Warm holiday wishes from the Hess family toyou and yours! May there be peace and joy in 2019.

Our annual holiday letter is our way of keeping intouch with so many family members and friends whoare scattered east, west, north, and south. We love toreceive all the letters that come our way. And whatwould we do without all the technology that today’sworld offers: email, Facebook, Skype, and even tele-phones!

2018 high points were graduations, careers,travel, visits with friends and family, and watchingRobert and Michael take the next steps as they ad-vance in their personal and job-related lives.

Michael and Megan visit as often as they can, buttheir busy lives in Ottawa tend to keep them there.They were, however, able to travel to Aurora: for along Easter weekend; so that we could all visit Jay inLancaster, PA in mid July; for wedding planning inmid August; for a long Thanksgiving weekend; andto share time in Aurora and Fenwick for one weekaround Christmas. They have both graduated fromthe University of Ottawa, with Michael receiving hisB.Soc. in Criminology and Sociology. Both areworking full time – perhaps not in the jobs they wantto have for the rest of their lives, but their jobs arestepping stones. They are happily planning their June2019 wedding at Sharon Temple National HistoricSite in Sharon, Ontario, Canada, which may havechallenges due to the distance between Ottawa andSharon.

Michael took his last course at uOttawa fromearly May to mid June, and then immediately begana month-long Artillery Course with the CanadianArmy Reserves in order to advance his military ca-reer. At the end of July, he took a firearms trainingcourse. Michael continues to do security guard workin Ottawa and also works one day a week teachingphysical exercise to a group of children who arehome schooled. He also volunteers with the uOttawacampus safety initiative. This summer, he found agreat apartment with two other nice young fellows,so all has been going very well for Michael in 2018.

Megan shares a house with a few other girls, sothey have found that Uber works very well in Ot-tawa! Megan loves to bake and makes such delicioustreats. Her passion would be to open her own veganbakery, but that will probably take some time.Megan cooks other things as well! She is currentlyassistant manager at a coffee shop, Second Cup,which is at the uOttawa campus. Michael and Meganhave found a church they enjoy going to, and as amatter of fact, the minister there will be traveling toSharon to marry them in June!

Robert and Sammy continue to be a happy cou-ple, but there are no wedding plans just yet. Theyboth are trying to save enough money by living withtheir parents a while longer. We are delighted whenSammy can come to Aurora from Toronto (almost anhour away) to spend a couple of days with us.Sammy’s parents also enjoy hosting Robert at theirplace from time to time. Robert and Sammy also jug-gle busy lives.

Robert also graduated this year, and Sammy sur-prised Robert by attending his Wichita graduation!Mary Beth and Richard concluded a spring trip bygoing to his graduation on May 12 from WichitaState University in Kansas where he obtained hisMasters in Music Performance. We were delighted tomeet a few professors and a few of his close friendsthat we had heard so much about. Robert continuesto keep in touch with them. Robert has secured al-most a full-time job teaching saxophone, flute, andclarinet to people of all ages at Cosmo music store inRichmond Hill which is about a half hour south ofAurora. He does enjoy it, but is learning how to deal/cope with young students! He also has some studentsin Aurora. Occasionally, Robert does the sound forlive performances at a couple of venues in Toronto.Robert worked at the Mariposa Music Festival inOrillia, ON and he and Richard made a video of aconcert in Richmond Hill this June. Robert went toNova Scotia to play an organ and saxophone concertwith John McIntyre, his uncle, and has other projectsthat will continue to unfold throughout 2019.

Greetings from the Hess Family: Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, and Michael – 1 –

Justine Pang

uOttaw

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Sammy graduated from Western in London sev-eral months ago and has just finished her Certificatein publishing at Ryerson in Toronto. She has alsobeen working at a restaurant, and has just recentlybeen hired to assist a publisher in a variety of ways,including working as a marketing assistant.

Mary Beth continues to work for the Aurora His-torical Society at Hillary House National HistoricSite. In 2018, she worked full time until June 30, andthen changed to part time. She juggles her 21 hours aweek as needed by the Society. For the fifth year in arow, Mary Beth has just completed all the Christmasevents. Main responsibilities include Membershipand Administration, and she also gives tours of the156-year-old house, and is in charge of the gift shopwhich is a fundraising endeavour. Perhaps workingnow seems backwards, but Mary Beth volunteered alot when she was a stay-at-home mom. Most peoplework first and then volunteer!

