My name is Scott van Pletzen-Rands, and I currently live in Salt Lake City, Utah. I’ve lived here for nearly 12 years, so I do consider it home, even though I’m technically not from Utah. I do come from a long line of Mormon pioneer heritage (yes, I am a product of polygamy), so to say that I’m not from Utah seems odd. I suppose it’s in my blood, even though I really never lived here until college.
I have tried to leave Utah once before, just after graduating from college in 1995. However, as with just about anyone who has ever lived here for a while and left, I ended up back here. I just missed it to much. What exactly I missed, I really can’t say. Maybe it was the beautiful mountains that are practically in everyone’s backyard. Maybe it was my friends here. Maybe I just thrive on the drama of church vs. state that is so apparent here. (I’m more for the state, personally.)
I have been “married” to my partner, Blane, since 2000. We had a ceremony in South Africa while there visiting his family. At the time, it wasn’t legal there, so it was more ceremonial but just as real to us. We will legalize our marriage on a return visit to South Africa in the summer of 2007.
Blane is entering seminary at General Theological Seminary in New York City in September, 2007. After his three year program, we will be returning to Utah for his ordination to the priesthood, and probable assignment somewhere in the Episcopal Diocese of Utah.
I am currently addicted to genealogy, although I’m beginning to reconsider whether or not it’s a “healthy obsession” anymore. I am concerned about climate change (whether it’s caused by human interference or it’s a natural phenomena) and committed to taking whatever steps I can to reduce my carbon footprint, as well as spreading the word about the simple steps each person can take to do the same. I am a member of the Episcopal Church (Diocese of Utah) and concerned with social justice, the elimination of poverty worldwide, affordable healthcare for all, etc, etc.
So…if any of this appeals to you or sounds familiar, read on!
Hi Scott–
I stumbled onto your page while searching for Sterns in St. Louis. Some of my grandmother’s siblings settled there around the turn of the 20th century, after growing up in Quincy IL, and some of their descendants remain there.
My cousins (but not the Sterns) and I are, like you, obsessed with genealogy, and we had quite a time finding the origins for our Sterns, the first of whom (we think) immigrated to the U.S. about 1838 from the village of Handrup in Lower Saxony.
Do you know where your Sterns came from, and when? Ours were Catholic, and it appears that yours were, as well. That narrows the field. Thanks for putting up your website!
Maureen Girard
Pacific Grove CA
My Sterns came from Lothringen–now Lorraine, France–about 1835. I haven’t found information about them prior to their settling in Millstadt, Ill, in 1843. They were Catholic, definitely.