In the program The Lost City we go to a different place in Haarlem every time to see how it has changed over time. Today we are on the corner of Damstraat and Klokhuisplein, where the Johan Enschedé printing company was located.
Drukkerij Johan Enschedé has been a household name in Haarlem since 1703. For the longest time, the company was located on Klokhuisplein. Here we also agreed with former financial director Johan Slinger. He can tell us all about the printing house.
“The house on the corner was only acquired in 1890, which was a shop selling household items. In addition, the house in Damstraat was the home of the Enschedé family. Six generations have lived there since 1761.”
Over time, the printing company expanded its activities and additional buildings were purchased because extra space was needed. This went on until the printing house encountered an important obstacle: the Concertgebouw. “We were good neighbours, you know,” says Slinger, “but the Concertgebouw actually got in our way. That eventually led to the so-called Jump over the Spaarne, where we established the entire company in the Waarderpolder in the early 1990s. ”
Text continues below the photo.
Simple printing
Enschedé started out as a printing company for simple printing, but grew into the specialist in the field of banknotes, stamps and securities. Of course, Isaac Enschedé could never have imagined the latter when he started the printing business at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Another beautiful document is exhibited in the Noord-Hollands Archief, which shows that Isaac has registered himself in the book printers’ guild. Soon his son Johannes started his apprenticeship with him.
Van de Wiel: “When Johannes is a little older, he also becomes a partner and they start doing more and more together. It is mainly Johannes who is the driving force behind this. I think he had more business acumen.”
Text continues below the photo.
Wagon gate
With Johan Slinger we continue our search for what once was the old printing house.
“The staff had to enter through the Wagenpoort. That was the difference: the chiefs and the management were allowed to enter at Klokhuisplein 5. The ‘ordinary staff’, I think that’s a bad word, all went through the Wagenpoort, because you had to passing company police.”
Most of the production halls have been demolished, but the building where Slinger worked and the former residence are still reasonably intact. A hotel and a restaurant are now located here.
“The first Dutch banknote, the Roodborstje, contains fourteen different fonts”
Music notation
A German stamp cutter, Johann-Michael Fleischmann (1707-1768), played an important role in the technical developments at the printing house.
“He designed and cut a lot of letters for Enschedé on a kind of freelance basis,” says Van de Wiel. “At one point he made a music notation. That was a convertible music notation. That means that you can put all those notes in a framework and also add text. Before that, if you wanted to print notes, you had to engrave on an etching plate If there was a mistake, you had to start over.”
The printing company is so proud of this unique musical notation that they decide not to resell it to other printing companies. This decision would turn out very well 35 years later, when the French invaded the Netherlands. The French want to have securities that cannot be counterfeited. And here the printing company sees its chance.
Text continues below the photo.
Van de Wiel: “If you arrange that music notation in a different way, you get a certain decorative border. No one else can make that, because no one has that music notation. That is actually the first time that secure printing was made. After the French time, in 1814, the Dutch Bank is founded, and it also needs a banknote. Something that cannot be copied, but claims to be worth a sum of money. The first Dutch banknote, the Roodborstje, contains fourteen different fonts.”
This is how Enschede became a specialist in making banknotes.
‘Counters don’t sit still’
But with only a musical notation and fourteen different fonts you will not make it in the end, because the counterfeiters are not sitting still either. On a printer’s roll, the archive shows the origin of the iconic Lighthouse banknote.
“These are not real banknotes”, says Mart just to be on the safe side, “but here you can see very well how such a banknote is made. This banknote is seen by connoisseurs as the most beautiful. A top of a banknote because it is so complicated. It consists of eight different printing layers, all with a so-called iris print, which means with a gradient of colours. This way you get an immensely rich banknote, with all kinds of details.”
Text continues below the photo.
Meeting room
Finally, Johan Slinger takes us to the most important room of the printing house. “Not everyone was really allowed to come here,” says Johan Slinger. “When the Dutch bank came here, they were received in this room.”
Now we are standing in one of the rooms of the restaurant between the set dining tables, but then there was a long, large conference table in the middle. “You shouldn’t imagine too much about that. It had been a family dining table. It had been sawn in half and they had put two ordinary boards in between. There was a beautiful rug over it. The springs of the chairs were almost through the plush, but the management liked to sit on it. These rooms have remained fairly intact, I must add that.”
Text continues below the photo.
So there is now a restaurant annex hotel on the Klokhuisplein. Some of the other buildings have been demolished to make way for De Appelaar courthouse.
Look here for more episodes of De Verdwenen Stad Haarlem. An earlier series about Amsterdam is here to look back
