Lingelbach Heritage

Culture & Traditions

Facts About Germany - A website featuring up-to-date information about Germany,
including a downloadable PFD book, Facts About Germany, glossary and collectio of
useful German weblinks.

Germans - A short article in The Canadian Encyclopedia.

Language

Translation - SDL International offers free online "gisted" translation from German to
English and vice verse. Just cut and paste and you're away! Of course, you might
spend hours trying to figure out what the "gist" of it really means! (Ten other
languages are also supported.)

The Ominglot Guide - Omniglot is a website devoted to alphabets, writing systems
and the languages that use them. This site is the creation of Simon Ager, a
webmaster and multilingual wizard in Brighton, England.

University of Winnipeg - German Studies - The University of Winnipeg's German
Studies department offers a wide variety of courses on the German language, German
history and culture, and German literature in translation.

Hessen Tourism Links

Gasthof Gemmer (Deutsche) - Conveniently located in the heart of Lingelbach, just
ten kilometres east of Alsfeld, Gasthof Gemmer is a charming country hotel where
hospitality is a way of life. It also happens to have been the birthplace of John
(Johannes) Gemmer, who, along with his younger brother Henrich, emigrated to
Ontario around the middle of the 19th century. Their older brother Wilhelm remained in
Lingelbach to operate the family inn, which is now managed by his great-great-
granddaughter, Christel Siewert.

Tourist Centre Alsfeld (Deutsche) - A good overall source for tourist links to Alsfeld
and surrounding communities ... and the language barrier is only slightly intimidating!

NordHessen - An English-language tourism site focused on northern Hesse, which
includes the fairy tale city of Kassel, historic Schwalmstadt (Ziegenhain) and touches
on Alsfeld and Bad Hersfeld.

Hessen Tourism - The official website of the Hesse state tourism agency.

German Tourist Office - A comprehensive tourism website covering all of Germany.

Consulate-General of Germany - The Consulate-General in Toronto is represents
the German government in the provinces of Ontario and Manitoba. Gerhard Spindler
is the Honorary Consul for Germany in Winnipeg.

North American Community Links

Grafton - The Dippel family relocated from Ontarion to Acton, North Dakota, in 1880,
a rural district just a few miles east of Grafton, where they remained until migrating
once again to Sanford, Manitoba.

Sanford - John and Elizabeth Dipple returned to Canada with their children in 1903,
settling north of the present-day town of Sanford. Once a village serving the local
farm population, Sanford has also become a small "bedroom community" southwest of
Winnipeg. It is part of the Rural Municipality of Macdonald. If your curious about
statistics, you can discover more about Sanford by reading its community profile.

Tavistock - John Gemmer emigrated to Upper Canada in 1846 and within five years
had secured a farm in South Easthope Township, which borders on the north side of
Tavistock, the major population centre in the district. John, his wife Catherine Becker
and three of there children are buried in the Grace United Church cemetery here. The
village of Tavistock is part of the Township of East Zorra-Tavistock.

Winnipeg - Winnipeg is "home base" to most of the descendents of John Dipple and
Elizabeth Gemmer. A progressive city of more than 700,000 people, it is the capital of
Manitoba and Canada's historic "Gateway to the West."

Woolwich Township - Upon their arrival in Upper Canada in 1857, Nicolaus and
Helena Dippel first settled in Woolwich Township, along with their children and
Helena's mother, sister and nephew. They moved next door to Pilkington Township.

Travel Manitoba - Everything you need to know to plan an unforgetable visit to
Manitoba -- the heart of North America.

Cultural Organizations

German Society of Winnipeg (Deutsche Vereinigung von Winnipeg) - Founded 1892,
the German Society of Winnipeg is one of the oldest cultural societies in Manitoba,
reflecting the cultural aspirations of hundreds of thousands of Manitobans of Germanic
origin. The German Canadian community is the second largest ethnic group in
Manitoba and the third largest in Canada, comprising 22% of the population of
Manitoba and about 12% of the population of Canada. The society sponsors a German
language school, choir, brass band, theatre group, wildlife club and bowling club,
among other activities. (I do not endorse the society's position on firearms control or
even accept the legitimacy of a cultural society taking a position on this issue!)

News and Periodicals

Der Spiegel - An English-language edition of the famous German newsmagazine.

Deutschland Online - The international magazine of the Federal Republic of
Germany, providing a forum on politics, culture and business.

