Mr. Jack van Ommen

Jack van Ommen is a Dutch American who writes, in Dutch and English, about his life’s experiences in the Second World War, the various countries and continents he lived and worked and his solo sail adventures. His travels started with hitchhiking from Holland to Italy at age fifteen. Before he immigrated to California in 1957 as a nineteen year old, he had visited thirteen countries already. When he ended up as a draftee with a Green Card in Vietnam in 1961, he, and his American wife, travelled to six South East Asian countries from Saigon. In his career he travelled constantly to Europe and infrequently to Asia and Latin America.

Through his curiosity, interest in people and his language fluency he discovers his fascinating stories. He accentuates these encounters with his professional photography in his books, articles and on his blog and his slide shows and videos on YouTube.

His articles appear regularly in cruising and traditional sailing magazines, for example: Cruising World, Wooden Boat Magazine, Blue Ocean Cruising, Latitude-38, 48-North. And in similar Dutch magazines like "Zeilen" and Spiegel der Zeilvaart.

His first book came out in 2012: “The Mastmakers’ Daughters” and the Dutch version "De Mastmakersdochters"

The biography of his mother and the contrasting life of her cousin, with the same maiden name. His mother was betrayed as a resistance member during the 2nd World War and ended up in Dachau, her cousin was German and a Nazi member. His second book, published in 2016, “SoloMan” is part biography and the nine year solo circumnavigation adventure. Both in this book and on his blog, he professes his joy of living in this fascinating world and its people and he describes his survival and dealing with adversity through his faith in God, just like his mother witnesses in “The Mastmakers’ Daughters”.