Painting of Roelof Sleyster

In the summer of 2002 I received an email from Janet Boom.

Janet was doing reseach on her husbands family and made in the 1970's a trip to Holland looking for information on the Boom, Duitman and Sleijster families.
She has done a lot of research on the Boom family and was also interested in the Sleijster family.

The line from Roelof Sleijster to 
Roelof Sleijster & Johannah H Leisvelt
Evadina Margaret Sleijster & Henry Duitman
Jessie Duitman & Arend Jan Boom
John Alton Boom & Miriam Fath
John Edward Boom & Janet F Jones

So Roelof Sleyster is a great great grandfather of her husband, John Boom.
Janet wrote me that they have a wonderful framed picture that Roelof Sleijster painted and John inherited. 
It is a small painting of a Holland scene with water and boats with a windmill, bridge, and house or building, built with wood.
It is quite nice and he must have been a very talented person.

The story of the painting

Then Janet did sent me the photo's of the painting and on January 1, 2003 she wrote:

The story of the painting is that it was passed down from Evadina M (Sleijster) Duitman to her only daughter Jessie Duitman.
I do not know why Evadina had it unless it was because she stayed in the area and lived so long as she was 90 when she passed away.
Jessie had only one child (my husbands father, John A Boom) and it was passed on to him.
Jessie lived with her son for many years and the picture was with John A Boom when Jessie died.
I had always loved the picture and the history behind it, so that was the only thing I wanted for my husband, when John A Boom moved from Florida and passed on the family treasures to his children. 
It was in the Florida area for some years and was getting damp and had some mold on it.
So when we got the picture, I carefully cleaned and air it to remove the smell.
I was so happy to have it stay in the family and plan to pass it on to my son and grandson some day with my husbands blessings as it really belongs to his side of the family.
There is nothing written on the picture or on the box, we only have the information from family tradition.
~~~~

So it's sure that Roelof Sleyster painted the picture.
The dimensions are 30 x 40 cm (12 x 16 inches) without the frame.
It might be a picture of a Dutch landscape near Arnhem where he lived.
He might have painted it there or maybe he painted it in Alto, while thinking of earlier days.
It's really great that the picture after ± 150 years still is so good conserved.