200 years of Nieuw-Buinen: the village of peat and glass has regained its shine

Nieuw-Buinen, a beautiful part of Groningen in Drenthe?

Nieuw-Buinen is located in Drenthe on the map, but with Stadskanaal a stone’s throw away it could just belong to Groningen. How Grunnings are the New Buiners? “It depends on who you ask,” laughs Albert Trip, chairman of the historical society in Nieuw-Buinen and until last year alderman in the municipality of Borger-Odoorn.

“It is true that the economic ties with Stadskanaal are great. In the past because of the Philips factory that was there, nowadays because people do their shopping there and children in Stadskanaal go to secondary school.”

According to Trip, there is ‘a large group’ who think that Nieuw-Buinen fits better with Stadskanaal, so Groningen, than with Drenthe. “You can also hear that in the dialect, there is a separation between Drents and Groningen through the village.” But in Buinerveen, just a few kilometers away, the Groningen sentiment is much less present, according to the former alderman. “That is a Drenthe village. They have less feeling about that at Stadskanaal.”

Derk Smit of Dorpsbelangen also laughs at the question about the provincial feeling. “We are indeed oriented towards Stadskanaal, and that is of course Groningen. But we are Drents.”

Still, the confusion has always been there, Smit recalls. Also with the predecessors of this newspaper. “When I used to be with the football club and delivered pieces to you, they said in Groningen: ‘It has to go to Assen, because you are Drenthe.’ And in Assen they said: ‘You come under Groningen.’ We are right on the border.”

The shine of the glass

How did Nieuw-Buin actually come about? It started in the nineteenth century, when a number of wealthy entrepreneurs wanted to exploit the Drenthe peat areas. As a result, peat villages emerged over the course of the century. Buunermond , or Nieuw-Buinen, is one of them in 1823. From Groningen and Germany, men, whether or not together with their families with many children, move to the area to work as peat laborers or district diggers (a worker who digs the canals).

Fifteen years later, in 1838, the first glass factory in Nieuw-Buinen was founded on the Noorderdiep by the German Johann Christian Anton Thöne and the Winschoter notary and wine merchant Jan Fresemann-Viëtor. The latter owned land in Nieuw-Buinen and needed bottles for the liquor he traded. There was already a vibrant glass industry in Germany at that time. German workers transfer their knowledge to the Nieuw-Buiners. Later, the Meursing glass factory also settled in the village.

The factories offer employment and security and will become Drenthe’s largest employers. But the working conditions are tough and unhealthy. “Workers often had to work six days a week and the glass furnaces were heated to up to 1300 degrees,” says amateur historian Jacco Pranger from Nieuw-Buinen, who has immersed himself in the history of Southeast Drenthe. “Glasblowers could also get sick from the fumes coming off the glass. My grandfather was also a glassblower, he died of lung cancer.”

Factory life may be tough, but the companies provide vibrancy in the still young village. “Nieuw-Buinen had a large middle class, with more than one hundred and fifty stores,” says Pranger. “Many grocers, but also bakers, pubs and as many as ten bicycle shops.”

In the course of the twentieth century, the Buuner glassblowers attract the interest of other entrepreneurs, who ‘hijack’ them. For example, Philips persuades workers to work in the factory in Eindhoven. After the closing of the last glass factory in 1967, a new migration started, this time to the Koninklijke Glasfabriek in Leerdam. Since then, the glass industry in Nieuw-Buinen has been a thing of the past. A last melt is now in the form of a large stone in front of the multifunctional accommodation on the Noorderdiep.

Turbulent times

After the closure of the industry in the village – in addition to the glass factories, the Hollandia potato flour factory also closes in 1981 – uncertain times dawned in Nieuw-Buinen. The employment that was taken for granted for more than a hundred years is seriously decreasing.

From the fifties, Nieuw-Buiners can still go to the Philips factory in Stadskanaal, until this too closes in 2006. The disappearance of the factories also means a decline in the number of shops and other facilities. This development causes a dent in the self-confidence of the Nieuw-Buiners. The quality of life and the atmosphere in the village are deteriorating, poverty and social problems are increasing.

In the first decade of the 21st century, Nieuw-Buinen made the local and national news after a number of shocking events, the tragic low point being the murder of twelve-year-old Suzanne Wisman from 2e Exloërmond. The perpetrator, Henk van D., appears to live in Nieuw-Buinen. A few years later, there was great unease about the arrival of a wind farm in Borger-Odoorn and Aa en Hunze. Residents of the Veenkoloniën have the feeling that the government is pushing the windmills down their throats.

The turbulent years caused a tilt; the inhabitants and the municipality are tired of the fact that the peat village with its rich history is now known as the ‘drain hole of Drenthe’.

In 2010, therefore, a brand new multifunctional accommodation will be opened, which will house, among other things, the village hall, the library and the general practice. The municipality and the housing corporation are sweeping through socially vulnerable neighbourhoods. The Association for Village Interests and the historical association are founded for more togetherness. As icing on the cake for the football-loving village, football club Nieuw-Buinen will get a brand new sports park.

The shine returns

During that period, from 2008 to 2014, Marco Out was mayor of Borger-Odoorn. Out found ‘only a very nice village’, he looks back. “Which had the name of a drain, but where everyone wanted to work very hard to change that. As mayor I was supposed to love all 25 villages equally, but Nieuw-Buinen really believed in ‘don’t talk, just brush’. I saw that at Dorpsbelangen, but also at the football club, which was experiencing its heyday at the time.”

Out found the royal honors that were awarded to residents in his period special. “Awards were not common in Nieuw-Buinen. That wasn’t part of it Buunermonders don’t pat themselves on the back. But I really liked it so much, because the hard work of the people was visibly rewarded. There is a lot of strength in everything that has been added to the village. That is really the merit of the residents.”

Nowadays, the municipality is investing heavily in new construction in the village, in an attempt to meet the high demand for housing. Partly because of this, Nieuw-Buinen plays penny-changing with Borger in 2023 when it comes to the village with the most inhabitants. According to the municipality, Nieuw-Buinen was the largest on January 1 of this year, with 4,963 inhabitants. At that time Borger had only two inhabitants less.

Peter Zwiers, one of those new residents of Nieuw-Buinen and chairman of Stichting 200 Jaar Nieuw-Buinen, sees as a relative outsider from 2e Exloërmond a ‘very energetic village’. “Where people are willing to make something of it and put their shoulders under it.” Nieuw-Buinen has not been discouraged, says Zwiers. “The people here have said: we will persevere, better times will come. And they have come.”

The foundation behind the 200-year village festival is pleasantly surprised that the Nieuw-Buiners are helping massively with the preparations for the celebration. “The residents of Nieuw-Buinen are ready to celebrate this. They can show that they are proud of where they come from, and that Nieuw-Buinen is more than the negative stories of the past.”