Stan Zegel lives in the Chicago area, where he pursues his love of European History as time permits. His specialties are Austrian, German, and English history. He also has a strange passion for wanting to know the language and meaning of the surname borne by every person he meets. (Zegel is Dutch, meaning a signet, stamp or seal.)
Stan Zegel amid his 2000-volume (mostly history) library (2004).
He is not as fluent in German as he would like to be, but finds it very useful in pursuing his historical interests. He is able to use it to add facts to the English Wikipedia from the German version, and to disambiguate titles that others may confuse as part of a name (see an example). It also helps him translate (v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y) sources written in Dutch when editing or creating a new article (see an example).
Having a natural inclination as a teacher (although not working as one), he likes to help readers by cross-indexing items and putting events into context so that actions can be judged by the standards of their time, and not today's standards. He loves to help draw out the Why (see an example), not just the What.
He has retired as a newspaper publisher, and also published a scholarly zoological work Herpetarium Hibernae: An Illustrated Catalog of All Indiginous Species of Serpents of the Irish Isles.
He is blessed/cursed with the ability to recognize an inconsistency of terminology or facts or an uncanonical term when reading an article, and feels he must have been a copy editor in a previous life. (In this one he is merely pedantic.) Wikipedia lets him exercise those inclinations to fix things up.
Stan has participated in amateur dramatics for many years, and accepts only title-character parts. He is well known in the area for his portrayals of Harvey and Godot in the plays Harvey and Waiting for Godot and once managed to handle both roles in the same evening at two theatres five miles apart. He also often played the title role in Edward, My Son until he grew too old for the part.
Pet peeve: misplacement of adverbs of limitation, e.g. "he only did it five times" instead of the proper "he did it only five times."
Stan is a Kentucky Colonel, former city councilman and candidate for mayor.
On April 27, 1872, the Cunard Line passenger liner Batavia arrived in New York City (from Liverpool via Queenstown) with Meindert Zegel (known to history as The Great Immigrant), his wife and their three children from the Dutch island of Texel. Thus April 27, 2010 was the 138th anniversary of the arrival of the Zegel Family in the New World.
The Great Immigrant
The pioneering Meindert Zegel, arriving through the Emmigrant Landing Depot immigation center at Castle Garden at the foot of Manhattan Island 20 years before Ellis Island was opened to welcome other immigrants, brought his family to a country only slightly larger (39 million inhabitants) than Texel (6 thousand).
He brought with him his wife Maatje (Martha) (nee van der Wal), their sons Jan (John) and Kasse (English equivalent unknown), and daughter Klaasje (Nicole). A son, Paul, was born two years after arrival.
Knowing only life on an island, he explored the surroundings and discovered a habitable island between Long Island Sound and the Great South Bay.
When he discovered the virtually unknown island, it had merely 549 thousand inhabitants living on it, most of them huddled together in two separate areas at the west end, afraid to venture east, and denying that they were living on an island at all! Learning that other natives unimaginatively called it Long Island among themselves, Meindert then gave it the name Long Island and it has ever since been known as such.
He also learned that one of the two tribes at the west end were referred to as the Queens, so Mindert decided to look further for a more family-oriented environment in which to raise his children.
During his explorations, he found a small village with only 4,600 natives in it (they called it Islip in their quaint native language, so he named it that too) and decided to settle there to begin the family's mission of Keeping America Great. He was delighted to learn that some of the natives even spoke Dutch, perhaps due to contacts from those hardy seafarers who made the Netherlands a world power in previous centuries.
The Zegel Family: Keeping America Great for 138 Years
It has not always been an easy job, but we've been glad to do it, and we've even had some help along the way from others. With your support, we will continue Keeping America Great for at least another 138 years.
The Zegel Family: Keeping Europe Populated Since 1730
Zegel Day is always celebrated on April 27 of each year, commemorating the Landing Of The Zegels in the New World on that date in 1872.
Join the Celebration!
Happy Zegel Day to you!
Knowing that you wish to help celebrate this great event, you can participate in the festivities wherever you are, even if you do not join in the group singing, or accompany us to place Zegel Flags on the various family graves, or other events: Please go to your favorite restaurant and order a very nice meal of your choice. (You may want to mention to the waiter that you are celebrating Zegel Day, in case they have any specials.) When the check comes, pay for it using your credit card, and spreading the joy by leaving a generous tip.
If you wish to share even more joy, make a major contribution to the charity of your choice, in the name of a Zegel family member, and send the tax-deductible receipt to the Zegel of your choice.
Even better is to help us reach our goal for next year of Keeping America Great for 134 Years: your non-deductible check to any Zegel goes to that worthy cause.
Souvenirs
You don't need to be a Zegel yourself, to celebrate Zegel Day or buy souveniers of it! Although the first of our planned series of annual Zegel Day greeting cards is not yet available, you can still spend money celebrating Zegel Day by placing an expensive order for lots of goods or services (whether you need them or not) at any Zegel-owned enterprise near you:
USA
California (San Quentin) Resident 387420(Commissary and Recreation Fund)
Illinois (Chicago) AdValorem(Networking solutions and Sales Tax Software)
Reproduction permitted provided photo credit to Stan Zegel is given.
For Halloween
Halloween Disguise (2004)
Stan's birthday is on the eve of Halloween. He notes "I've made five dozen trips around the Sun, and I haven't fallen off yet!"
Gift Instructions:
Please include receipts with your gift so it can be cashed in or exchanged for something nicer.
For monetary gifts (preferred), consider your cancelled check as your thank you card.
If you want an acknowledgement, write out what you would like it to say, sign my name, and seal it inside a self-addressed stamped envelope accompanying the gift. Inexpensive gifts are not appreciated, and will be summarily destroyed. No products of France, please.
News from Down Under
(from www.news.com.au September 22, 2003)
FART tax ruled out
September 22, 2003
VICTORIAN Premier Steve Bracks has ruled out placing a tax on flatulent cows to combat the greenhouse effect.
He gave the undertaking in response to a question from National Party Leader Peter Ryan, who said a similar tax in New Zealand had led to the formation of the protest group Farmers Against Ridiculous Taxes (FART).
Mr Bracks said there were no plans to introduce such a tax in Victoria.
"An F-A-R-T tax will not be supported by our government," he told parliament.
AAP
Sure, I Knew That
In lithic analysis (a subdivision of archaeology), an eraillure is a small secondary flake removed from a lithic flake's bulb of force, which is a lump left on the dorsal surface of a flake after it is detached from a core of tool stone during the process of lithic reduction. The mechanics of eraillure formation are related to the propagation of a Hertzian cone of force through the cryptocrystalline matrix of the stone, but the particulars are poorly understood. Eraillures form only when a hammerstone is used for lithic reduction, and then only occasionally; use of soft hammer fabricators made from bone, antler, and wood produce different flake characteristics.
Ghoti Phonetic Alphabet
Army
Bdellium
Cake Cayman Cue
D
Eye Elephant Esquimo
F
Gnu
Heir Hallelujah
Irrupt
Jose
Knight Knot
L
Mnemonic
N
Opossum
Ptomaine
Q
R
See Seychelles
T
U
V
Why
Xerox
You
Z
