Texts

Marijn Cochius (1874–1938)

Better known as P.M. Cochius (Petrus Marinus), here we have a man that I run into in connection with Farwerck frequently. The two had much in common, but Cochius was Farwercks senior by 15 years. It is time to dedicate a few words to Cochius.

Cochius was born as the son of the major of Rijswijk. There was a glass factory in the family as well and that is how Cochius came into the business. I have already devoted some text to this factory in which Farwerck (and fellow Theosophist Tenno Selleger (1876-1967) to whose daughter Cochius was married) was involved too.

One movement that Farwerck and Cochius shared was Theosophy. In the Dutch Theosophical periodical Theosofia of April 2008 there is a nice biography from which much information in this little text comes.

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New and edited

Yesterday I was lucky. Every now and then I look around a bit to see if any new information was added somewhere. When searching the digital archives at Delpher my eye soon feel on magazine titles that weren’t familiar to me. They were the monthly magazines of the Dutch Rotary Club. There proved to me many, so I tried scanning them to see what information about Farwerck would be there. This resulted in another text about the Rotary Club. There was not groundbreaking new information, but we do get to learn the man a little better again and he mentions having been abroad a few times.

There is also irony in information that becomes available over time. For a long, long time I have been trying to prove if Farwerck was a member of the Theosophical Society or not. I finally succeeded a few months back due to a very lucky shot when I ran into old American Theosophical magazines online. In my search of yesterday I found two Dutch magazines of the Theosophical Society which simply state him as leading the Hilversum lodge. I edited the Theosophy article somewhat.

A funny finding was a sports magazine in which Farwerck at the age of 16 is twice mentioned as being a member of a club that appears to have played both cricket and soccer. A not uncommon combination in 1905 by the way.

No new information, but newly added were two issues of the magazine of the Dutch vegetarian union. One mentions Farwerck joining (1918) another his resignation (1922).

I added a little text about P.M. Cochius.

I don’t yet know if it’s ‘usable’, but I also found an old elementary school publication with a short text by the 12 year old K.J. Farwerck (and a story about Balder), who married “mrs. Farwerck“. That daughter in law of C.W. Farwerck cooperated with Farwerck on his publishing house Thule and the periodical Nehalennia.

Vegetarian Farwerck

Not too much information about this subject, but still enough to make a separate mention.

“De Nederlandse Vegetariërsbond” (‘the Dutch union of vegetarians’) was founded as early as 1894. According to Wikipedia, the initiative came from A. Verschoor from Rotterdam. What Wikipedia doesn’t mention is that at the founding meeting several Theosophists were present. With P.C. Meuleman-Van Ginkel we are already in the Van Ginkel family of Henri van Ginkel who would initiate Farwerck into co-Masonry in 1911. Meuleman was also involved in the early days of Dutch Theosophy.

Most likely through his Theosophical contacts, Farwerck joined the union late 1918 as we can see in the periodical of the union that can be found online. Apparently Farwerck was not as active in this union as he was in other groups that he found, because the only other mention in the named periodical is from early 1922 when he resigned. Also this issue can be found online.

In his Rotary Club vegetarianism was a subject too on 4 October 1937 and again on 20 January 1938, but these talks were not by Farwerck, but by Cochius.

Rotary Holland

The digitalisation of archives continues, so it pays off to check for new information every once in a while. I found out that the periodical of the Dutch Rotary Club has found its way to an online archive. Farwerck is mentioned frequently, so let us have a look if this monthly magazine / newsletter has new information.

Rotary started in the Netherlands in 1927 in Hilversum and Amsterdam and Farwerck was involved. No wonder that the first “Rotary Holland” (as the name of the magazine goes) is from that year and that Farwerck is mentioned. This is not very interesting though, it is only mentioned that he was present at a meeting on 1 November 1927. Somewhat interesting, also present was Cochius.

