After college, Liz landed her first teaching job at Croton-on-Hudson in Westchester County, thirty miles north of New York City. This picturesque and historic village nestled on eight miles of Hudson River shoreline. It was a new and different place, a beautiful location with river gorge views that took her breath away. But still, for Liz, it was life in “the sticks.” She yearned for someplace more exotic and was active in her pursuit of her dream to see the world.
Finally, she got her wish. The Department of Defense (DOD) hired her as a teacher in Sapporo, Japan’s northernmost island. While there, she thrilled at the exotic musical instruments of the Far East. In no time, she mastered them as if they had always been a part of her life.
Another delight in this far-flung land was the Sapporo Snow and Ice Festival. This event began quite simply in 1950 when six statues were fashioned by a couple of high school students. By 1955, the U.S. military had joined in the festivities when members of Sapporo’s defense force built the first megalithic snow statue.
By the time Liz arrived on the island, the festival had evolved into an international event of carved and sculpted ice masterpieces that were lit up at night with colored lights. Today, hundreds of statues, some as large as a house, are showcased at the event, including ice renditions of the Statue of Liberty, the Great Wall of China and the pyramids of Egypt. The exhibition drew more than two million visitors to Sapporo every February.
In 1968, Liz was ready to travel on and the Department of Defense was prepared to accommodate her. Fluent in French and German, she was a valuable asset as a teacher of children in military families. They offered her a new teaching position in Germany.
Between her teaching, her folk singing, traveling and a growing battalion of friends, Liz’s life in Europe was full. She became close friends with another teacher, Patty Peterson. Patty’s family of four lived on her teacher’s salary while Mike worked on building a career as a writer. Liz wrote home to her sister Margaret asking her to send hand-me-down clothing for the two Peterson boys. Margaret was delighted to help Liz’s friends. Liz always remembered her children’s birthdays with a card and a beautiful book. It was the least she could do.
There was only one thing missing and it came walking into her life in the form of a tall Texan. Liz met George Ratliff, an Air Force navigator, in a stereotypical rendezvous point for a DOD teacher, at the Officer’s Club.
George Ratliff was All-state in football at Van Vleck High School in Texas. He graduated in 1968 and followed in his father’s footsteps to Texas A&M University as a member of the Corps of Cadets. He majored in Industrial Technology and was a member of the G-2 company of Second Brigade.
A year later, another second generation Aggie, Randy Durham, joined the same company. He was the first one in the Corps to major in Philosophy. Despite their seemingly incompatible majors, George and Randy hit it off well—even selling encyclopedias together one summer.
Both cadets were in Army ROTC, but wanted to join the Air Force when they graduated. For Randy, that transition was easy. His dad was career Air Force and that gave him the option of transferring his commitment.
Transferring was not so easy for George. He had to bust his Army contract when he approached graduation. At times, the Army held tight to those agreements. But now, with the Vietnam War winding down, the Army was downsizing as quickly as it could. They let his contract slide and George enlisted in the Air Force.
By going this route, it took George longer to get where he wanted to go. He took basic training at technical school and followed that up with another basic training at Officers Training School. Then he was accepted to the Officers Commission program and sent off for navigator’s training, where he reunited with Randy Durham, who had graduated a year after he did.
In the interim, George had married and divorced the sister of one of his classmates. The marriage lasted two years on paper, but in reality the couple was together only a handful of months.
George and Randy were both assigned to C-130s at Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene, Texas. After a couple of years there, an opportunity arose and George snatched it up.
Rhein Main Air Force base near Frankfurt, Germany, had, until now, only temporary assignments or rotations for C-130 squadrons. The decision was made to station a permanent squadron there. George put in for the first cadre and resituated in Germany in 1978.
There he met Liz McKee, an artistic soul with a personality well suited for her job as an elementary school teacher. She was gentle with the children and the well of her patience was bottomless. George was enchanted.
By the time Randy came to Rhein Main in 1980, the two were an item. Liz was spending more time at George’s loft apartment than she was at her own. They lived in Klein–Gerau, the same village as Randy and his wife, Carol Durham—they were the only two American couples living there.
Both men were members of the Blue Tail Flies, a squadron of C-130s with AWADS (Adverse Weather Aerial Delivery System) capability, which enabled their craft to operate in nasty weather. They delivered cargo and personnel and performed other missions all over Europe including down the Berlin Corridor. They were often gone for days at a time.
