Nachrichten des Deutsch-Amerikanischer Zentralverein zu Peoria www.peoriagermans.net January - March 2015 Affiliate News 2 Committee & Event News 4 Membership 2015 Renewal Info 6 Issue 49 GACS Banquet info 8 Publicity and Media News 9 Upcoming Events: Seasons Greetings! GACS Banquet, Sat. Jan. 10 In parts of Europe the Holiday Season does end until Three Kings Day on January 6th, the Feast of Epiphany, which is the 12th day of Christmas! Fasching Ball Sat., Feb. 7 Damenchor's Bockfest Sun. Feb. 15 Newsletter Sponsorship For those receiving this newsletter via snail mail, the postage was sponsored by the Damenchor. We hope you and your family had a wonderful holiday season and are looking forward to 2015. It is hard to believe that we are ready to start a new year! 2014 was another great year for the Peoria German American Society and its affiliates. Our fests at Hickory Grove were very successful. in 2014 we began advertising with the folks at WGLO 95.5 to attract a more diverse demographic than we were getting elsewhere. This change paid off. We saw many new faces at our fests this year. Many of the newcomers plan on coming back again! We also increased our use of Social Media. Even with a change in our featured headliner, the Oktoberfest almost matched last year's record numbers. The Das Bier Run is paying big dividends. Our Sunday crowd was the biggest in recent memory. 2015 will mark the 20th Anniversary of the Oktoberfest and we are planning to make it very special. The Kristkindlmarkt lived up to its potential with two fantastic weekends of Christmas magic. Great vendors, great food, great atmosphere, and great weather made for our most successful year ever. We could not have done all of our great events without the support of our members and all of you who are not currently members volunteering hundreds of hours. We greatly appreciate your efforts. Thank you! Published four times a year. To Submit Articles or to Change Contact Information: [email protected] or (309)444-4656 Editor: Jeff Pulfer Please take note, it is that time of year to renew your memberships. Details of how to do this can be found in this newsletter. We are looking forward to your continued involvement in our organization. - Jeff Pulfer Editor AFFILIATE NEWS 2015 GACS Officers SVP Schuetzen Newst Angie Blasek - President We had a great year with good performances in our Chicago (2d), Peoria (1st) and St Louis (1st) matches and in our Leagues. Lauren Blasek - 1st Vice-President Steve Dippel - 2nd Vice-President Jeff Pulfer - Membership Secretary Mat Hanley - Treasurer League Results: Luftgewehr / Air Rifle: Ross Baer 86.5, Paul Bishop 84.4, Bryan Brown 78.5 Laurie Martin - Assistant Treasurer Mary Dempster - Recording Secretary LuPi / Air Pistol: Chris Knapp 91.6, Paul Bishop 90.9, Rich Klockenga 89.3 2015 SVP Officers President - Tommy Franken Halbauflage / Half-supported Rifle: Ross Baer 99.2, Eva Rushford 97.7, Jane Klockenga 96.6 1st Vice President - Nate Eisfelder 2d Vice President - Gary Emery Armbrust / Crossbow: Ross Baer 4.8, Paul Bishop 4.3, Bryan Brown 3.9 Treasurer - Mat Hanley, Membership Secretary - Steve Dippel, Bogen / Bow: Bryan Brown, 4.5, Ross Baer 4.3, Justin Howeler 3.9 Recording Secretary - Julie Brown Pentathlon: Ross Baer 15, Paul Bishop 15, Justin Howeler 14 Standing Committee Representatives: We also want to congratulate our new King and Queen, Terry Beachler and Julie Brown, and Vogelkönig David Lee! Lindenhof - Justin Howler Special thanks to Ross Baer and his crew for construction of the storage room at Hickory Grove Park, to Bryan Brown for running the Archery League and to our Vorstand for keeping the shooting tradition alive and well in Peoria! Vorstand: Hauptmann Paul Bishop, Range Officers Dave Hale and Justin Howeler, Treasurer Bryan Brown, Bar Julie Brown, Training Ross Baer and Terry Beachler, Juniors Dick Barth, Quartermaster Bob Eissler, Scoring Chris Knapp, Statistics Bobby Franken, Sustenance Hans-Jürgen Wiegand. Media - Steve Dippel Hickory Grove - Bill Ross 2015 Airgun League Shooting begins January 8th and continues on the 1st, 3rd and 5th Thursdays through the year. New shooters are always welcome. Contact HPTM Paul Bishop at 231-4620 with any questions. Music and Culture - Gary Emery 2015 Damenchor Officers President: Debbie Hedemann 1st Vice President: Carol Hedemann 2nd Vice President: Ingrid Ruscheinski Membership Secretary: Ruth Sepich Secretary: Carolyn Alaksiewicz German Speaking Stammtisch Nights to Begin in January!! Schuss Heil! The Music and Culture Committee will be hosting Stammtisch Nights the second Friday of the Month at the Lindenhof. One or more tables will be devoted to those who want to practice and/or learn to speak more German. Please show up around 6pm. You will be on your own as to food and beverages. Stammtisch