Albert Henckel was fifteen years old when he did his first internship at the forestry department. He never actually wanted to become a public forester, but life had other plans for him. Now, almost fifty years later, his job as a forester is as good as over.
Sorting through filing cabinets, scanning photos, Henckel hardly goes outside during his last days as a public forester. Because anyone who knows Henckel immediately thinks of photos. He is a great collector of everything he has encountered in the field over the years.
“47 years is a long period, but I also still have things from my predecessor. That is of course a piece of history of your area in which things are written down. In the past everything was on paper,” Henckel laughs. “I still come from the time when we didn’t work with computers.”
All information is carefully selected. Henckel is afraid that important knowledge will otherwise be lost. He also wants to talk to the Drenthe Archives soon.
The photos, slides and bindings that pass through his hands make him realize how much has changed. Old raven cages that at the time could only be found in a few places in the Netherlands, such as in Dwingeloo. Or the story of an old horn that could be used to blow from the fire watchtower when a fire broke out, because telephones were not yet common. Henckel was there, saw it and gathered. “The area has changed quite a bit.”
“I have of course also experienced the transition from production forest to a real National Park and that restoring natural values became much more important,” says Henckel. “That knowledge is disappearing a bit.”