[1][2][3] Henriette Rosina Dorothea van der Meij was born, the youngest of her parents' five children, in Harderwijk, at that time a prosperous fishing and trading town on the shores of the Zuiderzee (an inland sea subsequently sealed off, partially "reclaimed", and then renamed as the IJsselmeer).
[2] Her mother, born Henriette Rosina Dorothea Costers (1822-1895), who was of German descent, exercised a strong influence over her daughter as she grew up in Harderwijk.
When she left the position, some former pupils wrote he a letter: "... we will miss the German classes with you ... You are able to understand us better than the other ladies (i e. teachers)"[b][1] In 1882 she attracted attention by publishing a book, "Deutsche Lesebuch für höhere Töchterschulen", for use in secondary girls' schools.
There were also contributions to "Vragen des Tijds" (loosely, "Current Issues") in which she argued in support of causes such as housing for female teachers and legal protections for women workers.
On 14 October 1884 the Middelburgsche Courant, one of the oldest newspapers in the country and a longstanding mouthpiece for progressive liberalism, announced the appointment of Henriëtte van der Meij as its new contributing editor, in succession to W. N. F. Sibmacher Zijnen.
More than half a century later, in 1935, Floor Wibaut would recall "the event" ("de gebeurtenis") when the Middelburgsche Courant had appointed a woman as its editor ... there were still plenty of readers of the newspaper who thought it not right.
[1] As time went on she also deputized for editor-in-chief Van de Pauwert, which meant compiling the official report of proceedings in the provincial parliament for Zeeland.
[2] A late amendment to her membership card attests to the unusualness of the situation: the printed title "Mr." was crossed out by hand and replaced with "Mrs." Her journalistic work was not restricted to the Middelburgsche Courant.
Writing in "Mannen van betekenis", as early as 1891, she identified the new emperor, Wilhelm II as a "nervous unsettled personality" ("zenuwachtige, rusteloze persoonlijkheid") who could cause international tensions.
[1][2] In 1889, van der Meij teamed up with her friend Mathilde Wibaut to set up an organisation for providing warm meals to impoverished school-age children.
[1] Van der Meij moved to Amsterdam in 1896, accepting an invitation from Jeltje de Bosch Kemper to take over as editor-in-chief at Belang en Recht, a twice weekly feminist news magazine which was the principal publication of the "Vereniging tot Vebetering van de maatschappelijke Rechttoestand der Vrouw in Nederland" (loosely, "Association for the Improvement of the Legal and Social Standing of Women in the Netherlands").
The influential left-wing commentator Pieter Jelles Troelstra wrote appreciatively about Belang en Recht under van der Meij's editorship.
[1] In fact, as long as she was working on Belang en Recht, van der Meij never openly joined the Social Democrat Workers' Party, though the matter was one with which she struggled.
Meanwhile, in Amsterdam van der Meij became more closely involved in labour activist groups through the journalist-politician Pieter Lodewijk Tak and Henri Polak.
For Henriëtte van der Meij these courses were the start of a long-running education partnership with the important "Algemene Nederlandse Diamantbewerkers Bond" (ANDB / Diamond Workers' Trades Union).
In 1903, with Pothuis-Smit and support from the "Amsterdamsche Bestuurdersbond" (employers' organisation), van der Meij set about extending the women's education initiative into other industrial sectors including cocoa production, cigarette manufacturing and clothing/hat making.
Later, in 1904, the socialist pioneer Clara Zetkin asked her to write an article for the women's magazine Die Gleichheit ("Equality") about the movement for political voting rights in the Netherlands.