Hengelo

This article is about the city in Overijssel, Netherlands. For the town in Gelderland, Netherlands, see Hengelo, Gelderland.

Nl-Hengelo.ogg is a municipality and a town in the eastern Netherlands, in the province of Overijssel. The city lies along the highways A1/E8 and A35 and is a station for the IC Amsterdam - Hannover - Berlin.

Population centres

Traffic and Transport

Hengelo has a relatively large harbour in the Twentekanaal, a heavily used canal from the Twente region to the IJssel.
Within the city limits, the only means of public transport is the bus. Some parts of the route are on bus lanes, specifically built for buses to travel faster.
The A1/E8 from Amsterdam to Moscow goed right through the city.
The A35 from Enschede to Almelo goes along the west side of the city

The town of Hengelo

Although archeological research indicates the location is inhabited for thousands of years, the municipality was founded in 1802. At that time it merely consisted of a few hundred farms and landworkers houses.

Hengelo rapidly developed from a small village to a town in the late 19th century when it became a significant railway junction. This attracted heavy industry like Stork, Hazemeijer, Heemaf, KHZ and Hollandse Signaal Apparaten, now taken over by the French Thales. Although it had a reasonably sized population, Hengelo never got city rights

During WWII the city was often bombed by Allied because of the presence of the railways and the war industry activities of local factories. Accidentally the heart of the town was bombed out, during the Bombing of Hengelo on the 6th and 7th of October 1944, killing several hundred people. This has also left the city without much of an historical centre.

One of the most prominent buildings is the Roman Basilica built in 1890, devoted to H. Lambertus.

Basilica:^*]

Notable Events

On February 11, 1992, a Dutch F16 crashed into the district Hasseler Es.

Notable people born in Hengelo

Henk Kamp (b. 1952), Dutch Minister of Defense
Joris Keizer (b. 1979), Dutch butterfly swimmer
Niels Oude Kamphuis (b. 1977), Dutch soccer player
Joost Posthuma (b. 1981), Dutch cyclist
Kirsten Vlieghuis (b. 1976), Dutch freestyle swimmer
Theo Wolvecamp (b. 1925), Dutch painter, member of Cobra

External links