Jan de Jong
Jan de Jong (1942 - ca. 28 April 2009) was the ice master of the Thialf skating stadium in Heerenveen, Netherlands. De Jong was responsible for the ice in the pre-eminent Dutch skating rink from 1967 when it opened as an outdoor 400-metre oval (the first with a concrete floor under the ice), and then from 1986 on, when Thialf became the first indoor ice stadium in the world, until his retirement in 2000, when he was succeeded by Beert Boomsma.
An ice master's job consists of preparing and cleaning the ice; they control the temperature of the ice to create the fastest possible surface and clean ("mop") or shave the ice to repair damage done by skates. De Jong considered himself the last old-fashioned craftsman, much of the work now being controlled by computers.
Thialf
De Jong was instrumental in the development of Thialf as the premier skating rink in the Netherlands and, for the first years of its existence, a world-record setting rink: until the construction of rinks at higher altitude such as the rinks in Utah Olympic Oval near Salt Lake City and the Olympic Oval in Calgary, Thialf was the location for 35 world records, and De Jong is credited with a total of 38 world records. His importance to Thialf was recognized outside the Netherlands also, the German paper Die Welt, for instance, making note of his retirement in 2000.