Richard continues to be involved in tape restora-tion and is focusing more on education than he hadin the past. Robert and Richard attended the AudioEngineering Society (AES) International Conferenceon Audio Archiving, Preservation & Restoration inCulpeper, VA, at the Library of Congress PackardCampus, The National Audio Visual ConservationCenter. There he renewed old friendships, made newfriends, and overall had a great time. He presented apaper detailing his analysis of azimuth issues in tapeplayback and participated in a panel discussion ontape degredation

One of Richard’s new friends, John Dyson, anexperienced software engineer, was working veryhard to create software decoders for noise reductionsystems when they met. He and Richard have hit itoff, and Richard is leading the effort to enhance andmarket the tools so archivists don’t need to rely onaging hardware products to properly play noise-re-duction encoded tapes. To that end, Richard also

attended the AES Convention in New York City andpresented a paper on noise reduction on his birthday!You can learn more about this at www.dhnrds.com.The easy way to remember the URL is Dyson-HessNeRDS.COM! We’re OK with that.

Travels in 2018 took Mary Beth and Richard tothe remaining U.S. states that they had not been totogether. Now, we have been to all 50 states, Wash-ington, DC, all Canadian provinces, and The Yukonand Northwest Territories together – and we drove toall of them except Hawaii!

We began our trip with a marathon drive to Day-ton, OH on April 21. Upon arriving in Louisville,KY, we had a great time visiting Churchill Downsand the Kentucky Derby Museum.

The next two nights were spent in Nashville, TN,where we attended The Grand Ole Opry. The showwas even better than we thought it would be! InMemphis, TN, we enjoyed Elvis memories as wevisited Sun Studio where Elvis got his start and thenwent to Graceland which was tastefully done. Thehotel even had a pool in the shape of a guitar. Ofcourse, we were not there when the throngs of sum-mer visitors would be at Graceland!

In Eureka Springs, AR, we saw the ThorncrownChapel, and the huge statue, Christ of the Ozarks.The Crystal Bridges Art Museum in Bentonville, AR(funded by Walmart!) was delightful. The RoundBarn was unique in Arcadia, OK. We had a delicioussteak dinner at the Big Texan in Amarillo, TX beforearriving in Santa Fe, NM.

A relative told us we should visit Santa Fe, andwe are very glad we did! It was a lovely town towalk around in, and we saw so many art galleriesand museums including the Georgia Okeeffe Mu-seum, the oldest church in the U.S., the BasilicaCathedral, the Loretto Chapel with its marvelous spi-ral staircase, among many other sites.

Taos, NM wasn’t as charming as Santa Fe, butthe landscape was interesting, especially the drive

Greetings from the Hess Family: Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, and Michael – 2 –

from Santa Fe. We visited a few places in the area:the Kit Carson House, the San Francisco de Asischurch, the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, and the thou-sand year old Taos Pueblo, “the only living NativeAmerican community designated both a World Her-itage Site by UNESCO and a National HistoricLandmark.”

In Colorado Springs, CO, we toured the USAFAcademy Cadet Chapel, another amazing structure.The landscape at Garden of the Gods and Pikes Peakwere stunning though the cog railway was closed forthe season and we decided not to drive the windingroad up. Before arriving in Kansas, we had a delight-ful visit and lunch with an audio friend of Richard’s,Park Peters and Peggy in Arvada, CO.

Kansas was the final state in Richard’s and MaryBeth’s quest of being in all 50 states together as acouple! Richard had been to Kansas a couple ofyears ago when he and Robert drove there forRobert’s saxophone audition for acceptance into theMasters of Music Performance program, but MaryBeth had never been to Kansas until this trip. As wedrove into Kansas, we stopped at the first Informa-tion Centre, and sure enough, they had large card-board images from the Wizard of Oz inside wherethe State employee happily took our photo so that wewould blend right in with the famous characters. Welater found out that the residents of Kansas are notalways amused with this portrayal!

Our first night in Kansas was spent in the smalltown of Abilene so that we could tour the Eisen-hower Museum, home, and library (a wonderfulgroup of memorials) the next morning before

Loretto Chapel, Santa Fe USAF Chapel, Colorado Spgs.

arriving in Wichita, KS. Robert took us to a concertthat evening where a recital was taking place on thefamous Wichita Wurlitzer Organ. A fun and specialevening!

Robert was a great host entertaining us by drivingus around, taking us on tours of the city and build-ings, and introducing us to his friends and professorsthat Richard and I had heard so much about. Wewere all so happy that Sammy was able to join us forRobert’s graduation. In Canada, we are used to hav-ing the university graduation ceremony a couple ofmonths after classes end, so we found it very refresh-ing that Wichita State held their ceremony just a cou-ple of days after exams ended. We were able to packup Robert’s and our cars a day or two after gradua-tion, and begin the three-day journey back to Aurorawith Robert’s possessions.

