MacKay Champion Genealogy - Person Sheet
MacKay Champion Genealogy - Person Sheet
NameBetty Devuyst 
Birth Date1960
FatherJoseph de Vuyst (1913-1977)
MotherMariette / Marianna / Marianne / Yet Elisabeth De Pauw (1914-2009)
Notes for Betty Devuyst
August 2021: Pauline indeed had 2 children, Jan De Mooi and Willie (Wilhelmina) De Pauw. I'm not sure who was the eldest. I think the girl. They lived in Nijmegen (Holland); I never heard about their father.
Willie was struck by polio disease when she was a (very bright) student. My mother told me she contracted the disease by swimming in unclean water (a canal?! ) The vaccine did not exist in those years. She lost the use of both her legs, mostly sat in a wheelchair or stayed in bed. (She absolutely refused wearing braces on her legs) . My mother knew her rather well, and told me she developed a very bitter character, always cross about everything with everybody. Quite understandable.
I never met her. She lived alone, and only loved her little dogs, always cairn terriers, which she made pictures of and sent them as Xmas cards.
Jan was an attractive, jolly boy. He loved telling jokes and figuring the clown. He had to help Pauline a lot because she was so worried and busy with Willie. But he did'nt ever mind doing the errants. That's how he met a woman, named Cor, some years older than himself, who also had a polio child, a little fatherless boy named Bob, who could walk with difficulty, thanks to his braces . Aunt Pauline was not happy with that situation and I think she broke up with her son when he finally married Cor. (or did he wait until she died to marry? I'm not sure) Jan liked the handicapped boy very much and they had some sort of father-son relation. I met Jan and Bob when they came visiting us in Rixensart in 1983 for my mother's 70th birthday. I think Cor was already deceased. It was a very joyfull meeting, mother was quite happy. I know I have a picture of Jan somewhere but I did'nt find it yet (still looking)
Aunt Roos married a dentist called Leo Something. She had no children of her own but she looked after a boy who was a bit mentallly desabled. I wonder if it was Leo's son? Could be. I never knew his name, everybody called him "Broer" (dutch for brother) He lived in a religious catholic institution of "fathers" but spent the weekends or holidays with Aunty Roos.
What also was told to me: Some time before WWII began in Holland, when Germany invaded Austria (der Anschluss) Holland temporary accepted poor austrian children to foster them back to health. Aunty Roos was rather active in that organisation and had such a girl home that she liked very much. She even went one or two times by train to Austria (Tirol} to visit her, or bring her back... Sorry that I don't know the facts with more precision.
That's all I remember, I really regret now not having been more curious about those people when my mother still lived. My grandfather Guillielmus De Pauw was not the talkative type, I remember him sometimes speaking about his sisters with my grandmother but I did not know them closely and was not interested, bad little girl!
Willie was struck by polio disease when she was a (very bright) student. My mother told me she contracted the disease by swimming in unclean water (a canal?! ) The vaccine did not exist in those years. She lost the use of both her legs, mostly sat in a wheelchair or stayed in bed. (She absolutely refused wearing braces on her legs) . My mother knew her rather well, and told me she developed a very bitter character, always cross about everything with everybody. Quite understandable.
I never met her. She lived alone, and only loved her little dogs, always cairn terriers, which she made pictures of and sent them as Xmas cards.
Jan was an attractive, jolly boy. He loved telling jokes and figuring the clown. He had to help Pauline a lot because she was so worried and busy with Willie. But he did'nt ever mind doing the errants. That's how he met a woman, named Cor, some years older than himself, who also had a polio child, a little fatherless boy named Bob, who could walk with difficulty, thanks to his braces . Aunt Pauline was not happy with that situation and I think she broke up with her son when he finally married Cor. (or did he wait until she died to marry? I'm not sure) Jan liked the handicapped boy very much and they had some sort of father-son relation. I met Jan and Bob when they came visiting us in Rixensart in 1983 for my mother's 70th birthday. I think Cor was already deceased. It was a very joyfull meeting, mother was quite happy. I know I have a picture of Jan somewhere but I did'nt find it yet (still looking)
Aunt Roos married a dentist called Leo Something. She had no children of her own but she looked after a boy who was a bit mentallly desabled. I wonder if it was Leo's son? Could be. I never knew his name, everybody called him "Broer" (dutch for brother) He lived in a religious catholic institution of "fathers" but spent the weekends or holidays with Aunty Roos.
What also was told to me: Some time before WWII began in Holland, when Germany invaded Austria (der Anschluss) Holland temporary accepted poor austrian children to foster them back to health. Aunty Roos was rather active in that organisation and had such a girl home that she liked very much. She even went one or two times by train to Austria (Tirol} to visit her, or bring her back... Sorry that I don't know the facts with more precision.
That's all I remember, I really regret now not having been more curious about those people when my mother still lived. My grandfather Guillielmus De Pauw was not the talkative type, I remember him sometimes speaking about his sisters with my grandmother but I did not know them closely and was not interested, bad little girl!