De Zwaan: The Last Dutch Windmill to Leave the Netherlands
Near Holland, Michigan
The windmill standing on Windmill Island in Holland, Michigan was long said to have been built in Krommenie in seventeen sixty-one, though later research points to Dordrecht in eighteen thirty-three. It worked as a mill for generations before the Dutch government banned the export of its windmills to preserve the national heritage. Holland, Michigan got an exemption.
Because the mill at Vinkel, where De Zwaan had stood since eighteen eighty-four, was in poor condition, authorities agreed to let it go. It was carefully disassembled, labeled piece by piece, shipped across the Atlantic, and reassembled by Dutch millwright Jan Diederik Medendorp. The mill opened in Holland, Michigan on April tenth, nineteen sixty-five, making it an authentic working Dutch windmill and the last one permitted to leave the Netherlands.