The three of us had lunch with Penny Hix, a verygood friend from our early days in Glendale, CA andfrom St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Glendale. Pennymoved away from Glendale several years ago to bewith some of her family and now lives in Olathe, KS.Over the years, Christmas letters were our ways ofkeeping in touch. Penny was as delightful as ever,and Robert enjoyed meeting her as an adult! We thenfound our way to Sarnia for a couple of days whereCathie was, as usual, a great hostess and very enjoy-able to be with.

At the end of August, Mary Beth and Richardwere able to visit Cathie again for another three-daymini vacation. The St. Clair river at the Blue WaterBridge is a nice summer spot we enjoy visiting whenwe are in Sarnia. You never know what large shipsyou might see passing through!

John, Mary Beth’s brother, was at our Aurorahome when we returned. He actually arrived severaldays earlier while we were away. A special play, TheTemple of Fame, had been revised and was per-formed at Trinity Church, Aurora, the same weekendas Robert’s graduation. Mary Beth had really wanted

Greetings from the Hess Family: Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, and Michael – 3 –

to be in Aurora to see this special production, butRobert’s graduation was a not-to-be-missed event!The Temple of Fame was special to John and MaryBeth as one hundred years ago their grandmotherparticipated in the play and was a major influence inits production. The Aurora Museum & Archives Cu-rator took the lead in making the 2018 performanceshappen over a three-day weekend. John was able tovisit many Aurora and area friends and was able tovisit with us for a couple of days before he had tohead back to Parrsboro, Nova Scotia.

John is happy in the very small town of Parrsborowhere he is a church organist, and he gets involvedwith other community activities. This spring, hestarted a bed and breakfast at his home and has en-joyed many visitors from several different provinces,states, and countries! John was able to attendMichael’s graduation in Ottawa at the end of Octo-ber, so it was good to see him then as well. We wishhe could visit us during this holiday season, but withchurch responsibilities before Christmas and withunpredictable weather, he has decided not to comethis season. We hope he will be able to come soon!

Jay is wonderful and keeps on going at the age of 99!Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, Sammy, Michael, and Meganfound the time in our schedules to make the ten-hour drivingtrip to Lancaster together in our 2001 Suburban which isholding up well. We left Aurora on July 23rd, had lunch anda visit with Jay on the 24th, and drove back to Aurora on the25th.

The McKeowns are a lovely family to be associated with.Mary Beth’s and John’s connection with them is through theMcIntyre/Campbell side of the family. Isobel (Campbell)McKeown was Hugh and Brian McKeown’s mother. MaryBeth has fond memories of visiting Keswick years ago withher parents, Bill (McIntyre) and Margaret. For a few yearsnow, we have been invited to summer and Thanksgivinggatherings in Keswick which we truly love attending. It iswonderful to keep the connections alive.

As most of you know, for years, John has been workingon the McIntyre family tree with input years ago from AllanHood, who is related to the McKeowns. Mary Beth andSally McIntyre took on some of the recent research, some ofwhich dealt with births, deaths, marriages, etc. of peoplewho are living now. Mary Beth has found that once you startdoing research, it is like solving a puzzle as you put pieces

together in the hopes of creating a final product.Now that Mary Beth is employed, John has taken onthis project once again and has put together evenmore information that he has uncovered as he contin-ues to go through boxes in Parrsboro. Just this week,John sent us several more pages of letters, photos,and other information.

Our 35th wedding anniversary in September foundRichard and Mary Beth at a Joan Baez concert inToronto. Richard was able to secure back stagepasses to make a photo with Joan happen! That sameday, we also visited for the first time Toronto’s Rip-leys Aquarium, a must see.

Throughout the year, we have enjoyed socializingwith Ray and Elaine, Sammy’s parents. In Decem-ber, 2017, they were able to come to Trinity ChurchAurora’s Christmas Carol Service, and in June, 2018,we were able to attend a Sunday morning church ser-vice at their church, Knox Presbyterian Church indowntown Toronto. Their newly renovated churchwas very tastefully completed, combining the oldwith the new. We very much enjoyed the service andwelcoming atmosphere as well!

Health has been good to us this year. May 2019be a happy, peaceful, and healthy year for everyone!Please keep those cards, letters, and emails coming.We really do love hearing from you!

Love, Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, and Michael

Greetings from the Hess Family: Mary Beth, Richard, Robert, and Michael – 4 –

Anne

Keillor

Sammy Robert Mary Beth Jay Richard Michael Megan