June 27-28, 2001
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| Birthdays & Wedding Anniversaries
Gossip/Klatsch (formerly Dies und Das) New Kids - makes 66 Schwenk Reunion Chairman's Report A Word from Uncle Don - on a speech recognition program. Midi Music Mini Mall |
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4. David Schwenkbeck of Varysburg, NY born this date in 1941.
Want to see how these and other Kids are related to you? Click here for those who are descended from John Schwenk and his immigrant siblings. Click here for all others. Want to see a gallery of pictures of most of these 60 Kids? (220 KB).
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| Gossip/Klatsch (formerly Dies und Das) |
 up stuff |
(Editors' note: The underlined persons are Konrad's Kids.)
A correction to our statement last month that Loretta Andrews Broecker's
mother is Joyce Schwenkbeck Spencer. Joyce is her aunt. Her mother
is Constance "Connie" Schwenkbeck Andrews (see New Kids column below)...Our
condolences go out to Markus Hilsenbeck and his family. His father
Johannes Hilsenbeck died of natural causes at the age of 61 on Feb 2, 2000
near Neu Ulm, Germany...Ellen Schoenfeld, a vice president of Oppenheimer
Funds, Inc. in New York City, reports that her brother Fred Schoenfeld
of Charlotte, NC recently moved to Spokane, WA where he is now employed
as a fireman for that city...David Schwenkbeck of Varysburg, NY
became a first-time grandfather with the birth of Dustin Joseph Schwenkbeck
on Jan 28, born to David's son Darrin and Darrin's wife Judi who live in
Maryland...Irene Rehse recently saw something interesting inside
her bank in Laichingen. It was a display of signatures of prominent people
in Germany (or just in Baden-Wuerttemberg?) The signatures appear on cards
along with a photograph of that personality. The name and photograph of
Uli
Schwenk of nearby Münsingen caught her eye. She sent email to
Don
Schwenk in Idaho asking what Uli is famous for. His reply indicated
that Uli had won first place in the European Soaring Championship in 1998...
Who
of you plan to attend the Schwenk Reunion in the Black Hills of South Dakota,
June 27-28, 2001? Remember, all descendants of our Konrad Schwenk
and their spouses are welcome - whether online or not. The Black Hills
is a spectacular part of America to see, to visit. Spend a week or so there,
and two days of that vacation meeting and mingling with your blood kin.
Click here for a really great map of the region...Kyle
Schwenk near Astoria, OR and his brother Kevin of Yakima, WA will travel
to --Wait a minute. Here are Kyle's own words from an email of Feb
28th: My brother Kevin and I are planning a trip to Arizona in a couple
of weeks. We'll be gone for a week, and we plan on seeing Mom and
Dad while we are there. They're somewhere near Phoenix. They'll
probably join us for a Mariner game or two. Looking forward to some sun
and some relaxing baseball...(editor's note: His mom and dad are Milton
Schwenk and Joann of Yakima, WA)...Uschi Gorzelany of Kochstetten
SE of Stuttgart is back online. Her brother recently repaired a defective
modem or something. She has a new address - which is also true for Michael
Schwenk near Stuttgart. For anyone desiring these addresses, write
to your editors. And also, don't
forget to send us news pertaining to what is going on in your lives...See
you next time.
New Kids - makes 66
In early February, Loretta Andrews Broecker informed us that her mother
Constance "Connie" Schwenkbeck Andrews had become connected to the
Internet - thanks to her son Gerald Andrews (already a Konrad's Kid) who
had moved back home with his parents in Tonowanda, NY near Niagara Falls.
Connie lives with her husband of 33 years, Gerald. To view a tree showing
her descent from our Konrad, click here.
In mid February, Irene and Dieter Rehse of Laichingen informed us that Dieter's first cousin Horst Wurtz, likewise a police officer in Laichingen, had gotten online. Horst is married and has two children. At the moment we are waiting for more data from him such as his date of birth, but we know he was born in the 1950s. He is a 12th generation descendant of our Konrad. Click here to see his descent tree.
In late February, Ellen Schoenfeld had lunch in NYC with Katrin Fehse,
a second cousin whom she had never met. Katrin lives in Berlin, Germany
where she is studying acting. In an email of March 1 Katrin wrote, "...I
was in NYC last year for a couple of months, studying acting at the Stella
Adler Conservatory. I will be in NYC in April again." Katrin is likewise
a 12th generation descendant of our Konrad. Click
here to see her descent tree.
