Tiny Burger

Tiny Burger was the daughter of Gerrit Adrianus (Gerard) Burger (1882-1950) and Alida Johanna Maria van de Winkel (1886-1964).^[1] According to the Rotterdam population register, Gerard Burger worked for the police,^[2] but when he was registered in Amsterdam in May 1915, his occupation was listed as editor of De Telegraaf.^[3] He had been a board member of the Dutch Athletics Union since 1911 and would hold various positions there for many years. In the run-up to the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, he was a member of the council of the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF).^[4] During the occupation, he showed a compliant attitude towards the occupying forces. After the war, he emphasised that continuing with sport meant that concessions had to be made.^[5] This was probably the reason why he was stripped of his honorary membership of the Atletiekunie (Athletics Union) in 1945.^[6]

Tiny also participated in athletics. She competed as a long jumper for Sagitta. This Amsterdam athletics club for women was founded in 1936 by athlete and trainer Jan Blankers, who would marry athlete Fanny Koen in August 1940.^[7] On Sunday 8 September 1940, Tiny Burger finished a relay race together with Fanny Blankers-Koen in a time of 57.4 seconds.^[8]

The Burger family – father, mother, daughter Tiny and son Gerard – lived at Merwedeplein 39-II and were neighbours of the Frank family. They lived on the right-hand side of the main entrance, on the same floor. They may have been the neighbours who were given the key and asked to look after the cat when the Frank family went into hiding.^[9] On 22 July 1941, Tiny married dentist Aat van Kalken. As was customary at the time, the groom came to pick up the bride at her parents' house, and then they drove together to Amsterdam City Hall. This event was captured on celluloid by an acquaintance with a film camera. The old 16 mm film shows the couple leaving the bride's parental home and getting into the waiting limousine. The cameraman also panned the lens to the various open windows. This film contains the only surviving moving images of Anne Frank, leaning out of the window to watch the spectacle. German journalist Ernst Schnabel visited Aat and Tiny van Kalken as part of his research for his book Spur eines Kindes (Traces of a Child) and was shown the film footage at that time.^[10]
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Aat and Tiny van Kalken had two children: a son and a daughter.^[11] At the end of the 1970s, the couple moved to Cannes, France, but returned to the Netherlands in 1997. They settled in Wassenaar, where their daughter lived. In July 2006, they celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary.^[12]

Source personal data.^[1] Addresses: Sloten; Amsterdam: various addresses (January 1921); Merwedeplein 39-II (June 1937); Stadionweg 216hs (May 1941); Cannes, France (November 1978);^[1] Wassenaar (1997).^[12]