Alaska author Margaret F. Merritt (Photo courtesy Margaret F. Merritt)
Switching careers from studying biology to writing history books might seem an unusual jump, but retired biologist Margaret Merritt said it makes perfect sense.
“I shifted over to looking at history and people,” said Merritt, “because I think science and history both gather information and try to inform people. And the conclusions on both science and history can change as new information is uncovered and new perspectives are given.”
Merritt has had a lengthy and varied career. She spent 23 years as a biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, retiring in 2001. This overlapped with a decade teaching fisheries courses at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. She also worked 16 years as a private consultant for federal, state and community groups on fisheries research, monitoring and management. She retired from that job in 2015 and turned her attention to writing. She’s since released three books.
Merritt’s recently published “Finding Democracy: Through the Lens of a Young German Woman, 1944-1950,” follows the life of Tilly Keilitz, who became an internal refugee in Germany in the years immediately following World War II. This was the period when what would become West Germany was under American occupation. They were years of dislocation, denazification, hunger and the slow establishment of a functioning democratic government.
“Finding Democracy: Through the Lens of a Young German Woman, 1944-1950,” by Margaret F. Merritt
Merritt, who refers to Keilitz by her first name throughout the book as a way of helping readers bond with her on a personal level, described Tilly’s experience as “a true coming-of-age story of a young German girl in her teens at the end of Nazi era and the beginning of the American occupation.”
Tilly was an artist and amateur photographer who left a large cache of pictures and other documents behind. Her photos and drawings are found throughout the book. Through the documents and images, Merritt said, she drew a few brief years from Tilly’s life to explore the socioeconomic, political and cultural forces in Germany at that time, and tried to understand how those forces impacted the behavior and thoughts of Tilly and her German and American contemporaries.
Merritt explained that in the book, “We’re following Tilly’s journey and seeing what happens to her, interacting with the Americans.” Tilly was 8 when Hitler assumed power, and was thus required to join the Hitler Youth at a young age. She grew up under Nazi ideology, but when American military forces took control of the country, she overcame that indoctrination and embraced democratic ideals instead.
The book opens with Tilly fleeing Berlin during the bombing campaign that preceded the arrival of Allied troops and finding refuge in the Bavarian hamlet of Freising. There, she obtained employment with the Americans owing to her fluency in English and the skills she had developed in her previous job with the advanced technology corporation AEG.
Merritt said Tilly was drawn toward democratic principles because of “how humanely the Americans treated her.” She carefully added, however, “Not all German women had that experience. But that was her experience.”
Merritt said she traveled to Germany to research the story, pored through numerous archival sources, and dug into U.S. military records to build the book from both the German and American viewpoints. “I think you need at least two perspectives to get an idea of really what was going on, on the ground.”
Before researching human history, Merritt studied natural history. In her 2023 memoir “Adventures of an Alaskan Woman Biologist,” she tells of her decades of exploring nearly every region of the state through her work.
Merritt first arrived in Alaska in 1977 after finishing grad school at Utah State University. “I came up to visit a friend. I walked into the Sitka Fish and Game office with my resume that I carried with me, and I was offered two jobs starting immediately. I picked one, and that’s what started everything. I just kept getting job after job after job.”
“Adventures of an Alaska Woman Biologist” by Margaret F Merritt Ph.D.
The first job was counting salmon on Chilkat Lake near Haines. And like so many who come for a summer, Merritt was smitten with Alaska. In the ensuing decades, she earned a Ph.D. from the University of Alaska and received a succession of assignments that kept her on the move, studying different forms of wildlife across Alaska’s wildly varying lands and seas. She was also one of the first women to do research for ADFG.
“Some of the guys questioned my physical ability and the skill level I had,” she said. “They questioned my capability. And that’s not unreasonable. I had to prove I could do the job. Because not only did the project depend upon that, but my welfare and maybe other people’s as well.”
Merritt decided to write the memoir, she said, “because I had been all over the state. It was unusual for a biologist, especially these days, to work with such a wide variety of animals and on such a wide variety of research. I thought people might be interested in it.”
During her career, Merritt maintained a fascination with the human elements of the places she worked in. When an aging miner she knew gave her a box of historical papers, she found in it the story of Roshier Creecy, a Black man born in Virginia in 1866. He came north with the Buffalo Soldiers, who were assigned to maintain order in Skagway during the Gold Rush. After being discharged, Creecy mushed into Alaska seeking his own fortune, settling into Wiseman, where he spent the rest of his life.
Merritt was intrigued by this forgotten story, and in 2019 published “Roshier H. Creecy: A Black Man’s Search for Freedom and Prosperity in the Koyukuk Gold Fields of Alaska.” Creecy was outspoken, she said, a trait that could have easily cost him his life in the South, but something his fellow miners, who accepted him as one of their own, had little trouble with. He never struck it rich, “but he found something more valuable. He found a place that he felt comfortable, where he could express himself freely.”
Merritt said that in today’s world there are many parallels with the lives of both Tilly and Creecy. She hopes that by telling their stories, she can encourage readers to think more deeply about current events. She’s concerned with how at present, in America and beyond, there are increasing efforts at pushing many people aside for being different, be that for racial reasons, gender or their place of origin.
The entrance to the 604th compound, pictured in 1949. The 604th was renamed as an Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron and a new sign installed. Pilots from the compound were assigned to provide defensive cover for cargo planes during the Berlin Airlift. (Photo by Tilly Keilitz)
“What happened to Tilly is still happening to young women today. The problem of integrating refugees back then is the same as integrating immigrants today,” she said. “And the danger is their marginalization. When you marginalize people, you can’t have an enduring democracy.”
She added, “People who are thinking about today might say, well, if we treat people badly, is that going to help them accept our way of life?”
Merritt, who is presently translating “Finding Democracy” into German, said she hopes her books will encourage people to consider these questions and come to their own conclusions. “It will be really fascinating for me to hear from readers. What insights have you gained from reading about the war and American occupation from Tilly’s perspective? But also all these other questions? I’d love to get some reader feedback on that.”
