A funeral service will be at 11:00 a.m. Thursday, August 19, 2021, at Lauber Funeral Home, Milford, with Pastor Angela DeFisher officiating. A visitation will be Wednesday from 4:00-6:00 p.m. at the funeral home and 1 hour prior to the service. Her final resting place will be at Friedensberg Cemetery near Avon, South Dakota at a later date. Memorials have been established to the Milford United Methodist Church or to the Friedensberg Bible Church. Due to the resurgence of the COVID pandemic, the family requests that everyone attending wear masks for the protection of everyone.
Helen Beverly Ratzlaff was born in 1934, at St. Luke’s Hospital in Denver, Colorado to George and Esther (Desch) Robinson, the oldest of four children, and passed away on Sunday, August 15, 2021, at Ridgewood Care Center in Seward at the age of 87.
She attended grade school in Wisconsin and later in Iowa and South Dakota where she graduated with the class of 1952 from Avon High School in Avon, South Dakota. Beverly’s father was a preacher, and so in her youth, she and her family got accustomed to moving often from one community to another. Later, Beverly was united in marriage to Leonard R. Ratzlaff on March 12, 1954, in Avon, South Dakota and to this union two sons, Robert and Allen and two daughters, Brenda and Janet were born.
Together they lived in Avon where Leonard farmed and Beverly was a loving mother and housewife. They later resided in Red Lion, PA, and in 1992, moved to Lakewood, New Mexico before moving to Milford in 2008. Beverly was an associate member of the Milford United Methodist Church and was a member of the Friedensberg Bible Church, Avon, SD where she was a Sunday school teacher and bible school teacher and also served as president of the mission society. Beverly was a resilient and kind person and loved to do quilting and sewing. She was an avid reader and loved to play games. She faced life’s trials with her trust in the Lord and would comfort others by saying, “Everything happens for a reason”.
Survivors include her husband, Leonard, Lincoln; sons and daughters-in-law, Robert and Kathryn, Norfolk, VA, Allen and Sandra, Malcolm, NE, daughters and son-in-law, Brenda and James Meyer, Papillion, Janet Ratzlaff of Lincoln; grandchildren and spouses, Zachary Ratzlaff, Malcolm, Gabe and Mardi Ratzlaff, Fort Dodge, IA, Amanda and John Snyder, Omaha, Jared and DeAnna Meyer, Elkhorn, Etta Ratzlaff, Chesapeake, VA, great-grandchildren, Yazmin Ratzlaff, Malcom, Judd and Mae Snyder, both of Omaha, brothers and sisters-in-law, David and Doreen Robinson, Minneapolis, MN, Dennis and Connie Robinson, Maple Grove, MN, many nieces, nephews and a host of other relatives and friends.
Beverly was preceded in death by her parents, George and Esther Robinson, parents-in-law, Sanford and Etta Ratzlaff, a great-grandson, Andrew Snyder, sister, Ruth Pleins, sisters-in-law, Delia Knoll and Mary Waltner.
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