Sooo, Connie, Horst and Katrin,
welcome to the Klub! 
Schwenk Reunion Chairman's Report - Reprint
I am happy to report that the plans for the Schwenk Reunion in 2001 are progressing nicely. The exact dates for the Reunion are Wednesday, June 27 and Thursday, June 28, 200l. Many days off in the future, I know, but we also realize how our time flies, and now is the time to plan for this, one of the greatest of Konrads Kid's Occasions! All of us joining together for a visit, totally and literally "off-line", nothing virtual about it!It's truly the real thing!
In the December SNNL I mentioned that the reunion would be somewhere in the Rapid City area. I hope you "clicked" on that map that Don provided up above in Gossip/Klatsch, when he was gossiping about the Reunion. The Schwenk base of operations will be The Sylvan Lake Lodge which is situated at the edge of Custer State Park and is within easy driving distance to the scenic area of the Black Hills (Mt. Rushmore, Crazy Horse Memorial, Wind Cave, The Badlands, not to mention the totally awesome scenery of the Black Hills, and many more sites to behold). If you have never ventured "Out West", this area will provide you with one of the best scenic tastes of what the West is really all about!
At the Sylvan Lake Lodge we will have the use of a dining and meeting room at the lodge so that we can meet as a group. There are also rooms in the lodge and individual cabins at reasonable rates for lodging. For those of you who love to camp or have an RV, there is also a campground nearby. Sylvan Lake is a beautiful spot with clear water for swimming. There is playground equipment for children and plenty of hiking trails for individuals or families to pursue. As the days and months do bring us closer to the Schwenk Reunion 2001, I will be informing you of more facts and highlights about the area and the Schwenk Reunion itself. Most everything that we need for a wonderful get-together is ready and waiting for me to finalize.
In order for me to continue with this planning, I will need
your help. Please contact me, Jim Schwenk, at this address :
jamesrschwenk@earthlink.net
with an email message, telling me three things: 1. If you will be
able to attend the reunion. 2. How many in your group? 3. What kind of
lodging you would prefer?, (a lodge room, cabin, or camp ground.)
Also include any questions you might have, and I will respond. You can
see why it is imperative that I have this information so that I can tentatively
reserve lodging and meeting room size at this time. PLEASE WRITE
ME! jamesrschwenk@earthlink.net
(You see, Konrad's Kids, everybody writes to Donald and never
to me. This is my big chance,so please write! ASAP)
Note to AOL users: When upon clicking those email links above you
find the symbols %20 in front of the address, simply delete those symbols.
A Word from Uncle Don - on a speech recognition
program. 
| Most of you have heard of speech recognition programs. With these, one speaks into a microphone and the words appear on the screen - in an e-mail or word processor application. Sort of like a dictation machine, except you do not need a secretary to do the typing. I had heard from a few friends who had acquired these kind of programs that they are far from perfect. Well anyway I saw such a program being promoted on America Online. I clicked on TELL ME MORE. And it told me that this Point & Speak program is fantastic. Naturally. $39.95 plus shipping and handling plus state tax if applicable. PC magazine was quoted in saying that Point and Speak is 99 percent accurate. Well, to make a long story short I ordered it and am writing this very article with my hands on my lap. |  |
This is a very sophisticated program. It is also very large, taking up around 160 MB of hard drive space. Since receiving this program about one week ago, I have spent some five to six hours using it. There are times when it types my words flawlessly. There are other times that wrong words appear. According to the handbook, this program becomes more accurate the longer one uses it. It gradually learns the particular phrases which the user employs. It learns the accent, the dialect, the twang - in a word the idiosyncrasies of the user's voice. It builds a vocabulary for the user.
Right now the jury is out. At this point I would not care to make
an endorsement for this particular speech recognition program. However,
I will make a few general observations. For someone who types very
slowly, this kind of program might be worth considering. The program
types as fast as the user speaks. So this might be a boon to the
slow typist, even though some manual editing will be required. However,
for the skilled typist, it is unlikely that this program will save any
time. On the other hand, it is an interesting experience to speak
into a microphone and see the words appear immediately into an document
even though this gets written a little bit slower than through the old-fashioned
way. If any of you are interested in learning more about this, drop me
a line.
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(Don's favorite) |
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Note to AOL users: When upon clicking those email links above you
find the symbols %20 in front of the address, simply delete those symbols.
