Ronald Ray Gretz was born in Milwaukee, WI in the early 1960s and is a resident of Northwest Arkansas. He is married and has four children. He earned a B.S. degree in Statistical Research from the University of Arkansas College of Business and served 12 years in the U.S. Air Force as a reserve pilot. He has been doing genealogical research since 1977.
He has been a member of the Donauschwaben Villages Helping Hands since its inception in 2003 and serves as a voluntary helper.
His paternal grandfather, George Adam Kratz, was born in Sharon, PA 3 months after his parents emigrated from Apatin, Bacs Bodrog (Batschka), Austria-Hungary in 1908. He was the son of Georg Kratz and Anna Muller who settled in Milwaukee. His paternal grandmother, Barbara Rohar, was the daughter of Franz Rohar and Marie Amrein, the Amrein family emigrating from Szaszvar, Baranya Bodrog, Hungary.
Ron's material family are primarily of English and Hessian lineage, settling in Virginia during the early 1600s shortly after the foundation of the Jamestown settlement. Ron's interest in genealogy began with the Roots mini-series in 1977.