is an informal group meeting held on a regular basis, and also the usually large, often round table around which the group meets. A Stammtisch is not a structured meeting, but rather a friendly get-together. - Paul Bishop, Hauptmann SVP Member of the Year - Ross Baer Congratulations to Ross Baer on being named SVP Member of the Year! Ross did a fantastic job of rehabilitating the former snow cone stand attached to the office into a storage space for the shooters and archers at Hickory Grove as well as being active in the club throughout the year. -2- 2015 Harmonie Officers Harmonie-Concordia President: Bill Marriott Harmonie had another successful year. We had a great time and made some nice money at the Peoria Jaycee International Beer Festival at Expo Gardens. We are looking forward to this event again in 2015. Our Spring Concert and the Return of Eddie Korosa in April topped off a very busy month for us. 1st Vice President: Jeff Pulfer We once again served breakfast after the Race for the Cure in May. A nujmber of us ventured up to Milwaukee to the National Sangerfest in June. A good time was had by all. Delegates to GACS: 2nd Vice President: John Katzke Membership Secretary: Pete Bachfischer Treasurer: Adam Gudat Recording Secretary: Andy Sepich Brent Caras John Katzke Norbert Zagas Thanks to all of you who came out and enjoyed our Breakfast in the Park on July 4th. We hope to see more of you in 2015. Matt Doling Alternates: Jon Robison and Louie Mayer In August we held our Bratfest, which is the biggest fest held at Hickory Grove, in August. Our second annual beer tasting was a real crowd pleaser along with Eddie Korosa and his band. Least I forget Harmonie works the kitchen at all of the German Fests at Hickory Grove. That's the main reason our fest food is so awesome! Trustees: Roger Martin and his helpers sold a record amount of pretzels at the Oktoberfest. A number of other Harmonie members worked the Heritage Tent, served beer, and performed other tasks at this outstanding end of Summer Event. Lindenhof: Louie Mayer Jack Fennel * 2015 Bill Saathoff * 2013 Dick Orth * 2014 * year of election Committees: Hickory Grove: Dennis Kalvy Publicity and Media: TBD Cultural Affairs: Dick Orth Oktoberfest 2015 Matt Doling chaired our annual Fall Stag and Louie Mayer organized a bus trip to the Bayern Stube in Gibson City. Of course we saved our best for last with two weekends of Christmas magic with our 5th Annual Kristkindlmarkt. This is the largest public event held at the Lindenhof each year. Thanks to all of you helped out and/or attended this year! Planning for the 2015 Oktoberfest has begun. If you are interested in planning this event please contact Angie Blasek 693-2349 or Lauren Blasek 314-580-0597. During the year we were sorry to lose a few of our long time members. They will be missed. We continued our music scholarship program to Bradley University along with the help of Damenchor and the Rathskellar Brummers. We also gave money to the PJ Star Christmas Tree Fund and Central Illinois Riding Therapy from our Service Fund. We are in need of someone to take over as co-chairman of the Heritage Tent. After serving in this roll for a number of years, Al Hedeman, has decided to step down. I'm sure he is more than willing to mentor anyone who wants to take this on. Since this is the 20th year of this wonderful event I'm sure we can find something for you to help us with. And all of this from a group that was suppose to not have much left in the old gas tank a few years ago! Prost! - Jeff Pulfer Jeff Pulfer First Vice-President -3- COMMITTEE & EVENT NEWS Fasching: The Carnival Season in Munich Music and Culture Committee We just finished a great Christmas Season of Singing at Senior Homes in the Peoria area. Jan. 6 is the music committee meeting to plan the coming year’s program, etc. Jan. 13 is the first Singing Practice of the new year. We welcome all singers – new, old, former, whatever, just if you like to sing. Sopranos will be especially in demand and thus will be treated with the respect the y deserve We are awaiting our song books from Evansville for the District. Saengerfest in May. We will also be working on songs for our Spring Concert at the Lindenhof on April 11. When other countries of the world celebrate “carnival“, in Munich “Fasching“ is celebrated. “Fasching“ comes from the medieval word “vaschnc“, in present-day German “Fastnacht“ and relates to the fasting period, which begins immediately after Fasching and is what we know as Lent. Al Hedeman Past Director and current chairman of the Music and Culture Committee Fasching Ball - Trudy Smith Carnival was originally a pagan festival, later it has become associated with the catholic church and was celebrated on the day before the beginning of Lent. Nowadays the carnival