Eugene Edward “Gene” Hertzog was born in Oakpark, Illinois in 1932 and spent his childhood in Upper Derby, Pennsylvania. At the age of seventeen, Hertzog contracted polio and was unable to completed high school. After recovering from the disease, Hertzog obtained his GED and joined the United States Army in 1949. For nine years, he served as a military photographer stationed in Japan and finally in Albuquerque, New Mexico where he met his first wife, Magdalene Tefoya. The couple married in November 1957 and had one son, Wayne Alan.
Willard H. George (1889-1956) was a Los Angeles, California based furrier who designed, created, and supplied furs to movie studios during the Golden Age of Hollywood (1920s-1960s). George was the son of Sadie Kiel George, and great-grandson of early Las Vegas, Nevada settler Conrad Kiel, owner of the Kiel Ranch in North Las Vegas, Nevada.
Raya Meron was born July 08, 1935 in Tel-Aviv, Israel. She joined the Israeli Defense Force after completing her education. Following rigorous boot camp training, she was assigned to the Mixed Armistice Commission. After her military service, Meron worked as Secretary at the Foreign Office where she met her first husband who was an Israeli diplomat at the Israeli Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey and shortly after her marriage, she moved to Istanbul.