The Jan Willem Ter Avest and Hannah Michmershuizen Family

Name              Born                     Birthplace              Died                    Burial Location                                                              

Jan Willem      April 25, 1846      Kamphuis (Zuna)   Nov 2, 1915        Coopersville, MI

(William)

Ter Avest

Hendrika          July 11, 1856      Overisel, MI            Mar 31, 1941      Coopersville, MI    

(Hannah)

Johanna

Michmershuizen

Jan Hendrik     Dec 19, 1876       Fillmore, Twp., MI  Dec 1, 1953        Coopersville, MI 

(John Henry)

Hendrika          Apr 20, 1878        Fillmore, Twp., MI  Feb 1, 1886        Overisel, MI

Johanna

(Dieka)

Hendrika’s second eldest son, named Jan Willem (William), lived with his mother and played a big role on the farm. He was the primary farmer of her 65 acre plat of land in Fillmore Township, MI. Jan Willem was received by confession of faith into the Overisel Reformed Church on May 5, 1874. He married Hannah Michmershuizen on April 29, 1875. 

Hannah was the daughter of Hendrik Grijpmoet Michmershuizen and Hendrika Johanna Rozendoorn. She was called Hannah to avoid confusion with her mother, with whom she shared the same name.

The Michmershuizens were from Wijhe, in southwestern Overijssel Province of The Netherlands. They had immigrated in 1847, arriving in Baltimore from Rotterdam, aboard the ship Harvest Havanna, on April 4, 1847.

Jan Willem became a United States citizen on September 4, 1875. 

Jan Willem and Hannah were the parents of the man we know today as John H. Ter Avest, longtime resident of Coopersville, Michigan. His younger sister, Hendrika, died of “brain fever” at the age of 6 years, 9 months on February 1, 1886. John was 9 years old at the time. “Brain fever” is a term from the Victorian era that can refer to Encephalitis or Meningitis.

Jan Willem and Hannah were received by confession of faith May 5,1874 into the Overisel Reformed Church.  They transferred from Overisel Reformed Church to Hamilton Reformed Church

April 7,1890.    They were dismissed with papers from Hamilton Reformed Church to Zeeland First Reformed Church on  March 15, 1899. And they were sunsequently received with letter at Zeeland First Reformed Church on September 14,1899. 

We can see from today’s records that Jan Willem was an ambitious man. At times he speculated in land and was a partner in a general store.

Jan Willem’s mother purchased the original 80 acre farm, in section 36 of Fillmore Township in Allegan County, MI., for $2,900 in cash on September, 25, 1869. She subsequently sold 15 acres to her eldest son, Jan, in November of that year. On February 13, 1874, she sold the other 65 acres to Jan Willem for $1000. 

In May of 1876, Jan Willem purchased 80 acres in Section 34 of Fillmore Township for $1200. By January 1877, Jan Willem had sold the land for $1440, making a tidy $240 profit.

He purchased the 15 acres owned by his brother Jan on March 15, 1878 for $600. When Jan and his family moved to Iowa in 1883, Jan Willem purchased 35 acres for $1,900. He now held at least 115 acres in section 36 of Fillmore Township.

Jan Willem also owned 40 acres in section 9 of Heath Township for some period of time. 

In 1880, the owners of the Hamilton General Store in Hamilton, Michigan, decided to sell their assets and get out of the business. The proprietors were Kolvoord & Baker, a partnership between Jan Kolvoord and Siebe Baker. They set the purchase price of the assets at $4,200. 

As an experienced general store clerk, John Kolvoord’s younger brother, Albertus, saw this as an opportunity to try his skill at ownership. Lacking sufficient capital to purchase the operation alone, he sought to find someone who had the ability to share the cost and forge a partnership. He found that someone in Jan Willem Ter Avest. Ter Avest was John Kolvoord’s brother-in-law. Through a combination of cash and loans, Bert and Bill, as they were known, managed to put together the necessary amount of money, purchased the general store’s assets and went into business as Kolvoord & Ter Avest. 

The grocery business was a tough one and it was difficult to turn a profit. In spite of this, the partners did manage to make a living for nine years. 

Operating from a 41x50 foot building with a full basement, Kolvoord & Ter Avest carried a wide variety of general merchandise and food including: clothing, boots, shoes, millinery and crockery, as well as groceries, meats, etc. They were known as being a successful business that gave fair trade and always treated their customers in a courteous manner.

On Tuesday, April 3, 1889, Jan Willem Ter Avest retired from the business, selling his interest in the store to a man by the name of Tacken.  The store was then known as Kolvoort & Tacken.

The following is an excerpt from the personal recollections of Albertus [Bert] Kolvoord written in 1937.

Our early life was all hard work. Someone came after me about 1872 [Jan Scholten or Jan Kollen] and wanted me to clerk in a store. This was to my liking and there I stayed about a year at a salary of two dollars a week and board. This was quite a step up from where I began. Having had no chance for an education, I went for three years to Hope College and graduated from the preparatory department [their high school]. This was in 1878. Then I clerked some in Hamilton for about six months [possibly for Kolvoord & Baker]; then clerked in a store in Cadillac, Michigan [possibly for Jan Scholten who had gone to Cadillac] and for four months in a drug store in Fife Lake, Michigan.