season begins in midNovember with the coronation of a carnival prince and a carnival princess and lasts about three months until Ash Wednesday seven weeks before Easter. The most Fasching events are held in the last four weeks. Up until the beginning of the 19th century all Fasching celebrations took place in the open air. It wasn’t until 1829 that the first “Fasching Ball“ took place, an artist’s festival, soon to be followed by other artist’s festivals and numerous masquerades and society and court balls. It is getting close to that time for the Fasching Ball. The date will be Saturday, February 7th. Yearbook—2014-2015 Doors open at 6pm, entertainment (West MacQueen Street Band) starts at 7pm. Admission is $8.00 per person to offset the cost of the entertainment. Prizes for best costumes!! The 2014-2015 Yearbooks are now available for pickup at the Lindenhof. Please bring a dish to pass. This is similar to the New Year's Eve party and which has always had great food. Thanks to all of you who sponsored ads in the book this year or found businesses to sponsor an ad. With out your help we would not be able to do this. I hope to see y'all and more members because this is really a great party. Everyone always has a great time. We distribute 2000 copies throughout the year at Oktoberfest, our fests at HG, and at the Lindenhof. - Judy Slankard -4- to sell out of almost everything including the Peoria dining tour books 5th Annual Kristkindlmarkt @ T heLindenhof One final thank you, to the Harmonie Singers for allowing me to serve one again as chairman of this wonderful Holiday Event! - Jeff Pulfer, Kristkindlmarkt Chairman The 5th Annual Kristkindlmarkt was our most successful yet. We had two outstanding weeks. The weather helped out a lot. We also upped our advertising and exposure for this event. I got to be on TV three times to promote the first weekend, plus we were part of the Peoria and Peoria County's Small Business Saturday campaign. We also used a couple of e-mail blasts with Whofish and I posted to as many Facebook pages as I though would make sense. Our vendors also helped us out by promoting our event to their customers at other events. We also have some of the nicest vendors in the area participating in our event. As one new vendor mentioned he felt like he was among family. We are sorry announce that Doug Lais, of Leatherhelm will no longer be able to participate in this event due to his move out of state. We wish him and his wife the best in their new adventure. Bockfest is Coming! Hallo Folks, Damenchor is planning a Bockfest for Sunday, February 15th at the Lindenhof! Bockfest is typically a celebration of strong beers brewed in the Spring for the Lenten Season. Strong beers were drunk while fasting during this period for nurishment. Also, bock beers were brewed for Christmas and other religious festivals. A number of the Kristkindlmarkt attendees come back year after year just to try our wonderful Gluhwein and to get the latest edition of our Kristkindlmarkt mug to add to their collection. Thanks to Matt and Linda Doling for making batch after batch of this wonderful nectar! My niece compared our version to the one in Chicago and our's was deemed to be the best! Bock is a strong lager of German origin. Several substyles exist, including maibock (helles bock, heller bock), a paler, more hopped version generally made for consumption at spring festivals; doppelbock (double bock), a stronger and maltier version; and eisbock, a much stronger version made by partially freezing the beer and removing the ice that forms. We hope you all enjoyed the entertainment this year. Each weekend was different. Thank you Al Hedeman for arranging all of this again! Originally a dark beer, a modern bock can range from light copper to brown in colour. The style is very popular, with many examples brewed internationally. A special thank you to Bob Barker who did an outstanding job of playing Santa as well as the numeous lovely ladies who served as Mrs. Claus during the two weeks. The style known now as bock was a dark, malty, lightly hopped ale first brewed in the 14th century by German brewers in the Hanseatic town of Einbeck. My niece Rena Pulfer and new Damenchor member, Emily Johnson, both did great jobs as our Kristkindl's. Rena was even featured on the evening news the first weekend. I'm not sure what the Damenchor has planned for this event since the organizers have not provided me with any input for this event. Thanks to those of you who worked the kitchen, the pretzel table, and the bar. Your efforts helped make this a true German experience for our guests. I'm not even sure if bock beer will be served since this could also be a celebration of bockwurst. Of couse bockwurst was originally eaten with bock beer, so I would only hope at least one bock beer