The next mention is that he was present on 2 February 1928. Also present then was Van Duyl who would later ask him to join the N.S.B. In that time he is mostly listed as present, but on 19 April 1928 Farwerck spoke about his carpet factory, Interestingly enough, the short report opens with a quote of Inayat Khan that not Farwerck, but another member (Rozenbeek) presented. The meeting after Farwercks talk, the idea arises to start a museum in Hilversum. It would take several more years for this to become true.

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Het sportblad

I had only vague references that Franz Farwerck did something with horses, just like other members of his family. Now I run into a periodical called “Het Sportblad” (‘the sports magazine’) in which Farwerck is listed twice.

The first six pages are about soccer, Dutch sports number one. Then there is a strange divider and there follows a member list:

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Farwerck on initiation

Here I present you a text that was published in Bouwsteenen 1/2 (first issue of second year), 1926. It gives a nice idea of how Farwerck approaches spirituality (to use a vague term). He refers to a range of different authors and seems to refer to his own spiritual development. As before, translation is not too easy. Farwwerck’s Dutch is cluttered with many sentences within sentences. The English gives an idea of his writing style.

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Additions to website

When rereading things to see if anything needed updating, I realised that some time after I started this website, I had short bios of some people around Farwerck and short texts specifically about some subject. These were mostly because I had discovered new things, but I didn’t do the same for information that I already had in the biography when this website was launched. Yet, some people and subjects deserve a little more attention, so I started to add some texts.

For starters:

Henri van Ginkel (1880-1954)

The influence of Hendricus Johannes (Henri) van Ginkel on Farwerck must have been immense. Van Ginkel lived in Laren not far from Hilversum where Farwerck lived. Both were active in the Theosophical Society. In 1917 Farwerck lead that lodge. Both were active in the Universal Sufism movement and the Coué foundation.

In 1911, Van Ginkel initiated, passed and raised Farwerck into mixed gender Freemasonry in a lodge that he himself had initially set up in his house, but which would quickly move to Hilversum. Both Farwerck and Van Ginkel were of the opinion that Freemasonry and Theosophy should not mix. As a matter of fact, the lodge that Van Ginkel started (for which he left the first mixed gender lodge in the Netherlands) and in which Farwerck was initiated, was the first lodge with a non-Theosophical (or rather: less Theosophical as Van Ginkel’s reforms weren’t ready yet then) ritual that Van Ginkel himself had written.

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Mixed gender Freemasonry (in the Netherlands)

Farwerck’s Freemasonry is spoken about on this website (and elsewhere) frequently. Time for a little more in depth information. Let me start with a bird’s eye view of mixed gender Freemasonry (or co-Masonry) and how it came to the Netherlands. Then we are going to have a look at Farwerck’s place in all this.

Freemasonry is traditionally a men’s thing, but towards the end of the 19th century some people started to do more to change that than just talk. A French lodge initiated a woman in 1882, Maria Deraismes (1828-1894). Even though the lodge that did this was already quite liberal, the Grand Lodge they worked under did not agree. Deraismes and Georges Martin (1844-1916) decided to start a new Masonic organisation, open for both men and women, the Grande Loge Symbolique Écossaise “Le Droit Humain” in 1893,

This symbolic Scottish Grand Lodge would eventually become “The International Order of Freemasonry Le Droit Humain”, LDH for short.

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Anne Kerdijk (1882-1944)

Kerdijk was one of the early members of the Dutch federation of Le Droit Humain, but not from the very beginning. Initiated in 1908, and unlike many other early members, she progressed through degrees slowly. Her passing was in 1909 and her raising in 1910. Kerdijk is mentioned in the documents surrounding the founding of the Dutch federation in 1918.

Together with H.J. van Ginkel Kerdijk was editor of the magazine Swastika, which was published between 1911 and the outbreak of the First World War. She was also editor of the official bulletin of the Dutch federation of Le Droit Humain. She also translated texts, such as the book De Godsdienst der Vrijmetselarij by Charles Fort, which was published by the publishing house of Van Ginkel and Duwaer. In addition, Kerdijk was married to Stefan Schlesinger.

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