George Rankin Kelly, 74

After a two-year battle with cancer, George Rankin Kelly of Coeur d'Alene died peacefully at home, with whitetail deer and wild turkeys feeding just outside his bedroom window, shortly before sunrise on Feb. 8, 2011. He was one month away from turning 75.

George was born in Pittsburgh, Pa., on March 18, 1936. During his service in the U.S. Air Force and civilian work with the Minuteman missile project, he and wife Ruth Lyn Kelly lived in Spokane, Wash.; Salina, Kan.; and Great Falls, Mont. During the 1970s, he and his family lived in California, where he worked in civil engineering, restaurant management and construction contracting before returning to the Inland Northwest in 1981.

For the last 30 years, George lived east of Coeur d'Alene overlooking Wolf Lodge Bay. In addition to designing residential, apartment and ranch property developments in and around Post Falls and Coeur d'Alene, he was an area Realtor, and served on the Coeur d'Alene Board of Realtors. In 2009, he formed Legacy Land Group NW, in partnership with Associated Brokers of Hayden Lake.

Above everything else, George was a Christian, a wonderful husband, father and grandfather, an outdoorsman, the most kind and helpful neighbor you could ask for, generous to the point of setting aside his own work or ambitions in order to help family members, friends and clients. The numerous phone calls his loved ones have received after word of his passing are a testimony to the many lives George has touched.

George is survived by his sister Lois Morrow, of La Quinta, Calif.; wife Ruth Lyn Kelly of Coeur d'Alene; daughter Karen Swanstrom of Coeur d'Alene; son Bruce Kelly of Post Falls; and five grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Please visit George's memorial and sign his online guest book at www.yatesfuneralhomes.com.