will be served at this event! Also, thanks to those unsung heros who set up the hall both weekends and set it back up on Sunday evenings. Please contact Debbie Hedeman for details 444-8489. Also, thanks to the hall decorating committee for making the hall such a magical place for the event. And least I forget, those brave volunteers, many who were not German club members, who manned the Media Table for me. We managed -5- Membership Dues for 2015 are Payable Now! $30 for primary membership dues. $15 for secondary membership dues. Junior membership fees are only $10 per year. Damenchor Members should send their checks to Ruth Sepich at 32 Oakridge Pt, Morton, IL 61550. Harmonie Members should send their checks to Pete Bachfischer at 1357 Timber Oak Dr., Metamora, IL 61548. SVP Members should send their checks to Steve Dippel at 101 Amsler St, Bartonville, IL 61607. You can also hand over your check at a membership meeting to one of the officers above or if they are NOT there the affiliate treasurer or president. For those of you who need an invoice for business purposes or for you record keeping, I've included a GACS Membership Renewal form on the next page which you can use. You only need to fill it out and return it with your check if your information or interests have changed over the past year. You can also e-mail your changes directly to me if you do not want to fill out a form. I would not recommend writing one check to cover both your primary and secondary membership dues. If you do, make sure you notify both affiliates as to what your check covers and make sure they acknowledge that your dues have been paid. I normally write separate checks to each affiliate. For Harmonie, I pay my dues on-line through CEFCU Bill Pay. You can make one check to cover multiple memberships of a single affiliate. Just make sure you clearly identify what the check covers in a separate note. NOTE: I would encourage all members to renew by check. That way you will have a record of paying your dues. I would suggest NOT mailing your check to the Lindenhof. Mail can easily be misfiled. Checks sent to the Lindenhof may also not be picked up in a timely manner since some of the officers can only make it to the hall once a month or even if they are there, they forget to check for mail. I know I'm guilty of this all of the time. Even if the respective mail folder is checked, the processing of your check may be delayed by if not several days, several weeks, or even months. DO NOT GIVE YOUR CHECK TO SOMEONE BESIDES THE APPROPRIATE AFFILIATE OFFICER AT A FRIDAY NIGHT DINNER. If your check has not been cashed within 60 days of sending it, please contact one of the folks above. As a last resort you can contact me to follow-up. If your affiliate provides membership cards you may want to ask them to send you a card to confirm you are a member. Jeff Pulfer G.A.C.S Membership Secretary 2015 -6- German American Central Society Affiliate Membership Dues Renewal Form/Invoice Name________________________________________________________________ Dues: $30 for Primary Membership - Additional $15 if joining a Secondary Club Junior (18 and Under) Membership is $10 for the club you want to join. Primary Membership: Damenchor _____, Harmonie _____ or Sport Verein _____ Secondary Membership: Damenchor _____, Harmonie _____ or Sport Verein _____ Make checks payable to Damenchor, Harmonie or Sport Verein. Cash is also accepted, but not recommended. Renewals should be paid by March 1st of the renewal year. Separate form is required for each membership. OPTIONAL: Please fill out the following if you would like to become more involved with any of the activities below. Would you be interested in being an active singer? Do you play an instrument? Yes _____ No ____ Yes _____ No ____ Are you be interested in (Sport Verien sponsored): Soccer Program _____ Target Shooting _____ Golf League _____ Hiking ______ Running ______ Other activities you would like to participate in or help organize (check all that apply): Picnics ___ Dances ___ Weekly dinners ____ German Fests___ Bike Rides ___ Bus Trips ___ Charity Events ____ Newsletter ___ Youth Activities ___ Cooking ___ Folk Dancing ___ Puppet Theatre ____ Car Cruis'ns ____ Club Craft Fairs ____ Public Relations/Community Involvement_________ List others: __________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________________ Please fill out the following if you information has changed during the last year. Address: _____________________________________________________________ City: _________________________________ State: _________ Zip: _____________ Phone: _________________________ E-mail: _______________________________ NOTE: E-mail address is required to receive weekly e-Newsletter, quarterly newsletter, and updates. Birth Date: ___________Year (optional)_________ Signature: ________________________________________ Date: ____________ ************************************************************************************************************* To be filled out by an Affiliate Officer Date Received: ____________Officer Signature or Initials: _______________________ -7- You are cordially invited to the: German-American Central Society Appreciation Dinner - at the Lindenhof Saturday, January 10, 2015 • The doors will open at 5:00 pm, Awards at 6:00 pm and Dinner at 6:30 pm. • Music and Dancing to follow! • The cost of this year's dinner is $10.00 per person which will include the dinner and 2 drink tickets. • Please make checks out to German-American Central Society or GACS. •Please send all money to the Lindenhof c/o Angie Jungwirth to 7601 N. Harker Drive - Peoria, IL 61615 by Tuesday, January 6th. You may pay at the door if you have made a reservation. •Any questions please contact Angie Blasek at 693-2349 or [email protected] Please complete and return with your check. Thank you for your participation. Name(s): ____________________________________________________________ _____ # of guests (including you) $_____________ Total Amount Paid for dinner From SVP's Annual Member Banquet L-R New Schützenkönig Terry Beachler, out-going Schützenkönigin Judy Slankard, New Schützenkönigin Julie Brown and out-going Schützenkönig Al Smith -8- weekend match the numbers of the first weekend, which had more TV and radio coverage. Publicity and Media News 2015 saw a number of improvements and expansion of our marketing of our events. • We began paying for radio advertising for our events at Hickory Grove, which brought new folks to our events • Eight foot bannners instead of five foot banners are now used at the corner of Hickory Grove Rd and Rt 40 as well as in front of Avanti's on Knoxville. These new signs featured larger text to make it easier for folks to read. • Sharon Ferguson began creating a posting each week on the Lindenhof Facebook page for our weekly dinners. • A new Facebook page for the Oktoberfest was created by Angie Blasek, which not only easily passed the number of folks who Liked the previous Oktoberfest Facebook page, but also helped increase the number of Likes for our other Facebook pages. • A new agreement with the Peoria Journal Star for our ads allowed us to increase the size of our weekly Lindenhof ad for the same price each week as we were paying for the previous ad size.. By doing so we were able to promote in this additional space some of our smaller events as well as increase the number of times our larger fests appeared in the newspaper. • We paid for event e-mail blasts with Whofish. Whofish is an internet site to post your events to. They are nationwide. Whofish charges us $10 per 1000 of their contacts to send an e-mail to. This allowed us to reach additional folks via the internet that we were not reaching through our own e-mail distribution list. For example, for $100 we reached 10,000 Peoria folks for the second weekend of the Kristkindlmarkt, which helped the second • Improved contacts with WMBD TV and WEEK TV gained us more TV exposure in the second half of the year. • We participated in Pekin's first annual diversity fair as the Excite Peoria event (which replaced World Fest). • Worked with five area hotels to create special Oktoberfest packages for attendees to the event. This had been talked about for years, but we finally got this off of the ground. • We have created a Twitter account for the German American Society, but we have not employed it as of yet (as far as I know). • As to Facebook, our pages saw tremendous growth in Likes during the year. Facebook Page Likes Peoria Oktoberfest 366 German American Central Society 304 Lindenhof of Peoria 303 Kristkindlmarkt 260 Das Bier Run 229 Likes are folks that "like" your FaceBook page and are interested in following the content you post on your page. The Lindenhof and GACS pages grew by over 100 new likes since last April. The Kristkindlmarkt grew by 120 new likes since September. By doing all of these increase activities we believe we increased turnouts at most of our events and by continuing to use these improvements we should see even better attendance at our events in 2015! The Kristkindlmarkt at the Lindenhof -9- German-American Central Society 7601 N. Harker Drive Peoria, IL 61615 Stamp www.peoriagermans.net (309)691-7484 Fasching Ball (Mardi Gras Ball) The Lindenhof Saturday, February 7th 6:00 pm - 12:00 am The West McQueen Street Band From 7-11 pm Traditional German Costume Ball Costume Contest · Cash Bar $8.00 Per Person Please Bring a Dish to Share 7601 N. Harker Drive in Peoria, IL Contact Trudy Smith for More Information 309-697-4195 [email protected]
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