Named after the Netherlands town of Koudekerk aan den Rijn (“on the Rhine”), erstwhile sister city of Artesia. The Sister Cities initiative was born in the 1950s as a means of promoting American – or, more to the point, anti-Communist – values across the world by pairing up U.S. municipalities with those in other countries for friendly cultural exchanges. Koudekerk aan den Rijn was chosen in November 1960 because Artesia was, at the time, home to numerous Dutch and Dutch American dairymen. One of them, Harm “George” te Velde (1910-1990), who hailed from the city of Groningen, christened Koudekerk Street five months later on a tract co-owned by the Bellflower Christian School, of which he was president.
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