Religion in the Dippel and Gemmer Families

The Ancestral Faith in Hesse

Evangelische Kirche in Lingelbach and Berfa (Deutsche) - The Evangelische Kirche
(Evangelical Church) is the historic parish church in Lingelbach. It is a member
congregation of the Evangelische Kirche von Kurhessen-Waldeck and its district
organization, the Evangelischer Kirchenkreis Ziegenhain. The current church building
was erected in 1793 and fully restored and modernized in 1983. Its single-manual
organ dates from 1864-1865. (Read about the Evangelical Church in Germany.)

History of the Reformed Church - The Evangelische Kirche (Evangelical Church) in
Lingelbach was the Reformierte Kirche (Reformed Church) until 1821, when the
Lutheran and Reformed communions were united to form a single state church. From
the time of the Reformation until the establishment of a united state church, and
likely for some time thereafter, the Lingelbach congregation was identified with that
branch of the Reformed Church associated with Ulrich Zwingli. To understand the faith
of the ancestors of the Dippel and Gemmer families, it is the Reformed tradition to
which one must turn.

German Methodism in North America

Evangelische Gemeinschaft (The Evangelical Association) - In North America,
the Dippel and Gemmer families both affiliated with the Evangelical Association, a
German Methodist denomination founded by Jacob Albright in 1800. The Evangelical
Association merged with the United Brethren in Christ in 1946 to form the Evangelical
United Brethren Church which, in turn, merged with the Methodist Church in 1968 to
form the United Methodist Church. In that year, the EUB's Canadian congregations
affiliated with the United Church of Canada. The Gemmer family were members of Zion
Evangelical Church in Tavistock, Ontario, while the Dippel family belonged to the
Evangelical Church at Pilkington, Ontario. In Acton, North Dakota, John and Elizabeth
Dipple donated the land for Ebenezer Church, which was a member congregation of
The Evangelical Association. (Lesen Sie ungefähr Jakob Albrecht, Die Evangelische
Gemeinschaft und Die Evangelisch-methodistische Kirche auf Deutsch.)

Unitarian Universalism

Rev. Stefan Jonasson, the great-grandson of John Dipple and Elizabeth Gemmer, as
well as the webmaster of this site, is a Unitarian minister in Winnipeg, Canada. He
currently serves as Director for Large Congregations with the Unitarian Universalist
Association and minister of the Interlake Unitarian at Arborg and Gimli in Manitoba.
(Lesen Sie um die unitarische Religion auf Deutsch.)

Charles Follen - Sometimes credited with having introduced the Christmas tree to
America, Rev. Charles Follen (1796-1840) was one of the more noteworthy German
Unitarian ministers. Born Karl Theodor Christian Friedrich Follen at Romrod, a town
located just fifteen kilometres from Lingelbach, he went on to a tumultuous career as
lawyer, professor, linguist and minister. In an interesting article in Harvard Magazine,
Thomas S. Hansen notes that "Follen's 1828 German Grammar launched the
systematic teaching of German in the United States" -- a proposition which is much
easier to defend that Follen's relationship to the Christmas tree! (Lesen Sie ungefähr
Karl Follen auf Deutsch.)

Other noteworthy Unitarians of German descent include Arthur J. Altmeyer, who
helped establish Social Security in the United States; minister David Bumbaugh;
Harvard Business Review editor Edward C. Bursk; pioneer Humanist minister John H.
Dietrich; social scientist Karl W. Deutsch; minister and social activist Stephen H.
Fritchman; minister Max Gaebler; animator Matt Groening, creator of the television
cartoon The Simpsons; historian William L. Langer; architect Bernard Maybeck;
philosopher Max Otto; double Nobel laureate Linus Pauling; minister Robert Raible; Joy
of Cooking author Irma Rombauer; historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.; botanist and
explorer Richard E. Schultes; humanitarian Albert Schweitzer; economist and Nobel
laureate Herbert A. Simon; educator Robert Ulich; minister and liturgist Von Ogden
Vogt; and author Kurt Vonnegut.

In addition, Unitarian minister and professor James Luther Adams was a major
transmitter and translator of the work of the German theologians and historians Ernst
Troeltsch, Karl Holl, and Paul Tillich. Indeed, it may be fairly said that Adams
introduced Tillich to America and the English-speaking world.