Judy (Boppre) Zieg  
Judith Arlene (Boppre) Zieg
Married to Duane Zieg, LHS '56, for 49+ years.
Children: Jeffrey - Bristow, VA; Catherine - Springfield, VA; Four Grandchildren
WORK: First job, Secretary to Helen Snyder, Dean of Women, UNL; In 1977 I received my B Sci degree in Education from Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. I taught high school special needs students there until we moved to our current home, where I also taught middle school special needs students in Fairfax County, Virginia. Upon Duane's retirement from the Air Force, I became actively interested in genealogy. Eventually, I began working as a genealogist for the largest lineage society in the world, Daughters of the American Revolution. Being a Senior Staff Genealogist was a wonderful and fulfilling experience that I'll always treasure. One of the interesting parts of that job was being the training coordinator for NSDAR. I traveled to many states to present workshops to DAR members. I am still actively involved in volunteer and membership DAR activities in our local chapter and at the national headquarters. We were fortunate to live in many places while Duane was in the Air Force, and I was involved in military and community activities everywhere we lived. I am still pursuing genealogical research, but I am not taking private clients at this time. We retired in 2000.
INTERESTS:
Researching family history has been a passion and obsession for the last twenty years. We could trace our family back four generations when I began studying in this field, now I have documented our history for most of our family back to the 16th and 17th centuries. As I became involved with genealogy, I recognized that helping other people find their ancestral roots was deeply satisfying. As I mentioned before, what began as a hobby became an occupation. Our daughter-in-law is a rep for Creative Memories, so now I've incorporated my love for the past into scrapbooking, to help future generations of Zieglets to have their window into the past.
Our family is the most important passion we have. Our oldest child, Jeff, married a wonderful woman, Kelly, in 2001. Today they (we) are blessed with four little boys, Matthew, almost 6 and Joseph, 4, Thomas, 2 and Christopher, almost 1. Jeff owns his own IT company, Cornerstone Information Technologies, LLC, and works as a contractor to government agencies. Our daughter, Cathy, has grown up to be a lovely woman who is a joy. Cathy was a special needs child in school. Today she works full time as a mail clerk for a contractor and as such, delivers mail to the IRS, she knows the bus and area subway system as well, if not better, than many adults who live here, and she is saving her pennies to buy her own condo. She is currently living in a women's group home which is part of a Christian ministry affiliated with our church, St. Mary of Sorrows. We will also proudly tell you that she is a special gift from God for all our family.
Significant Events: The greatest honor and lucky break that I ever had was to marry Duane. The unity of our marriage, the joy of our family, and our life experiences has been far more than either Duane or I could have imagined fifty years ago. We have been blessed.
Significant World Events: The Viet Nam War affected my life. Duane was fortunate in that he was able to fly with a great group of guys back in the "good old days" in Okinawa, where we lived. For the men who flew, and the wives and families who waited day by day, this created a strong bond of fellowship that continues to this day. I would also say that 9/11/2001 affected my life. I was boarding a flight at National Airport in DC when the terrorists flew the airplane into the Pentagon. I could see the smoke and also smell it. Much, much later that day, we all arrived home safely; our daughter was working 3 blocks from the White House at the time and it took her many, many hours to get home. We will never take our freedom as Americans for granted again.
CHANGES: If I were in LHS now, I would like to say I would try to learn something besides how to pass a note in class. I would hope that I would even try to learn German, although that is probably still a far stretch. I know, however, that I would still hope to have my beloved 1949 Ford gassed up and ready to roll up and down O Street with friends.
REFLECTIONS: After seeing educational institutions throughout our country, I appreciate so much the experiences we had at Lincoln High School. We were fortunate to be there.
We wish we could been atthe big Five-Oh reunion. Plans had already been made for a two-week trip to Europe during that time period. Many of the people in our group are those people we knew back in the sixties in Okinawa, in fact. We thought of you at while we were at Oktoberfest and knew that you were all having a wonderful time.