Jun 27
2011

To many Richmonders, William B. Thalhimer is remembered best as the founder of Thalhimers department stores, of which the downtown flagship location still stirs fond memories.

But to others, he is recalled for his humanitarianism, especially by some Jewish students he rescued from the Holocaust.

In The Virginia Plan: William B. Thalhimer amp; A Rescue From Nazi Germany (208 pages, The History Press, $19.99), Richard H. Gillette, a resident of Lynchburg, tells that story.

Gillette begins his account in the 1930s, when the rise of the Nazis created fears in Jews everywhere. Among them were students at Gross Breesen Institute, and they were the ones Thalhimer saved.

Thalhimer, as national chairman of the Refugee Resettlement Committee, had been successful in saving other refugees. In 1938, he and his cousin Morton Thalhimer bought a farm near Burkeville in Southside Virginia and named it Hyde Farmlands, and there he created a haven for the students. There, they began new lives, and Gillette, in addition to his story of rescue, also tells of their lives after coming to America.

This moving account contains a foreword by Elizabeth Thalhimer Smartt, a great-granddaughter of Thalhimer. As she writes, Set during a time of unspeakable tragedy and human failing, the Hyde Farmlands story involves hope, spirit and something that Gramps called stick-to-it-iveness. It is a ray of light shining through the darkest part of the attic.

* * * * *

Farming, as anyone who has ever done it knows, is hard work. But its immensely rewarding, even as aspects of the business have changed.

One variation is hobby farming, and Michael and Audrey Levatino of Gordonsville write about their experiences in The Joy of Hobby Farming: Grow Food, Raise Animals, and Enjoy a Sustainable Life (241 pages, Skyhorse, $14.95). On Teds Last Stand, their 23-acre farm, they do just that.

But they have office jobs, too, and thats why Teds Last Stand is a hobby farm. In The Joy of Hobby Farming, the Levatinos discuss everything from growing your own food to caring for your animals to choosing the right flowers to earning additional revenue.

Detailed but never excessively so, and richly illustrated with color photos, the Levatinos book is a useful manual for would-be hobby farmers and a world of entertainment for readers with a passion for going green or simply with fond recollections of farm life.

* * * * *

For five years, David Goldman, a graduate of Virginia Wesleyan College, tried and never stopped trying to get his son back.

The story began when Goldmans wife, Bruna, abducted their 4-year-old son, Sean, and took him back to Brazil. She eventually divorced Goldman and married a Brazilian lawyer but died while giving birth to their child in 2008. The boys stepfather fought for custody as did Brunas family but Goldman wouldnt give up.

In A Fathers Love: One Mans Unrelenting Battle to Bring His Abducted Son Home (280 pages, Viking, $26.95), Goldman tells how, after years of battling, he succeeded. Among those who helped him, he writes, were Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and US Rep. Chris Smith, R-NJ

Goldman grew up in Ocean Township, NJ, where his dad was a charter boat captain. He found a career in modeling and now runs a charter boat business himself and does advocacy work on international child abduction. He and Sean live in Tinton Falls, NJ

* * * * *

Also:

bull;In Look to the Skies: A Study of Gods Technology (168 pages, Tate, $13.99), James D. McCall Jr. of Glen Allen examines some of the most renowned questions about the power of God and teaches readers how to find the answers within the Bible.

bull;New Hampshire resident Nancy Kilgores debut novel, Sea Level (284 pages, Quinnebec Press, $18.95) begins in Richmond and tells the story of two women searching for spiritual identity in a small town on the Delmarva Peninsula in 1980 as the church deteriorates into conflict over one of the women, its new minister.

bull;Ellis M. West, an emeritus professor of political science at the University of Richmond, has written The Religion Clauses of the First Amendment: Guarantees of States Rights? (250 pages, Lexington books, $70).

Jay Strafford

Tags:



Trackback  •  Posted in Your Animals  


Jun 27
2011

BURGAW, NC –

A fire that started in Pender County has more than doubled in size and prompted voluntary evacuations in Onslow County.

Diane Steltz of the state Division of Forestry Resources says a fire in the Holly Shelter Game Land area had reached more than 18,000 acres by Wednesday afternoon.

Thats nearly four times the size the blaze was on Tuesday evening.

The majority of the blaze is in Pender County but is spreading into Onslow County in the vicinity of Holly Ridge.

Onslow County spokeswoman Lisa Whitman-Grice says a shelter has been set up at a local middle school for residents who choose to leave their homes.

Whitman-Grice says the fire is burning about a mile from NC 50 in Onslow County.

The NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources have banned open burning and will begin canceling all burning permits at 6 pm Wednesday, June 22 for 27 counties. Out of those 27, six are in the NBC-17 viewing area including Cumberland, Edgecombe, Nash, Sampson, Wayne and Wilson. The ban will be enforced by local law enforcement agents, county fire marshals and the NC Division of Forest Resources.

The American Red Cross has now opened two emergency shelters for residents of Pender and Onslow County. The Pender County shelter is at Topsail Elementary School at 17385 US Highway 17 N. in Hampstead. The Onslow County shelter is at Southwest Middle School at 3000 Furia Drive in Jacksonville.

