Jaap van 't Veen's photos with the keyword: Heiloo

Onze Lieve Vrouw ter Nood (Our Lady in Distress) is located just south of Heiloo. It is the largest Marian pilgrimage site in the Netherlands. The history of the Sanctuary goes back to the end of the 14th century. At that time, a farmer found a statue of the Virgin on his land. He took it home with him, but miraculously it returned to the place of invention. Around the same time a ship got in distress off the coast near Heiloo. In his distress the skipper prayed to God. Above the roar of the waves and the roar of the wind, he heard a clear woman's voice saying: 'If you are going to honour me, the wind will turn'. The skipper recognized the voice of the Mother of God and promised to devote himself to her worship. When safely ashore, the two stories came together and the place for the construction of the Genadekapel (Chapel of Grace) was found. A document from 1409 has been kept in the archives of the Archdiocese of Utrecht that speaks of the capelle in de banne van Heiligenloo . In the courtyard of the Chapel of Grace there is a well with healing water, called Runxput . During the Reformation the chapel was destroyed and the well was filled with debris from the chapel. In 1713, at the time of cattle plague, the water started to sprout from under the rubble. History tells that animals that drank from this water survived the plague. After this miracle pilgrimage to the sanctuary flourished again. Nowadays the Marian pilgrimage site is visited by tens of thousands of people.

Heiloo – originally named ‘Heilegelo’ (= ‘holy woods’) - dates back to the early 8th century and grew around a church which most probably was founded by missionary St. Willibrord around 700. A well next to the church still bears the name of Willibrord. In the 15th century the church was extended. The building burnt down in 1568, was rebuilt, but five years later met a similar fate during the siege of the city of Alkmaar. The present church was rebuilt in 1630. This former reformed church - no longer used for regular services- is a one-aisled building. The tower and part of the walls of the nave are in Romanesque style, while transept and choir are Gothic. The White Church has two organs; the large organ is composed in 1966 of pipes from an organ (1740), which came from a Roman Catholic hidden church in Alkmaar (PiP). Early 19th century it became its striking white colour and since that time it was named ‘White Church’. Between 1964 and 1966 the church became a last restoration and its present appearance.

Eighteenth-century Nijenburg, located between Alkmaar and Heiloo, is a manor in the woods of Heiloo and surrounded by typical Dutch meadows. Since 1928 the estate is owned by the Dutch nature preservation organisation ’Natuurmonumenten’. Manor and carriage house are transferred to the ‘Vereniging Hendrick de Keyser’. The estate is located on an elevation of the former shoreline of the North Sea. The surrounding grasslands - due to excavations - are a lot lower. Nijenburg estate was owned for centuries by the families ‘Van Egmond van de Nijenburg’ and ‘Van Foreest’. In the year of 1705 ‘Gerard van Egmond van de Nijenburg’ built the current manor in the classic Dutch style with plain brick facades, using the remains of an older building on this site.In the 19th century the building became its white plaster. Since then the house has the romantic look of a rural location in the green.