I'm SLOWLY catching up with scanning various family collections I have.
I finished with Vicki McGrath's collection, another one from Jim Stoffers, and now working on my 2nd cousin, John Ehrichs' collection.
While going through John's collection I ran into one of the Lutheran Church confirmation pictures.
I double checked to see if I had a more recent scan of it or just a scan from 2000 when I scanned and printed the confirmation pictures that Mel & Marge Kusel located for
Zion's 100th anniversary.
Mel & Marge paid me for the photo paper and printer ink as a donation for the church project, but I donated my time & equipment for scanning/printing.
Anyway, every time I go to my Zion 100th anniversary confirmation folder in my database I almost cry because of the terrible low resolution scans I made 23 years ago.
Back then I didn't fully understand resolution and didn't have the quality programs and scanners as I do now.
Also, hard drives were very small and VERY expensive, so I
wasn't able to make very large scans or full scans of things or my hard drive would fill up.
So now I'm slowly trying to find original Zion confirmation pictures again so I can make very high resolution scans of them, make the pre and post scan adjustments, and
save them in TIF format.
If you have any of the old Zion confirmation pictures, please let me know - I'd like to scan them...
If you are a frequent visitor to my web pages you'll see my pleas for re-finding old pictures used in past Manning/Aspinwall publications and my comments on
low resolution vs high resolution scans.
Here is an example with the 1950 confirmation scan I made just now, as compared to the scan I made in 2000.
The first scan has been greatly reduced from the original scan - or it would be WAY too large to post.
The grayscale scan just below is the full-size scan I made 23 years ago.
The top scan original file is 225 MBs and saved in
TIF format.
The bottom scan I made in 2000 is only 424 KBs and was saved in JPG format.
Unfortunately the altar was cropped off in 2000 so the
file size would be smaller.
June 23, 1950 Back: Ed Grimm, Willard Dillingham, Gaillard Frank, Frank Musfeldt, Lewis Anthony, Charles Frank, Hubert Lamp, Charlie Pfoltner
Second: Ardella Joens, Marlene Anthony, Leo Iddings, Nora Musfeldt, Margaret Brus, Pastor John Ansorge, Emma Pfoltner,
Clara Ehrichs
First: William Kuhl, Corrine Sander, George Wentzel, Cheral Andresen, Velie Saunders, Marlene Jahn,
Alfred Ehrichs, Merlin Joens
Alfred & Clara were the grandparents of John who gave me these pictures to scan.
Here are 2 cropped views, 1 from the full-size scan I made now vs. a cropped view from the 2000 scan.
While digitally touching up the usual marks, splotches, etc. I noticed something I hadn't thought of
for decades - a woman's hair net that was commonly worn. If you look at the top picture you can see the elastic band of the hair net on her forehead.
Unless you know what it is, it is barely discernable on the bottom picture.
While the hair net isn't sharp/clear on the top picture you can see the difference in detail
between low resolution and high resolution.
Another thing that hit me as I am scanning the Ehrichs photos - this is the 150th anniversary of the Ehrichs family moving to the Manning area in 1873.
Next year will be the 150th anniversary for the Kusel family moving to this area in 1874...so a lot of history is involved here.
I should organize celebrations for both families but just don't have the extra time.
Maybe if my mother, Dorothy (Ehrichs) Kusel, who died in December 2021 at 98
was still living, it would have been more feasible, since she would have been able to help.
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