From there, I came back to Hamilton and became interested in the store business. From then on life really began! This was in 1880. I had three hundred dollars in cash, and William Ter Avest (a brother-in-law of Bert’s brother, Jan Kolvoord) had six hundred dollars in cash, making $900 between the two of us. With this we bought a store and contents which inventoried over $4,200, so that to begin with we were $3,300 in debt. Ter Avest mortgaged his farm for $1,500. I borrowed from a farmer and gave my note for $700—my good looks as security. Take it all in all, we were over $3,300 in debt to begin with. Store keeping at that time was not what it is today. There was no money in circulation and nearly all our business was in trade, so that what we got for our store goods had to be worked into cash so that we could pay the wholesalers. Butter and eggs was our principal stock. This we bought from the farmers and such other stock as they had to sell—meat, pork, maple sugar, wood, shingles—but never any money. It was all in trade for groceries or dry goods, or boots and shoes. We had a general store and did a trading business. I went to Muskegon once each month and there sold our butter and eggs, pork and anything that was needed in that market. Muskegon was a saw mill town at that time, and a good town to sell such products as I had. With the money thus collected, I paid my wholesale grocers, but it took a lot of patience and hard work. It also required lots of credit extended to us by the wholesale grocers. We never could take our discount, for we needed all the time. For example, I remember one time the time to pay a certain bill was set to pay or they would take possession of the store, I told my wife what was coming. Well, as luck would have it, I got sufficient money to pay on the day set. When at noon I came home for dinner, she asked me “what luck?” I told her I had the money. She said, “I prayed for it.” You may think of this what you please, but it was greatly appreciated by me. I wonder how many wives there are today who will do as much for their husbands to try and make a go of it.

We kept on doing business as best we could, until a competitor went into bankruptcy. A representative from the wholesalers came in and said, “You own considerable. How much do you owe?” I told him I did not know, but a great plenty. He asked for my book, which he compared with what he had, and when through he said it amount to over $5,000, quite a sum, with which I agreed. He asked how much stock we carried. I told him we had doubled the size of the store and gave him our last yearly invoice which showed we were doing quite a good business. I gave him our last inventory which contained our stock and list of our credit accounts. “Well,” he said, “You owe considerable, but we will talk it over and let you know.” But we never heard from any one thanks to Amos S. Musselman, who was the representative that came and we got all the goods we wanted. So after twelve years of struggling and hard work with butter and eggs, the principal stock in trade, we have had as much as two tons of butter on hand at one time looking for a market. It was the butter and eggs that drove me out. There were no creameries as yet in sight, and butter came in by the tons. It was a drug on the market. In those days prices were from eight to fifteen cents, for either butter or eggs. We had to work it over and ship it out. It came back again and more. The eggs were not graded, hence they had not standing in the market for goodness, and therefore there was no market for them as there is now. We have opened six gallon jars of butter with a heavy stone inside of them, cakes of tallow with butter spread on the outside of the tallow. In 1892, there came a chance to sell our store and business, which we did, and by doing so we could pay 100 cents on the dollar and had a little left, for which we were thankful. Much more could be said. I commenced the business with all odds against me, but in the end was able to pay all my creditors, of which I am proud. [4]

Shipment of eggs and butter to cities for resale was how most general stores made money. Most of their trade was done on barter. Very little merchandise was sold for cash. When the business was sold, they were fortunate to get 100 cents on the dollar for the inventory. The real value of the business was in the reputation they built for making fair trade so that the collection of eggs and butter from area farmers could continue.

During the time he owned and operated the general store, Jan Willem also owned and operated a 115 acre farm.

In 1897, he started to divest his land holdings. He sold 40 acres in October of 1897 for $1200. Another 80 acres was sold for $1,750 in November of 1898. And finally, the last 80 acres was sold in July of 1901 for $3,600.[5]

After the death of his mother, Hendrika, in 1898, Jan Willem and Hannah moved to Zeeland. They rented a home for several years. On September 14, 1899, Jan Willem and Hannah were received into the membership of First Reformed Church of Zeeland. Jan Willem worked as a “drover”. A drover is a person who drives livestock.

In approximately 1903, Jan Willem and Hannah purchased 300 acres of land near Coopersville, MI. The purchase included a 160 acre farm in Polkton Township, northeast of Coopersville. The farm was located at the southwest corner of current day Roosevelt Street and North 48th Avenue.  The other 140 acres was in Wright Township, east of Coopersville, adjacent to the railroad. They transferred their church membership to Coopersville Reformed Church.

Being near a railroad is consistent with his work as a “drover”. The railroad is one possible reason he chose to move to the Coopersville area. The other possible reason being, that land was less expensive in the Coopersville area, than it was in Allegan County, near Holland, MI.

Jan Willem died of stomach cancer on his farm in 1915.  His obituary describes Jan Willem as a “prominent stockman and shipper”.

Census records show that Hannah was still living on the farm in 1920. However, by 1930 she had moved into Coopersville. Hannah died of cancer of the bladder on March 31, 1941 at the home of her son, John, in Coopersville. Hannah’s death certificate stated she had lived in the Coopersville area for 38 years (since 1903).

Both Jan Willem and Hannah are buried in the Coopersville cemetery.