A LIFE'S WORK

In the summer of 2016 I received a shabby package. It contained a DVD. The return address was in El Paso, Texas. Inside the DVD, the only address
I could find was a post office box in Omaha, Nebraska.

Frederick Hoehn spent decades revising the King James Bible. His DVD contained letters donating the Hoehn Version to the Library of Congress and to the Smithsonian Institution. Covering letters will satisfy any U.S. court that he placed the Hoehn Version in the public domain.

Project Gutenberg is the most widespread way of getting a text-be it large, be it small-unto all in cyberspace.

Mr. Hoehn seems to have had no support from any source. His DVD  mentions no family. The handwriting on the envelope proclaims decrepitude, dementia, and social isolation. It is obvious that he has spent his entire life in poverty. He has made a virtue of that.

I composed an eloquent letter of gratitude: "The widow's mite is well understood here."  I sent it to the address in El Paso and to the address in Omaha. The postal service returned them both. I can only conclude that he has died.

I made copies of his DVD so that more than one volunteer can work on the Hoehn Version of the Bible at once. Obviously, it will take years to get it
all up, and PGLAF's technical people are not paid.

He refers to over three hundred of his works among Barnes & Noble e-books and audio books. His modernization of the Bible was the apple of his eye. He deserves everyone's respect for finding a godly purpose and pursuing it without trumpets preceding him.

If a commercial publisher could be found ...


Thomas Russell Wingate
M.A.   M.B.A.   Mensan
Chief Financial Officer