|
 |
 |
 |
|
 Ralph Heiden - Everyone always mentions the
Heiden Family Reunions. How did
they get started?
Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - They took place as long as I can remember.
Wilma (Heiden) Bicking -
Caroline Brown might have movies about them. Bill Brown’s
wife. She was Caroline Laas.
Helma (Heiden) Nickel - The
Laas’ were cousins from Toledo. She is the same age that
I am.
Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - They had a movie camera and always took movies at the
reunion. The one I remember best is the year after
Mildred
(Eipperle) died,
they brought the movies of Mildred walking around with
Sally
(Guy).
Helma (Heiden) Nickel - I don’t remember
Grandpa and Grandma Heiden coming to the
reunions.
Helma (Heiden) Nickel & Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - The people from Toledo got the reunions started. The
Burmeisters and the
Laas’.
Helma (Heiden) Nickel - I asked
Caroline how we are related to them. The only thing
she could figure out was that maybe our grandparents were cousins or
something.
Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - How come Berlins came?
Helma (Heiden) Nickel - She was married to a
Laas.
Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - Aunt
Rika (Laas) Burmeister
stood up for me.
Helma (Heiden) Nickel - She was a
Laas. She was a sister to
John,
Herman and
Louis Laas.
 The
Laas' and Burmeisters were related to August Heiden's wife,
Rika (Knaack).
Caroline (Laas) Brown,
for instance, was Rika's first counsin, twice removed i.e.
Caroline's grandmother was a first cousin of Rika.
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - You might get something from
Caroline (Laas) Brown too. Helma was
going to check with her. She and her husband, Bill, used to attend
all the old reunions. He used to take movies of the reunions. She is
somehow related to the Laas side.
William Frank Heiden - She was
Uncle John Laas’ daughter.
Marie (Heiden) Tommelein - She came to our place in Florida one time looking for
Helma’s address.
Ralph Heiden - Perhaps she would have the old films laying around
someplace. We could put them on videotape.
Marie (Heiden) Tommelein - I don’t remember him taking movies.
Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - Oh, yes. Don’t you remember everybody trying to duck out
of the way all the time?
|
 |
|
|
 |
 |
|
 [Looking at some old pictures of the
Heiden Family Reunion and family
gatherings. ]
Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - Is that you in the back row there at the reunion, Brick.
Brick Tommelein - I don’t know. I only remember one time going to the reunion.
Ralph Heiden - That picture was taken over at the
Grange Hall sometime in
the late 40's.
Marie (Heiden) Tommelein - Yes, I can see Pa there and I recognize a lot of these other
people but I can’t tell if that is you or not.
Helen (Henning) Heiden - I have a couple of albums with some old pictures. Maybe you
already have them all.
Ralph Heiden - You never know. I’d like to take a look at them.
Marie (Heiden) Tommelein - The caption under this picture says that’s
Libbie and me
sitting on grandma Heiden’s lap.
Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - We can spot you in all these pictures because you had
that short, blond hair, Marie.
|
 |
|
|
 |
 |
[Reading through the minutes of the
Heiden Family Reunion.]
Brick Tommelein - Look at this 16 gallons of beer, 250 ice cream cones, 7½
gallons of ice cream. All this stuff for the reunion and it only
cost 25 dollars!
William Frank Heiden - That ice cream was something else. It was really good.
They put it in those great big insulated boxes.
Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - We had lemonade in those big crocks too.
Ralph Heiden - The first few years, they debated on whether to have
everyone bring their own food and drink.
Brick Tommelein - That was 1938, William.
Dianne (Heiden) Houpt - Did anyone take
minutes of this year’s reunion?
Ralph Heiden - I wrote a few notes up and called it the 59th reunion
although technically it’s the 58th. The one in 1959 was “postponed”
but they gave it a number anyway.
All the minutes from the old reunions will be in the final book.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Listed
below are excerpts from transcriptions of audio tapes of
two meetings with different combinations of the people
shown here. They occurred on May 28 and September 25,
1995. For the entire script,
