Every artifact at the Scholte House has a story, an anecdote or some tidbit of information to make it special, and Clark can tell in detail what that is. The pencil box in the study? A gift from renowned Dutch poet Willem Bilderdijk to Scholte. The piano in the drawing room? It had to be disassembled and reassembled upstairs. Maria was playing it the night the dominee died, and she was especially fond of Liszt.
“ I feel as a community, we’ re very privileged and honored to have this house. I mean, we don’ t only have the house, we have the things in the house [ that ] belong to the family, and I think that’ s phenomenal.”
Along with the items on display, she’ s familiar with all the lore and history of the Scholte family, which immigrated from the Netherlands with his followers in 1847 seeking religious freedom for the state-run church. Beyond the pulpit, Scholte was a staunch abolitionist and— despite initially supporting one of his political rivals— eventually became a backer and good friend to President Abraham Lincoln. He was invited by Lincoln personally to attend his second inauguration in 1865.
When Scholte died in 1868, Maria married another man, Robert Beard, who was 26 years her junior. They remained together until Maria’ s death in 1892, at which point Beard married Hendrik’ s granddaughter from his first mother. And, as Clark enjoys pointing out to
visitors, this made the bride her own step-grandmother.
But tourists aren’ t the only people Clark shares her knowledge with. She’ s also taught the Scholte’ s history to the Dominee’ s great-great-great-granddaughters, Susie Winegardner and Deb Sunderman, while training them to give tours of the Scholte House as well.
“ It was fun because they’ re interested and they want to know. And even one time, I brought Susie’ s husband through and I told the boys, I said,‘ Do you understand the rich heritage you have?’ I said,‘ This is way cool. This is your family heritage and it’ s so awesome that you can say that,’” Clark said.“ So yeah … I enjoyed being able to do that.”
Clark stepped away from her work as the volunteer coordinator at Pella Historical in December. However, she will continue to give tours of the house. The history, she said, is too beloved to stay away from.
“ I guess I just feel privileged and honored that I have been able to do this because I don’ t feel like it’ s a job,” Clark said.“ I feel like it’ s been a gift I love to share our history with people. I love to hear other people’ s history. I had people come from Russia specifically to see the Scholte House. They had family in Canada, and they said,‘ We are going to the United States— to Iowa— to see the Scholte House.’”
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