Before George and Liz married, they made a trip back to the States to meet each other’s families. Liz’s relatives were enchanted with George. Her nephew, Damon Blair, named all of his stuffed animals and superhero figures “George” after meeting his uncle-to-be.
Liz was getting close to the dreaded 40th birthday, and although George was seven years younger, time for starting a family was running out. The couple was ready to begin.
Liz selected her wedding site with care. She chose a spot steeped in history, the Römer city hall, a complex of three patrician buildings with an ornate balcony and a crusty Gothic façade. The medieval surroundings lent the civil ceremony a solemn air of gravity. The gods must have smiled on their nuptials, because the early May day was glorious.
This was one of the first warm days of the year—unusually beautiful for Germany in the spring. Five Americans were present when the couple made their commitment: George and Liz, maid of honor Patty Peterson, best man Randy Durham and George’s mother, Martha, who traveled to Germany from Cedar Lane, Texas, for the occasion.
That evening, the newlyweds had a reception to celebrate. All five members of the wedding party were there. Randy’s wife Carol, Patty’s husband Michael, and a few other close friends joined them.
Liz and George moved from the loft apartment—which was little more than glorified attic space—down to the second floor. This apartment had a balcony with a breathtaking view across the fields to the neighboring village of Gross–Gerau, one mile away.
Since Liz’s first child was due in December, she took a sabbatical from her teaching job. She opened a private pre-school in her home. Her first student was Randy and Carol’s son, Jonathan.
Liz had a difficult pregnancy. So-called morning sickness plagued her day and night throughout her childbearing. A great fear lurked in the back of her mind. Like her father and both of her sisters, Liz had von Willebrand’s disease, a blood disorder. It is believed to be the most common genetic disorder in the world—one hundred times more prevalent than hemophilia. It is thought to affect one in every forty people.
The main symptom is excessive bleeding—like recurrent nose bleeds or bleeding from the gums. The severity of the disease varies from person to person even within a family. People with milder cases experience nothing more than prolonged or easy bruising, a symptom that can be explained away or ignored. Moderate cases display unusual bleeding. In women, this is most noticeable in excessive menstrual flow, which is often misdiagnosed. It is unknown how many women have undergone unnecessary hysterectomies because of medical personnel overlooking the possibility of von Willebrand’s disease.
Those with an extreme shortage or total lack of von Willebrand’s factor in their blood have the most extreme form of the disease. They can experience spontaneous hemorrhages in major joints such as knees and shoulders. If undiagnosed and untreated, these severe cases pose a serious health risk as well as mental and emotional difficulties. Fortunately, Liz’s fear of the worst case scenario was groundless—her condition was mild, and thus caused no complications during childbirth.
Like many military wives before her, Liz found herself alone when she went into labor. Her husband, George, was away on a mission. Cheryl Appel, who was living with the couple on a temporary basis, was at Rhein Main Elementary School teaching her class. Liz drove herself to the hospital in Wiesbaden, where the nurse on duty was Randy’s wife, Carol. On December 10, 1981, her first daughter, Margaret Elisabeth, was born.
George and Liz celebrated their first anniversary in grand style. They rounded up a group of friends and headed north of Frankfurt to the foothills of the Taunus Mountains and Schlosshotel in Kronberg.
The Empress Frederick, the oldest child of Queen Victoria of England, built this house from 1889–1894 following the death of her husband. She lived there for seven years after its completion. The castle still housed many of her books in English, including a fifty-year collection of bound Pick’s magazines.
Magnificent grounds with rhododendron, an Italian rose garden and a romantic grotto surrounded the castle. Each of the fifty-eight antique-filled rooms has its own individual character and style. Some feature paintings executed by the Empress.
During World War II, the castle was commandeered by U.S. troops for senior officer headquarters. It was a favorite spot for General Dwight Eisenhower.
George, Liz and their friends celebrated with a champagne party and endless toasts to the blissful couple. Their friends returned to Frankfurt, but George and Liz stayed for the weekend. They slept in a royal bed in a corner suite with a romantic balcony overlooking the elegant, manicured back garden.
Thirteen months after their first daughter was born, along came Martha Katalin on January 3, 1982, named after George’s mother. This time, George was on assignment in the States. Both Liz and George doted on the girls and made them the center of their lives.
George’s tour of duty was about to end, but he and Liz wanted to stay in Germany. He extended his service in the 7405th Operations Squadron, a classified missions unit. Theirs was a happy, complete home until 1983.