The Centre was closed during the remembrance ceremonies for 75 years of Dutch liberation
Remembrance Center Kamp Westerbork in Drenthe will reopen to the public on 1 June with strict public health measures to be observed during the reopening. The announcement comes after Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Minister Hugo de Jonge of Health announced on Tuesday evening that the intended relaxation of the Coronavirus measures could continue. For museums, this means that they can open again from 1 June, with a maximum of thirty visitors, excluding staff, being allowed to enter at the same time.
“We are very happy that we can open our doors again,” says director Gerdien Verschoor of the Remembrance Center. “In recent weeks we have worked hard to organise the museum in such a way that we can receive visitors safely. We are very much looking forward to people in our museum again. ” As reported by OOGTV.
In order to manage the number of visitors, visitors will have to purchase tickets in advance. These can be reserved from Monday 25 May on the Remembrance Centre website. In addition, time stamps will be used. “In this way we ensure that we meet the national standards for museum visits. People can get to know our collection and stories in peace and with sufficient distance”, says Verschoor.
The exhibition “The sorrow of liberation”, that has been on display since February 15 and was specially made for the year that commemorates 75 years of liberation, has been extended until January 3, 2021.
Camp Westerbork was built in 1939 by the Dutch government to receive Jewish refugees from Germany. Two years after the German invasion of the Netherlands, the Nazi regimé took over the camp on 1 July 1942. Westerbork was to function as a transit camp where, until the liberation in 1945, more than 102,000 Jews living in the Netherlands and 245 Roma and Sinti were deported by train to extermination camps in present-day Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic.
