An Empire Founded On Wind
Throughout history most empires have been founded using the power of swords, cavalry and war ships but there are a few whose tools were trading, manufacturing and exploration. Four hundred years ago there was an emerging world power based on just that formula. This nation was known by a number of names – Holland or the Netherlands and the people were called the Dutch. Most interesting of all is this nations real advantage was founded on the power of wind.
Holland was as much a business empire as a political one. Dutch merchants and traders sent ships out around the world looking for trade routes, raw materials and unique commercial goods to bring home. Back in Holland the raw materials were used by manufacturers using the prevailing winds as a source of manufacturing power.
The Netherlands was already a country being salvaged from the sea. Between four and six hundred years ago the Dutch were building dykes to ring itself off from the sea, fill in land and had created windmills to pump water out of these newly recovered lowlands. Over a couple of hundred years the largest portion of land in The Netherlands was actually that reclaimed land with the average height of this country being eighteen feet below sea level.
The windmills were so successful as an energy source employed to operate those pumps that the windmills were soon turned to provide manufacturing power. This low cost energy harvested from those strong prevailing winds now gave Holland a huge advantage over other countries who were mostly digging and burning coal. In the seventeenth century this made The Netherlands one of the worlds richest nations from exporting milled grain like flour, woven fabrics, pigments for pastel colors, wood, chocolate, and yarns.
Today many of these remarkable 400 year old windmills are still functioning in a number of areas in Holland and are open to visit.
- The Kinderdijk windmills – The Kinderdijk windmills are a group of 19 monumental windmills in the Alblasserwaard polder, province of South Holland, Netherlands.
- Zaanse Schans windmill village – Featuring windmills and houses from the 18th and 19th centuries and located only 15 minutes from Amsterdam.
- De Schermer windmills – Offers the Museum and story of the Schermer. How they made land out of water in 1633. From 1633 to 1635, the lake Schermeer was drained using 52 mills
- De Adriaan in Haarlem – A windmill in the Netherlands that burnt down in 1932 and was rebuilt in 2002. The original windmill dates from 1779 and the mill has been a distinctive part of the skyline of Haarlem for centuries.
- The Keukenhof windmill – Outside Amsterdam it’s a so-called tower mill and was built in Scharmer in 1892. The windmill was originally a ground-sailer and functioned as a polder windmill. In 1975, the windmill was moved to the grounds of the famous Keukenhof. The flower park received the windmill as a gift from the Holland-America Line.
- The windmills in Heusden – Part of the famous city walk fortress and windmills of Heusden, North Brabant on the Netherlands Hiking route.
- The windmills in Wemeldinge – There are two grain mills in Wemeldinge: De Hoop (1866) and de Aeolus (1869). De Hoop is open every Saturday afternoon, and de Aeolus can be visited by appointment only.
The Intentional Travelers 