The late evangelist
Reverend Ike, actor
Mark-Paul Gosselaar and musicians
Eddie and
Alex Van Halen,
Michelle Branch and
James Intveld share something: Indo roots. So do Joyce Luther Kennard, an associate justice of the California Supreme Court, and Santa Barbara city councilman Das Williams.
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| Tina Zellmer Art |
If you have no idea who the Indos—or Dutch Indos, as they’re sometimes called— are, you are not alone. But their story is compelling: Beginning in the late 1950s, tens of thousands emigrated to the U.S. from the Netherlands, part of a post-WWII migration that went into the late ’60s. The majority moved quietly to Southern California and became a part of our mosaic of life. Now Los Angeles is home to the largest Dutch Indo community, with some 100,000 people.
The California dream represented a myriad of personal and professional opportunities for the Indo diaspora. More than a few followed family and friends who had already arrived on the West Coast. Some traveled coach across America in bumpy railcars from the East Coast, tired of the same chilly climate they’d so disliked in the Netherlands. For a few, collecting fan cards of favorite actors and memorizing lyrics to big-band songbooks had made the Golden State a beacon since childhood. And for all practical purposes, it was a logical choice: The postwar economy boomed, jobs and housing were plentiful, schools were good and, much like in Indonesia, the weather was glorious year-round. They may have longed for home, but they knew they could belong here.
