By Diane Markel

Telegraph staff writer

(from the 7/20/96 issue of the Dixon Telegraph Newspaper)

Getting a second sister city for Dixon moved closer to reality on Friday morning when four people from just outside Herzberg, Germany, visited Mayor Don Sheets in his office.

Paul and Anita Meinke, along with their two children, shared pictures of Herzberg with the mayor. Then Anita Meinke presented the mayor with a miniature mug from Herzberg and a copy of the German village's coat of arms.

Earlier this month, Sheets had sent a letter to Herzberg Burgermeister (mayor) Michael Oecknigk asking to share educational, cultural and friendship exchanges between Dixon and Herzberg. The letter was given to foreign exchange student Dani Boemer when she visited Dixon at the end of June and the beginning of July. Boerner is from Ahlsdorf, just outside Herzberg, and she was to personally give the letter to Oecknigk when she returned to Germany.

The letter had not yet been delivered by the time the Meinke family left Germany on Tuesday, so they could not bring a response with them. However, Friday morning, Sheets had e-mail from Don Snodgrass saying the letter had been delivered and the Herzberg Village Council was going to act on the request. Snodgrass, who is with the University of Illinois Extension Service in Amboy, had originally made contact with Herzberg through the Internet.

The Meinke family was accompanied on their trip to Dixon by John and Becky Leckrone of Oak Forest. The Meinke-Leckrone friendship dates back to 1992 when Tinley Park became the sister city to Budingen, Germany. Budingen, which is in the former West Germany, is sister city to Herzberg, which is in the former East Germany. When Tinley Park needed more host families, the Leckrone family got involved, and the Meinke family stayed with them. Then in 1996, the Leckrone family went to Germany and stayed with the Meinke family.

"When we arrived in the (German) village, almost every house had an American flag because we were coming," John Leckrone told Sheets.

Now Claudia Meinke will be staying in the States and going to high school in Oak Forest.

Sheets said he was pleased to have met the Meinke family. "The key words for the sister cities program are family and friendship," Sheets said. "The more we do of this, the more of a global community we will be," said Leckrone.

The Meinke and Leckrone families also visited the Ronald Reagan Home.

Dixon's first sister city was Dickson, Siberia. That connection has not been abandoned. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, many of the people in Dickson returned to their native countries, and no one has had contact with the residents of Dickson in more than a year.