The Red Cross recommends that you bring a pillow, blanket, any prescriptions, clothing and snacks. Additionally, the Red Cross recommends several steps to make the evacuation process as safe and comfortable as possible:

  • If you need to evacuate, do so immediately. You may have only minutes to act. Protect yourself and your family members.
  • Follow the route and directions provided by local emergency officials. Its important that you do not detour from the route provided by officials it is the safest route!
  • Lock your home. Others may evacuate after you or return before you. Secure your house as you normally would.
  • Wear protective clothing. Including sturdy shoes, cotton or woolen long pants and a long-sleeved shirt to protect your skin from hot embers, and gloves. Take a dry handkerchief to protect your face. Smoke can make it difficult to breathe, damaging breathing passages or triggering respiratory distress.
  • Take your pets with you. If it is not safe for you, it is not safe for them. Red Cross emergency shelters cannot accept pets unless they are service animals. Prepare a list of family, friends, pet-friendly motels and boarding facilities that can shelter your animals in an emergency.
  • Take your Emergency Preparedness Kit. Having items such as prescription medications, copies of identification and important paperwork, non-perishable food, bottled water and a supply of cash already assembled will make you more comfortable and confident while you are away from home.
  • Register with the Red Cross Safe and Well Web site. If you are affected by a wildfire, this public site provides a way for you to register yourself and communicate your well-being to your family members. You can input information directly, or, via phone, ask a loved one to register your well-being for other family members and loved ones to access. The site is accessible via www.redcross.org.
  • Keep listening for updates, as the intensity and the path of the wildfire can change quickly, and without notice.

Tags:



Trackback  •  Posted in Your Animals  


Jun 27
2011

The phone company ATT brought many innovations to the world — phone operators, princess telephones, the Baby Bells – and also those monotone computer-generated voices you hear on the phone, computers and toys, sounding as unnatural as you could imagine. The name ATT gave to this product — Natural Voices Text-to-Speech – is either someones idea of a joke or a case of wishful thinking.

Those voices are not easy to take in long doses, says Gershon Silbert, CEO of Israeli startup Vivotext, which is developing a more human approach for text to speech (TTS).

There are many areas where more natural-sounding voices will have a major impact on the market, such as in interactive games, speech-enabled websites and audiobooks, says Silbert.

Today, just 1.2 percent of all books are recorded. This could be a multi-billion dollar industry, but you need expressiveness in order to make a book understandable, and currently the only way to provide that expressiveness is to hire humans to read and record books.

Existing TTS technologies from top players — ATT, Nuance, Loquendo and others — just wouldnt cut it with listeners. Nor would those phony voices impress game players, toy makers and motorists who want to listen to their email while driving.

Like comparing a Model-T to a Caddy

Enter Vivotext, Silberts expressive solution to natural-sounding artificial voices. Our text-to-speech technology is based on a multidisciplinary approach drawing on expertise from the fields of music performance analysis, phonetics, syntax, lexicography and digital signal processing [DSP], says Silbert. We have patents pending to cover our proprietary approach to expressiveness and the use of voice sample libraries.

Comparing Vivotext to ATT Natural Voice or Nuance Realspeak is like comparing a Model-T to the latest Cadillac, says Silbert. The older model is scratchy, bumpy and is barely functional, while the newer is smooth, rides like a whisper and features the latest technology.

Vivotext voices sound human because they are expressive. Our technology can add and adjust expressiveness to computerized voices, making them sound happy, sad, angry, calm, inquisitive – just like human voices, says Silbert.

Capturing every nuance of expression

The secret is based on music – specifically, the conversion of musical scores into human-like expressive performances – for the conversion of written text into natural-sounding speech. Just as variation in tempo, articulation and dynamics contribute to the effectiveness of a musical performance, speech attributes such as pitch, duration and amplitude are at the core of effective TTS, and are critical to conveying the full meaning of words and sentences.

Silbert knows music; he is a professional pianist who has cut several highly regarded albums. We apply methods developed for music performance, called MOR (music objects recognition) to speech synthesis, and the result is highly intelligible enunciation and natural flow in a variety of speaking styles.

Based on that technology, Vivotext has developed a large library of samples, applicable to any language, that allow programmers to load in a range of emotions to the voice. Vivotext derives basic expression automatically from the phonetic, semantic and syntactic analysis of the text — determining, for example, whether the sentence is a statement or question, simple or complex.

The analysis also takes into consideration additional expressive instructions provided by the use of punctuation, italics, underlining and capital letters. Expression is then determined by a speaking-style preference chosen from a menu. For example, the user can choose a deliberate style for news or an enthusiastic style for announcing the launch of a new product.

Major deals in the works

Studies have shown that the more closely consumers can relate to the artificial voices that speak from GPS devices, phone information services, websites, games, cell phones and remote controls, the higher their opinion of the product – and the more likely they are to spend money for the product or service associated with that voice.

The market for this is huge, with many billions at stake, says Silbert. We are the only ones who have succeeded in developing such an extensive human-like TTS, and the market is taking notice. Anyone who uses artificial voices in their products absolutely loves what we are doing.

Vivotext has two deals pending – one with a large US toy manufacturer and another with a major US audiobook publisher.

Based in the Mofet BYehuda incubator near Jerusalem, Vivotext is funded by the incubator and is working on a funding deal with several independent investors. The management team consists of Silbert, CTO Dr. Yossef Ben-Ezra and chairman Samuel H. Solomon.

Tags:



Trackback  •  Posted in Product Studies