions per month]. CBS Statline (in Dutch). CBS. 26 June 2014. Retrieved 24 July 2014.
5. Krzysztof R. Apt. "OBITUARY: Edsger Wybe Dijkstra (1930–2002): A Portrait of a Genius" (PDF). Formal Aspects of Computing (2002) 14: 92–98. Retrieved February 15, 2013. In 1962 they moved to Eindhoven, where he became a professor in the Mathematics Department at the Technical University of Eindhoven. Then in 1964 they moved to a newly built house in Nuenen, a small village on the outskirts of Eindhoven, which in 1973 was added to the world map of computer science when Dijkstra started to circulate his reports signed ‘Burroughs Research Fellow’ with his home address. Many thought that Burroughs, a company known at that time for the production of computers based on an innovative hardware architecture, was based in Nuenen. In fact, Dijkstra was the only research fellow of Burroughs Corporation and worked for it from home, occasionally travelling to its branches in the USA. As a result he reduced his appointment at the university to one day a week. That day, Tuesday, soon became known as the day of the famous ‘Tuesday Afternoon Club’, a seminar during which he discussed with his colleagues scientific articles, looking at all aspects – notation, organisation, presentation, language, content, etc. Shortly after he moved in 1984 to the University of Austin, Texas, USA, a new ‘branch’ of the Tuesday Afternoon Club emerged in Austin. Dijkstra worked in Austin until his retirement in the autumn of 1999. He returned from Austin, terminally ill, to his original house in Nuenen in February 2002, where he died half a year later, on 6 August.

External links

• Media related to Nuenen, Gerwen en Nederwetten at Wikimedia Commons
• Official website